Hoarders Of Hatred And Merchants Of Malice
While it no longer surprises me about the role that one particular English-language daily plays in the matter of broadcasting and giving “respectability” to the most reprehensible elements of Sinhala chauvinism, I have been fascinated both by the level at which it operates and the fact that yet another English-language daily has, more subtly and with less frequency, begun to support the same line, giving that master of the exclamation mark and their company lawyer, I understand, free rein with no fear of contradiction of any kind.
S.L. Gunasekera
I speak here of S.L. Gunasekera whose “wrangling” skills as Gunadasa Amerasekera describes them in a paean of praise parading as a book review, will permit of making night into day and day into night as he attempted to create the illusion that the J.R. Jayewardene government was completely innocent of complicity in Black July 1983.
But I digress.
The level of “intellectual discourse” as some of these self-righteous individuals choose to describe their rants has now taken a fairly concrete form, where it appears that Gunadasa Amerasekera is the theoretician and the elder statesman, S.L. Gunasekera is the pit bull and Gomin Dayasiri, fractured English and all, brings up the rear as the sycophant in residence.
They have all recently come together around Gunasekera’s collection of exclamation marks parading as an analysis of the Mahinda Rajapaksa vs Sarath Fonseka struggle for the presidency.
First, the Island ran a review of Gunesekera’s book, in which Dayasiri basically hailed it as the second coming of a Shakespeare or a Marx or a combination thereof. That it might be something that could be attributed to the more recent Marx, Groucho, is something that I might consider, except that that performer’s spiel was consistently witty and sometimes wise.
That seemingly wasn’t enough of a puff piece to meet the needs of a particular segment of Sri Lanka’s population, so, those that matter at the Island devoted two whole pages of broadsheet in their Midweek Review to further paeans of praise to Mahinda Rajapaksa via an article by Nalin Swaris and a reproduction (in full) of Gunadasa Amerasekera’s address to those gathered to herald Gunasekera’s newest literary masterpiece.
The latter, while it might have displayed a marginally better use of the mechanics of the English language, was certainly the more reprehensible of the two.
In countries (God save us from a similar fate!) where there is legislation to deal with hate-mongers targeting specific segments of the population, Amerasekera would have been hauled before the courts in a trice. However, we who live in the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and who might belong to a minority targeted by the Amerasekeras of this world are afforded no such protection from these hoarders of hate and merchants of malice.
Amerasekera’s trumpeted praise of Gunasekera does not deserve any extensive comment for the reason that an old and pithy adage holds particularly true for emanations of that kind: “The more you trample (excreta) the more it spreads.” However, I need to quote one sentence in particular which epitomizes the tone and content of the entire piece:
“It is the Sinhala vote that matters and not that of the English-speaking pariah who is fondly awaiting Sarath Fonseka to bring back the good old days.”
Need one say more? That is the level of discourse of the S.L. Gunasekeras, the Gomin Dayasiris and the Gunadasa Amerasekeras of this land and the fact that they are the most avid supporters of the current regime is no accident.
It is symptomatic of the times in which we live that the racist hordes have completely free rein to sow the seed of hate against those with whom they disagree while those who might choose to dissent from them and their masters are murdered, assaulted, intimidated in a variety of ways and forced to flee for their lives.
The additional irony is that, should Sri Lanka be blessed with a non-racist and non-chauvinist government of principle, these people who have made it their life’s work to hurt and damage minorities with little recourse to defence of any kind, are not going to be at risk of bringing on themselves the same misery and death that they sought to visit upon those with whom they disagreed.
Such are the ironies of history and geography!
[...] Hoarders Of Hatred And Merchants Of Malice | The Sunday Leader Share this story: [...]
The dregs are a quartet not a trio. You forgot the daddy of them all – Nalin de Silva – specialist in spewing racial and religious venom. The lot would have
easily got front seats in the John Birth Society of the Bible Belt. De Silva is also a specialist in “instant history making” and wants everyone to believe
Tamils came here only 400 years ago brought by the Dutch for Tobacco farming. To know they are mean of learning – some teachers in Universities -
is shuddering. Look at the students they produce.
ISS
I mean no sarcasm. Do please, enlighten us more.
Funny isn’t it? I wonder how Nalin De Silva reconciles his theory of how Tamils came to Sri Lanka with the story of the Duttugemunu defeating Elara! Oh…and don’t you just love the way that, in his world, every this is pseudo-this and neo-that? Either that or it’s all a neo-Christian western conspiracy! What a chump!
What is Emil Van De Pooten doing in Sri Lanka? If he doesn’t like people expressing their opinion he can piss off like the rest of his burgher brethren to god knows where. No one would care.
Nimal : You are an absolute GENIUS ! What you are implying is: that the Sinhalese “racists ” may express their opinion – But Mr Van De Pooten MAY NOT . Perhaps, we should also ban English in Sri Lanka; and appease the rabid -nationalists. OH #$%@ ; Bandaranaike already tried that . Please enlighten us on the consequences.
you are pure and simple a world class bigot. with people like ou around there will be no more ethnic harmony. however, we are thankful for morons like you, nimal, it keeps our heart rates up.
jeez, you should be preserved for posterity.
I am sure he would appreciate his name being spelled correctly even by an ignoramus such as Nimal.
Not a Burgher, not that it matters.
He did once “piss off” and has come back to haunt the racist hordes of Sri Lanka, it seems.
hmm, the US Constitution does not specify an official language; English is the first language by tradition, not by law. Likewise, it does not specify an official religion. To legislate the bonds that build nations. ie. language, religion and other traditions etc will never work. Sometimes it makes sense to “learn” form things already invented, such as the US Constitution. Amazing things do happen every now and then. Imagine that!
For these English speaking pundits, anybody who talks about Sinhalese, their heritage etc are hoarders of hatred and merchants of malice while everyone else who fund separatism, terrorism and destabilisation (not to forget militarisation) of the country from near & far are progressives of principle.
If they do that to their adopted countries, they would end up in places like Guantanamo or would vanish with no trcae via extraordinary renditions. Sri Lankan system of governance is too mild.
Pray tell who “militarised” Sri Lanka, Hela.
Maybe, you should check this columnist’s record in the country in which he lived for many years, the level and nature of his political involvement, inclusive of his opposition to right-wing governments such as that of the USA. However, he was obviously never subjected to “rendition” to Guantanamo or anywhere else it seems,otherwise he would not be back in Sri Lanka.
Speaking of “renditions”, perhaps Hela might enlighten us by revealing how KP arrived in Sri Lanka and how the same fate has befallen his successor (according to the SL Government!
These guys (Gunesekeras, Dayasiris and Amerasekeras ) should set an example to the nation and promote harmony within the nation arther than spread hate and venom. Well said Emil.
The current trend is to allow only one opinion and anything else is ‘unpatriotic’. The current generation should learn to keep everything in perspective and not be infuenced by a bunch of ‘has beens’.
this sinhala chauvunist old goat, who is just about to conk up, is still going at it very strongly. this old goat is supposed to be an intellectual, but his comments are similar to mine. without any restraint or balance in the use of language. a pity.
hope this guy rots in hell whilst still alive for being so vindictive in his use of language and for his outlook on all those people who know a bit of english.
very well written Mr. Vander Poorten.
Well done, Emil. What is frightening is that these extremist views – although probably not shared – are catered to by the present rulers of this country, who realize smartly that this line will always bring them a majority vote; so why worry about the minorities. How do we change this tyranny of the majority?
Isn’t SLG himself an English Speaking Pariah – educated in an elitist college , member of prestigious clubs in colombo. Ra Daniel Dawal Migel. He is still able to get away with this charade