The value of trust and complacency

England has come under many terrorist attacks since its involvement with the Iraq war. So had some of its other allies (and even detractors, like France). Now, the Germans find that they are not immune to the hostilities of terrorists. It might seem that terrorists are targeting some of the top capital markets in the world, making it one of the most feared problem next to rising crime rates (or dropping crime rates, depending on the statistics you choose to interpret). Now, for those of us living in the Asian countries, are we immune?

Malaysia has marketed itself as a Muslim country. Heck, we even have a large religious political party not too different from the Christian right wing in the US. But the, so did Indonesia. Yet, the country was not immune to terrorist attacks...why? Because they've more European and American tourists than Malaysia. I may be making a sweeping statement but from what I'd observed, we have more Middle Eastern tourists (in fact, we have such a big market for them that some of our signboards in the city centres actually have accompanying Arabic scripts next to the English translations!) than we do the Westerners. They come here for holidays, to study and to work. The university I belonged to had a big population of Middle Eastern and African students. A neighbouring university, merely 5 minutes away (or less, depending on the traffic), has an even larger population of these students. Add to that, many of our citizens have Arabic ancestors. So, would that mean that we are immune?

Well, we have dissenting sects of Sunnis, Shiahs, Wahabbis et al. I number my friends among them. Perhaps we may be subjected to terrorist attacks when major fights finally break-out between these dissenting sects. But as long as the extremists among them are focused on the common enemy, which to them is 'bigger' than their doctrinal differences, venting their anger on rich Arabs for their ties to the Western elites may not be too high up in the priority list. But, we never know when. And Malaysia, in its eagerness to court the Middle Eastern market, have better be prepared.

P.S. Of course, one of our claim to fame is that we had an engineering lecturer involved in the bomb in Jakarta. Perhaps an attempt to emulate Theodore Kaczynski?

P.P.S A slight detour but relevant to our subject. The German government has decided to pay more attention to surveillance and clamping down on certain rights in their bid to fight terrorism. IN the case of personal relationships, should married people be stripped of certain freedom to keep them from straying? One may talk about trust, but when the trust is such a fragile thing, easily betrayed, is it really worth having? In this day when people no longer understand the real meaning of matrimony, will policing it improve the institution, or should we do away with it altogether for everyone except those who plan to have children? Should we make it difficult for people to have children so that they will take their marriage vows more seriously?

What can I say, humans....