The Sharifah's of Malaysian chess.

Ref: Here.

So Sharifah wants to forgive Bawani. Obviously she does not think she has done anything wrong. What has happened to her sense of values?

I was thinking about a conversation I had with a former Perak player on facebook recently. She told me that many youths are terrified of the authorities. I didn't respond directly to that statement but I have been thinking about it since.

Let me now recollect an incident at a Perak chess tournament. A young girl had won her game with good chances to become Perak Champ that year. She was surrounded by her teachers who forced her to declare her game was a draw. So it was obvious to her at that time that this was wrong and she cried her heart out. Now these same teachers will also be the people who will correct her in school if she breaks any rules.

Lets pause here. Right has become wrong before. And the same people now enforces what is right. Isn't that confusing? What is the message? Isn't it saying that there is no right and wrong unless the people in authority say it is so? So how do we develop a sense of moral values in our kids this way?

Can they now not eventually grow into another Sharifah where everything becomes muddled if that is not corrected?

Why am I talking about this now? I just got some feedback that things have now moved to making threats of police reports going into the AGM. But the funny thing is that the person making the threat has no basis. Somebody asked for an update from COS. That information is public. It is not protected by OSA. So what did he do wrong when he requested for the latest information to make informed decisions? Doesn't this MCF guy know that making a false police report is in itself a crime?

I was going to talk about the roles the committee members can play so that we have an effective MCF. Then I was going to talk about a way that may be a compromise so no party needs to land up in jail and put MCF in jeopardy of being delisted. But I think that may be one step too far into the murky future.

For now I think we still need to deeply think about what is right and what is wrong. What are we doing to our kids with an MCF that does not know what is right from what is wrong?

Would it too far a stretch to say that we have a number of Sharifah's in Malaysian chess? Lets make up our minds about this first before we go any further.

Think about this. What are we injecting into our kids when we use authority and fear to distort right from wrong? And with each exposure, with each tournament are our players not getting more and more fearful? Then how can we expect them to make tough decisions on the board based on their own judgement alone?

We have taken away their ability to evaluate. So lets get this right first before we talk about getting a GM. All of us know that selection is the way forward but we cannot even get this decision accepted. All our energies are taken away by a drama that does not have the players welfare in mind. Can we not see that?