Talk:May 13 incident (Malaysia)

placate
removed "many Malays & Chinese dissatisfied by their newly independent government's perceived willingness to placate the Chinese at their expense"

Need further details as this statement should not be thrown off-hand--Malbear 07:48, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Suggestion Changing "Causes of the Riot" to "Chronology of the Riot" will make individual events stand out from the long paragraphy. Sltan19:00 1 Mac 2005 (GMT+8)

Suggestion include John Slimming's book, "Death of a Democracy", in bibliographical information.

removal of curfew
removed ", but the curfew was relaxed in most parts of the country on May 18 and rescinded even in central Kuala Lumpur within a week."

and changed to

"but the curfew was relaxed in most parts of the country on May 18 and not enforced even in central Kuala Lumpur within a week."

Officially this state of emergency has never been repealed. --Malbear 07:48, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Should this article be renamed?
I wonder if this article is in compliance with Wikipedia naming policy; for one, the name is too general. Many other important things could have happened on May 13, and due to its naming, this page is liable to be confused with the May 13 article by some new users. At the very least, shouldn't the "Incident" be in lower-case, per policy (correct me if wrong, though)? In any case, I think a more appropriate name would be "May 13 Malaysian racial riots" or something like that.


 * I thought about this when I created the article, but couldn't come up with a better name. It can't be lowercase "May 13 incident", because that could mean anything.  How about we drop the May 13 completely and call it the "1969 Malaysian racial riots"?  Jpatokal 10:24, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * It is known as May 13 in Malaysia. The term May 13 has in fact become a proper noun which is widely used. Mention the phrase and in the Malaysian psyche there can be no name space collision. However mention 1969 and you may get a blank look... I am sure there are policies for namespace collision and the article can be moved but renaming it pre-emptively for a yet to happen eventuality is pre-mature at best.--Malbear 10:55, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * The term "May 13, 1969 Racial Riots" has also been used in order to eliminate any ambiguity in local discussions and talks. This could be an option for the title of this article. I'm not sure if this term is in compliance with Wikipedia naming policy. Whatever the case, "May 13" or "13 May" are invariably written or spoken in any context (in Malaysia) when this topic is being referred to. --Saifol 02:39, 13 June 2009 (UTC)


 * It may mean everything in Malysia, but for the rest of the world, a more descriptive title that is connected to what happened or the place would be helpful: as in "May 13 Malaysian Racial Riots", or May 13 Racial Riots", or "May 13 Malaysian Riots". Or add the year, too. Can we reach a consensus? --Parkwells (talk) 01:45, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Whos started the fight?
As this is a sensitive issue for malaysian. I wonder if "Reportedly, the gathering crowd was informed that Malays on their way to the procession had been assaulted by Chinese in Setapak, several miles to the north." is correct? Where is the citation and source for it? Its quite misleading to actually imply that malay or chinese started the riots. We need proper quotation for it. There seem to be a lot of info to be included as well e.g Malaysia formally introduce the Rukun Negara after the may 13 riots. It was officialy introduce in August 31, 1970. Thought its best to include the links I found the info so here it is:. TheRace History 's introduction speaks of the riots briefly. Seems to have taken it from Anthony Reid 's "The Kuala Lumpur Riots and the Malaysian Political System" article in the Australian Outlook, Volume 23, Number 3. (December 1969 issue). So got any Australian friends that might track that down for us? - --C2Sane 08:54, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

Comment: An encyclopedia should report the facts. Sensitivities are really besides the issue. Example, even if 99% of people believed the world is flat....you know the rest of this old horse. anyway the government reports on the riot are still classified as OSA. So facts are scarce. IF there are any you dispute I would suggest putting in the disputed view and perhaps providing a citation. Then the reader must choose which citation is "better"--Malbear 13:26, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Agreed. But two points. One, its scarced in Malaysia due to the OSA but not elsewhere. Apparently they are riots pictures in Singapore and articles about it. I don't have access to it though and I think its illegal to bring it to Malaysia too. Australia papers did report on the riots as well. Don't have access to it. Two, the line "Reportedly, the gathering crowd was informed that Malays on their way to the procession had been assaulted by Chinese in Setapak, several miles to the north." seem dubious. I only found one hit in google and thats in Wikipedia. I can't find that fact report in anywhere. Wish to clarify the source? --C2Sane 13:55, Dec 27, 2004 (UTC)
 * Nevermind, I just got some more hits from google. Sorry about that. Heres one of the links --C2Sane 14:01, Dec 27, 2004 (UTC)

A book review of Kaneko Yoshiki's Ethnicity and Politics in Malaysia: Chinese Politics and National Intergration states that 'Kaneko describes the murder, looting and massive arrests conducted unjustifiably againts the Chinese by the pre-dominantly Malay police and military at that time of the 1969 race riots as an "example of how an extremly primodial element of ethnicity spontaneously' and powerfully defines human behaviour in the midst of extreme situation of ethnic conflict" --C2Sane 10:44, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

Found another info. "On May 15, government of Malaysia suspended all Malaysian newspapers including the Straits Times for four days due to May 13 riots but The Straits Times Singapore edition continued to publish news sent by teleprinter from Kuala Lumpur" --C2Sane 09:31, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

Should Marina's arrest be noted too? It shows how the Malaysian government deals with people who try to tell different story about May 13 incident. --C2Sane 10:19, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

May 13 incident influence on Malaysian Press
The claim of journalism in Malaysia's self-censorship should be noted? The links are here and here --C2Sane 10:07, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

this is a good website. try reading it. it explains what really happened and the effect. http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/May-13th-Incident

Repercussion of may 13 incident?
The ban on public rally because of the incident should be noted? Although DAP, Malaysia claims that the riots wasnt the reason for it. --C2Sane 10:44, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

Conspiracy?
Freeawnar.net contains article that claims a conspiracy associated with May 13 incident. Issit realible? Mggpillai sometimes in his article claims such evidence are surfacing recently. Should it be noted? There are other places where people claim and posted personal experience of May 13? Should it be noted too? --C2Sane 10:48, Dec 23, 2004 (UTC)

One should not limit to "official report" or "conspiracy theory". If 1+1 equal to 2 is a facts, you don't need a official to confirm it. Thus, facts can also be gather by analysis. Reviewing the economy facts on 1969, there is little facts that the riots cause by ethnics economy divide. Indeed, this wiki has little info about the whole cronology. This involve various action that take by governing political parties in stage. By taking away the opposition political rights(even they win seat, they lost their seat during the incidents), the whole incidents is more towards a political power seizure.

I have split this "Cause of riots" to official and unoffical claims.

Unofficial claims : Political Power seizure
In facts, the incidents is spark by a head of state, Harun Bin Idris. Although Harun Bin Idris have been arrested, the arrest are short live. Harun Bin Idris are not even trial for his crime. The economy divide conclusion is bring out after the two strong ethincs driven political party that lose badly in urban area to socialist driven oppositions. Banning the coucils elections, it allow the losing ethnics driven governing party to manipulate resources in favor of the governing party.

In contrast, the socialist opposition are strong worker union supporter, which represent the lower income class. While the governing ethnics party are strong opposer to union.

Conclusively, it seems that the whole incidents are merely a political power seizure.


 * Your edit is simultaneously NPOV and almost incomprehensible. Could somebody who speaks English explain the conspiracy theory in question? Jpatokal 08:49, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Er...we generally cite sources for conspiracy theories (i.e. the theory that there was a coverup regarding JFK's assassination), which means you have to find a website or book supporting your theory and cite it. Analysing the event and providing your own independent conclusions is not acceptable per the policy regarding original research. Johnleemk | Talk 16:02, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC)

How do you define seizure of power? Wheter in a democracy or ditactorship political system, when one party denied or suppress the opposing voices using inordinary actions, whether using army force, police forces, curfew, arrest order, even it is "legal" to the beneficial party; a political power struture changes without the consent of opposing voice, is a seizure of power. Here is some example of political power seizure
 * 2004, Nepal, Gyanendra dissolve the democracy government using military force.
 * 1989, US invasion on Panama
 * 1990, Burma military denied the political right of NLD, although through landslide winning.
 * 1968, Prague Spring. USSR invasion of czech

Do take note that, in the May 13 incidents, the incumbent political party has take action without consulting any opposition. The opposition have been strip off their rights to maintain the seat in the local councils. Although you can argue a local councils election is insignificant compare to Parliments election, this does not justify the legitimate of one side story of denying the minority voices.


 * That is not the issue. This issue is:
 * Are you willing to make your meaning clear in understandable English?
 * Are you able to cite a source for your claims on this issue? Johnleemk | Talk 07:21, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I will try my best effort to locate chronology of the events, provided I can find in local libary. It is not an easy task because it is a taboo in Malaysia. It seems out of Malaysia source has more freedom to source the information. Thus I add the following link. The link include numerous reference of books
 * A History of Race Relations in Malaysia from www.huaren.org
 * Some reference from the link
 * Comber, Leon. 13 May 1969: A Historical Survey of Sino-Malay Relations. (Kuala Lumpur: Heinemann Asia, 1983.)
 * Snider, Nancy L. "Race, Leitmotiv of the Malayan Election Drama." Asian Survey, Volume 10, Number 12. (December 1970)

Will the policy favouring the malays ever be stopped?
i can see a lot of the effects of the 16 may incident on my life and my others friends that are not malays or bumiputera's. i really do not feel that is is right to give malays the upper hand in the government or any juristiction. even the 'perlembagaan'or constitution prohibits us of talking about 'racial sensitivity'. we can be arrested just for questioning the 'perlembagaan'!

its not that i do not like malays, but it has been decades since then, and i think that some changes should be made. its not like the malays are as poor as they used to. walk around any city and you'll see many chinese and indians too, are still considered poor. yet the government still does not change the system and is still favouring the malays. i guess thats why the malays these days are said lazy, they depend too much on the government. thats why more chinese enters bussiness, because know they cant rely on the government.

the government says the malays need to have at least 30% share in the economy or bussines, or something like that, but how can that happen when the government keeps giving away posts in the government to the malays? the malays will almost definitely become a government servant, and the chinese will be a bussinesman. i dont see how the govenrment cant see this!

even in the education system, there is a lot of faulty favouring the malays. eventhough some chinese/indian students are better and cleverer than the malays, places in universites and sholarship will be given to the malays. i know of the students, top in their school, both chinese, not being able to get scholarhip, and yet the 3rd and 4th placed in that school with is bumiputera's got scholarship! now, those two chinese boys are living in australia and singapore. they said that they do not want to remember their schooling days, as it was a terrible injustice for them......... and the hardest thing in this is that this 'perlembagaan' or constitution is very hard to change. you'll need more than 2/3rd of the majority in the parliament and also the approval of the Yang Di-Pertuan himself! i cant see that happening anytime soon.

just to conclude, how can the government expect the non-bumiputera's to stay loyal to the government if the government does not be fair. it's just like pursecuting without thinking. a riot like 16 may will definitely reoccur if this system does not change. i can already imagine what will happen if i print this out and paste it all around my school and in the streets........ there is a very thin line peace seperating peace and conflict in malaysia in my mind.

pls, if anyone wants to comment on this, pls post here. im waiting to hear from you. check this site out http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/May-13th-Incident a very good site.

"those who forget the past is condemned to repeat it'

The above site is just a rehash of wikipedia

That is why the smart Chinese boys are all at overseas, and why Malaysia is so screwed.

Clearly you do not understand the constitution & how malaysia is built in the 1st place. I do see the effect of the bumi rights effecting other races. Most of the riches people in malaysia is non-bumi's. Maybe if more non-bumi sign up as military & police personnel and most of other races have loyalty to the country then its time to consider deleting the status. Even now i do hear about other non-bumi taking about motherland and others. Your loyalty is not to malaysia thats why this status will never stopped. Ask yourself & look around you. What have you contribute to the nation? I dont see any effect on that u say smart chinese boys all overseas. At least we do have smart other race still in the country living happily & yet malaysia is not screwed.

I strongly agree with above statement. Let me tell you - I am neither malay, chinese nor indian. I just live and work in m'sia. If the same had happened in my country - I am sure similar laws would be introduced to protect the locals. I don't see any loyalty displayed by chinese. many don't even try to use local language (bahasa) and certainly they don't assimiliate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.48.48.29 (talk) 12:01, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

A nation that doesn't love its people, doesn't deserve the people's love. Our loyalty will come if the nation would treat us as their children without bias. You lived your life through equality and don't act like you understand us and our positions, my 'no-name friend'. - CLeon —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.54.82.250 (talk) 15:49, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

So, you expect us to go out and die for a government that treats us as though we were immigrants and not deserving of equal rights? How dare you ask that of us while you sit there enjoying your privileges and quotas and bumiputera status and expect people to feel any shred of loyalty to a country that discriminates against them? It's like asking the Jews to feel loyalty towards Germany while being killed off. There's a difference in the magnitude of discrimination, but the basic principle is the same. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.177.159.140 (talk) 22:18, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Should eyewitnesses' accounts of what happened during that time be included ?
There are some good personal commentaries found in the internet by people who witnessed how the event unfold.

Granted these personal comments can be biased towards the eyewitness point of view, however there are some facts that can be verified, or corrected when more eyewitness come forward to contribute to this wiki. For instance,

"The riots first broke out in the Kampong Bahru/Raja Laut/Chow Kit area..when the Malay mobs armed with parangs came out of Kampong Bahru and started attacking Chinese and Indian passers-by, burning cars and torching Chinese shophouses in the Raja Laut/Chow Kit areas...Chinese gangsters came out to defend the Chinese and Indians and fought with the Malays with sharpened lead pipes...then the Malay regiment came out and started shooting the Chinese with their guns...a lot of people died in the Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman area near the Odeon Cinema.

The casualties brought to the KLGH in stages showed that in the first stage, most of the casualties were Chinese suffering from parang wounds..this showed that that the Malays had attacked first and the Chinese were caught by surprise...The 2nd stage casualties were almost equal between Chinese and Malays with parang wounds (Chinese) and wounds inflicted by sharpened pipes (Malays). In the 3rd stage, all the casualties were Chinese many dying from gunshot wounds showed reflected the shooting spree of the Malay regiment....Many of the victims were Chinese and Indians shot by Malay soldiers for "breaking the curfew"..what actually happened was that when their houses were burnt by the malay rioters, these non-Malays had to run out and were shot by the soldiers for "breaking the curfew"...I remember hearing over Radio Malaysia during the height of the riots that "curfew breakers would be shot..."

The mass graves of Chinese at Sungei Buloh and other places with some of the bodies tarred to prevent racial identification was true as described by other bloggers above"

- by Anonymous Thursday, February 03, 2005 10:47:46 PM

[taken from http://www.malaysia-today.net/Blog-e/2005/02/is-polarisation-in-malaysia-dead-or.htm]


 * Uh, I'm not sure if including a verbatim reproduction of that comment is legal here, as the original author has to release it under the GFDL. Anyway, according to WP:CITE, blog comments cannot be used as references because they lack verifiability. So, I guess that comment is verboten for use in the article. Johnleemk | Talk 15:36, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Your comments were based on biased bloggers & blogs cannot be considered as reference. If there's really an eye witness of the event, let them makes books or personnal interview.

I do not agree on comments or blogs considered as reference. Because most of it is based on personnal sentiment and now really an event. Please check WIKIPEDIA guideline as well if you do not understand. -azayi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.82.209.58 (talk) 03:17, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Unclear expression
In the second paragraph of Causes of the riot it is said: "1964 Race Riots in Singapore were a large contributing factor in the expulsion of the state from Malaysia". I do not understand (sorry) - what is an "expulsion of the state"? Deuar 10:18, 16 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Singapore getting kicked out Malaysia. IMHO the sentence is grammatically correct. Jpatokal 15:49, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Ah, now I see ... Very interesting. I've changed the text to make it understandable to someone (like me) not familiar with Malaysian history (although it was gramatically correct, indeed) :-). Deuar 16:14, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Let the young ones learn this
Should school children learn about this in the Malaysian history lessons? I just need to ask this, how much, if any are the school textbooks include this in their daily lesson. We are talking about to educate the nation of its past mistakes, thus should this be part of the lesson in school ? --dee.tee 21:26, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

grented this isn't the best forum to talk about such things. I completed SPm in 2003. The only reference to this incident was along the lines of "the may 16th incident is one where the races of malaysia came into conflict, it was an ungainly event." i was actually surprised at the "portrayal" of this chapter of our history. Khing 17:22, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

It is rather sad that as a malaysian youth, i had to read about such an important part of our history in wikipedia instead of being able to discuss it in school. Textbooks do mention May 13, but only to the extent of "racial riots" and citing it as a reason for policies and the RUKUNEGARA.

If this was learnt in our secondary school, even more racist riots will happen. It certainly wasn't a good step not to letting the young generation to learn about this, but it would certainly not be a wrong one. And however, with more racist statements coming out from, not the public, but the government officers themselves (even PM himself), and that just make us wonder how long this "peacefulness" between races can be preserved?203.127.106.2 07:36, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Children need to learn about the past to cease their attempts to make the same mistakes. Malaysia history books, if you ever read one, would always have this problem - blurry statements and facts that were covered when it is not in favor of the government. The children never know what's going on, what are the consequences and would always repeat the same thing and racism wouldn't stop. That is the dilemma here. - CLeon —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.54.82.250 (talk) 15:53, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

If children don't learn about this in the history books, parents will tell them about it anyway. And you can bet that those parents will be much more biased and they will tend to spread feelings of prejudice and racism to their children. What we need, instead of covering wounds up and letting them fester, is simply for an account of the event that is truthful, neutral, unbiased, and uninfluenced by any political motive, along with explanations of the political, social, and historical reasons for why it happened, without trying to push the blame unfairly on either side. Only when all these past issues are satisfactorily dealt with will Malaysia become a truly integrated country. If not, the memory of the riots and past conflict, combined with discriminatory policies, will simply cause racial tensions to grow and grow and grow until inevitably another riot - or worse - happens. There needs to be open dialogue and communication between groups so that we can, as a collective, deal with these issues in a mature and grown up way, which will help us move towards a future where all racial groups can co-exist in true harmony without too much underlying tension. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.177.159.140 (talk) 22:27, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.120.141.81 (talk) 17:15, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Excising the Singaporean 1964 Riots
I have removed the sections of the article relating to this (including "Foreign Views", which clearly deals with the 1964 riot instead of May 13). The article doesn't explain at all how the two incidents were related by more than their racial nature, geographical proximity, and UMNO's involvement in both. These two disparate evetns are not tied together, making the article confusing for both the clueless and those who have read about both issues. The 1964 Singaporean riots should be mentioned, but there is no need to devote several paragraphs and two sections to chronicling the events there. If anything, one ought to mention the racial riots in Penang and elsewhere that occurred in the 1950s and 1960s (I would include them, but have lost the relevant sources); these would likely be more relevant than the Singaporean riots. As far as I can establish from the sources I have read, any connection between the 1964 and 1969 riots is tenuous, at best. Therefore, I have removed the two sections of the article relating to the 1964 riots. Johnleemk | Talk 17:52, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Partial lock?
Since this article is coming out tomorrow at the front page in the selected anniversary section, maybe it is wise to partially lock the page? I do not doubt that some anonymous editors will make unhelpful contribution to the article tomorrow. __earth (Talk) 09:07, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah. i think you are one of the editors who simply deleted some of the fact section on the info which is refers to official books not based on personnal comments & blogs which is not consider as evidence. -azayi

Fair use rationale for Image:May 13 aftermath.jpg
Image:May 13 aftermath.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 17:50, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Smells of What Isn't Said
This entire article smells of what isn't said. For example, the lead states:
 * These riots continued for a substantial period of time, leading the government to declare a state of national emergency and suspend Parliament until 1971.

How long were the riots? Riots caused parliament to be suspended for two years? And whom did "affirmative action" favor? The majority? The article also needs a native English speaker to rewrite it.68.111.71.197 (talk) 18:59, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Done. - Two hundred percent (talk) 13:30, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Reversion without discussion
An editor reverted work because of thinking it made POV worse. My work included many grammatical corrections, punctuation corrections, and improvements to sentence structure - not just changes or additions to narrative. I also went back to original sources to see what material was being used to construct the article, and added more facts than were there. For people who don't know the background on Malaysia, the article has gaps. Per Wikipedia policy, please use this talk page to discuss objections or changes you would like to see rather than using reversion.--Parkwells (talk) 01:54, 15 June 2009 (UTC)


 * First off, you edit contradicted some fact in the article. For instance, in the lead section, you wrote the event happened after the Malays attacked the Chinese. But in the Cause section, it read that the Chinese attacked the Malays first. Given that the latter was cited and the former was not, I decided to remove the contradiction. Besides, the previous wording was neutral enough by stating it was a racial riot. Other historical inaccuracy include the independence of Malaysia (which you stated as 1963). Malaysia did not become independent in 1963. Previous version which I've reverted to use an accurate term of formation. __earth (Talk) 01:49, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Source text
I know it'd be better if I'd signed in to edit this post, but the book by Tunku Abdul Rahman, May 13 : Before and After, figures as my main source. Should I put in a gist of what is said in there, along with extracts ? 60.49.70.249 (talk) 12:11, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Copyright problem
This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. --Mkativerata (talk) 23:48, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Move back to May 13 incident
This article was previously May 13 incident. Someone moved it to the current title (13 May incident) with the the rationale: to mirror the Malaysian article. English sources mainly uses the term May 13. Google 13 May incident and May 13 will come out. ќמшמφטтгמ torque 07:32, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:13 May Incident which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 22:19, 12 August 2018 (UTC)