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Of Romancing the Poor and "Rabak" Bullshit
yes, i'm quite skeptical when i face with works that deal with "social" issues. Bear in mind, social activism are fashionable where we have middle class turned to weekend activists - who fight a cause for poor or marginalized communities over the weekend and back in their comfort zone on Monday, ( comfortably snugged in their air conditioned condo and have Englsh breakfast and tea in Mont Kiara ) flooding their IG or social media with photos of them posing empathically with poor kids, supported with quotes of Mother Teresa or Gandhi, they hark over sentiments, injustice and yes systematically capitalizing on romancing the poor. Just like this a photographer decides to do a series on orang asli villagers who don't get electricity in an exhibition. The "artist" aims to spread awareness. Konon...... Nevermind, most orang asal are acommodative, for sure they "know" the photographer's intention or maybe not. Or maybe they couldn't be b