Malaysian Woman Mistaken for Chinese Woman in Youtube "Squat Video" Results in Official Apology to Beijing
An amateur videos of an "official" body search on a Malaysian woman that was taken on a policeman's mobile phone in November 2005, has circulated on Youtube and garnered international attention of the humaneness of body search policies in Malaysia. In the video, the woman that is being search is naked, and doing squats with her hand on her ears. The squats are justified by the police as a method to ensure women are not hiding paraphernalia internally.
"Female detainees had complained for years that Malaysian police humiliated them by ordering nude squats, ostensibly to dislodge anything they might be hiding on or inside their bodies. Even women arrested on minor traffic violations complained of this..." Washington Post
What is interesting is that according to the Washington Post article, Malaysian officials did not react until they thought this video would hurt their tourism industry. Because the woman was considered to be light-skinned, many people thought she was ethnic Chinese (she is not).
The Chinese make up 25% of Malaysia's multi-ethnic/racial/cutlural population, however Chinese national and Chinese from outside of China make up a large part of the tourist industry. Only out of fear of offending ethnic Chinese though mass circulation of the woman's naked body and humiliating strip-search, did Malaysian officials order a high-level investigation and send government officials to Beijing to apologize in person. What type of attention would this have received if she was considered to be a dark-skinned Malaysian that was not of Chinese descent? Would this have generated as much of a shock within Malaysian society?
This video also reached critical mass because it was sent over MMS on people's cell phones in Malaysia, which eventually made its way to as video posting on Youtube. 20 million out of the total population of 25 million Malaysian citizens have a cell phone.
The woman in the video is now suing the Malaysian government for RM10million.
(thank you Leah!)
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