“Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.”
– Confucius
WHEN President Ronald Reagan was facing a congressional hearing on the Iran-Contra affair, he deftly evaded a loaded question with an advanced version of ignorance by responding, “Shucks, I can’t remember.”
“I-can’t-remember” became pure jurisprudential oxygen for career criminals who conveniently recited this all-purpose mitigation mantra. There’s no known law for punishing a failing or failed memory. Ask Joe Biden’s lawyers.
Agnotology – the study of culturally induced ignorance or doubt through deliberate and wanton misinformation or suppression of knowledge – must become a purposeful educational module in academia, politics, commerce, professions and the civil service.
The five-I (intimately involved in induced ignorance) idiocy runs amok as an unflinching and unhesitating self-inflicted wound. Even religion is not spared.
The victims and culprits exchanging roles are usually ignorant citizens and arrogant professionals claiming superior knowledge and experience. Thank Providence that tort law demands a duty of care.
We know what the problem is. Now, we need to decipher how it can be avoided, if at all that’s possible in this selfishly mad and maddening society. Action and inaction struggle for utterance.
First off, check, re-check and cross-check all available data on who you are dealing with. This is the LKY (Lee Kuan Yew) Method. Never fails. Police detectives are supposedly adept at this.
The LKY Method leaves very little margin of error despite Aldous Huxley’s admonishment that “facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored”. But Huxley probably forgot to contemplate manufactured or fabricated facts.
America is a living paragon of the five-I idiocy. It chose to ignore the sin and crime associated with slavery. Almost all its Founding Fathers were slave owners. It took the bloodlust of a civil war to set things rights with the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the US Constitution.
The Native Americans were not spared either as were non-European immigrants. America is still intimately involved in ignorance as if it is a natural right to discriminate. The constitutional convulsions of the 14th Amendment have not abated.
The five-I idiocy has not spared Malaysia that pays homage to the “ignorance is bliss” pathos popularized by English poet Thomas Grays who spun the Latin derivative in nil sapeindo vito iucundissima est – in knowing nothing, life is most delightful.
Unless caught in the act, “I don’t know” or “I can’t remember” offers more than a fighting chance of escaping handcuffs, investigations, interrogations, courtrooms and prison cells. There is a method to this madness offered by criminal defense lawyers.
Colonial Malaya made sure that the manipulated “education system” was designed and structured to produce future employees who will not look for the bliss of understanding and knowing.
The ‘ignorance is bliss’ works exceedingly in a vibrant society where people are so immersed in and connected with the ‘cari makan’ attitude and pursuit that nothing else matters. Government continues to pretend it owns everything.
Government desires elections to gain power to promote the idiocy pandemic. There is no known vaccine to stop rogue government. The laws are selective as are prosecutions. Voters have a sacred duty to do the right thing.
“Ignorance is the curse of God; knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven,” sighed John Milton. He must have referred to self-awakening because government sponsored knowledge through its education system is another pandemic.
Malaysians shun the five-I idiocy by destroying Bermuda Triangle politics where mystery has dissipated. The awakened citizenry demands answers whether a public official is entitled to executive immunity when criminal and or civil charges are levelled at him or her.
The accuser sued that public official and soon faced criminal charges himself that were abruptly dropped! If he drops the charges against the public official, then Bolehland has lived up to its faithful moniker.
Law and reform in this nation of fertile minds and verdant soil is still haunted by the hantu of the five-I idiocy. The ministry in charge of this portfolio and Parliament believes in the new pathos ‘ignorance and arrogance, spell bliss”. The Opposition meanwhile awaits gaining power in the next general elections.
Effective Opposition is totally missing while they cuddle up to the five-I idiocy. GE-16 may be another watershed event provided the frog culture is permanently outlawed as should GST, SST and all forms of taxation.
Another hapless candidate forced to pander to the five-I idiocy is the Judiciary still reeling from Executive sanctioned judicial appointments. PMX, Parliament, and the Opposition are not listening and doing nothing about this unjustified and discriminatory practice.
On June 2 2025 the Mexican government legislated the popular vote for selecting judges to eradicate deep-rooted corruption. The people are ready, willing, able and determined to lock horns with the notoriously wealthy drug cartels.
Meanwhile Malaysia stays faithful to anachronistic practices. The global legal and judicial fraternity is watching us intently. No matter how many thought-provoking speeches our jurists deliver, we are still navigating the five-I wilderness, thickets and brambles.
Agnotology must be shouted from Malaysian rooftops by concerned, caring and awakened Malaysians to avoid being blindsided by a black swan. Ignorance is a moral hazard.
With a shaky coalition government in place with no constitutional mooring or tethering, the voters may even decide to boycott voting to invoke Article 182(7) Federal Constitution as a final solution. Politicians are urged to study this Article very diligently.
The views expressed here are those of the columnist and do not necessarily represent the views of Sarawak Tribune. The writer can be reached at chiefjudge@secamtektektribe.org.
