HOW do most people make decisions? They look at a problem, weigh different solutions, looking at the pros and cons, then they decide what to do. If they still can’t decide, they call in other people and discuss what to do. Sometimes, the best action is to do nothing, to let things be.

But that’s not how some of our leaders operate. An incident happens which creates a lot of explosive noise of the human kind and someone feels the need to respond. Understandable. But there is such a thing as proportionality.

We scream when the Israeli air force pummels a Palestinian house with missiles from their fighter jets, killing everyone in it indiscriminately including children. They contend that people in the house had thrown rockets at Israeli civilians. Whether that is true or not, we can’t say. But we can say for certain that the children didn’t do it. So why kill them too?

When we mete out punishment, it must be just. Justice requires us to apportion punishment according to the crime. This is why we don’t ground our children for petty offences like forgetting to close a door or to pick up their clothes. The injustice serves no purpose other than to create resentment.

Resentment is what was created by the ministerial decision to shut down an entire music festival because of one person’s irresponsible act. By all means that person should have been sanctioned. His actions were not only disrespectful but also harmed the very people he thought he was doing a service. As the saying goes, with “friends” like this, who needs enemies?

Undoubtedly there is that old white saviour complex at play here. But nobody can effectively save anyone by just dropping from the sky and then making statements while in a drunken stupor before bothering to talk to any local person to get their views. That is known as performative support, an insincere act of supposed solidarity.

Sure, artists are sometimes eccentric but that is no excuse for not respecting local circumstances. Especially when statements are made under the influence and without real thought put into them.

But as inconsiderate as that artist’s behaviour is, that of the minister in charge is no better. Music festivals and concerts are not just about entertainment. They are a business, not just for festival organisers but also all the complementary services required to make it a success. Ticket buyers may be put out but so are the various vendors who were going to sell food and drinks. Let’s not forget that every concert requires stagehands, electricians, stage managers, and all the myriad support people to ensure that every act goes on smoothly.

There have been calls to say that the concert organisers are to blame because they should know what Matt Healy stands for. Yes he supports LGBT rights and tends to mention it wherever he performs, especially in countries where he believes the governments are suppressing those rights.

But what few have mentioned is that he has also been called out by other artists for racist and misogynistic comments. I don’t think that anyone can support rights for just one group and not any others and be taken seriously. Does this mean he only supports rights for white male LGBT folks?

In all fairness, when organisers book acts from overseas, there’s not a lot they can do to make sure those acts behave properly. Bands have managers and it should have been the manager’s job to make sure their charges remain sober at the very least. Also we should recognise an attention-seeker when we see one; Healy announced he was banned almost as soon as he was stopped from performing by the organisers, not yet the government. He was looking for headlines.

Now the Sepang Circuit has banned all international acts from performing there. The assumption is that all foreign musicians are out to make sensational statements and cause trouble for locals. Surely this is a generalisation, just as local acts are all assumed to be “safe”. But what it really says is that bodies like the Sepang Circuit is as prone to kneejerk reactions as the government: when in doubt, just ban. It is a typically lazy response. Or rather, it’s a case of “before anyone scolds me for not being careful enough, I’d better just shut down everything”. This is a slippery slope where everyone becomes so afraid to do anything that they imagine might attract controversy that they avoid doing anything at all. It’s the death of arts and entertainment.

But coming back to how our authorities make decisions, sometimes it is just plain baffling. Raiding stores to seize perfectly legal goods for one. Arresting someone in the dead of night when they could have waited until morning. What is the point of all these except to annoy the public? It’s one thing to fear a certain sector of voters because you have an impending election but doesn’t the very importance of that vote mean that you should take a breath, count to 10, and only then take action?

Undoubtedly this is a government that’s not on very secure footing. I do want to see it survive because the alternative is too awful to contemplate. But why is it always shooting itself in the foot by making hasty decisions? Those vendors are now being compensated by a government agency, MyCreativeVentures. But had they not cancelled the entire festival, we could have saved taxpayers’ money. Besides, why should an agency set up to support the creative industry be compensating food vendors?

It is this type of confusing policies that make people, even the most generous and forgiving types, scratch their heads. Why, for example, is there a need to invite religious authorities onto all policymaking bodies? What exactly are their qualifications in the economy, in technology, in the arts, in human rights? Are we turning into a stealth theocracy?

I know, I know, the government is facing a constant barrage of criticism about their religious credentials. But why is the response always to pander rather than stand up for your principles? What people care about is putting food on the table and their kids in good schools, being able to live a decent life in a safe environment. Nobody cares about music festivals until you take away people’s opportunity to earn an honest living for some trifling reason. All you do is give your opponents more ammunition to take you down. Own goal much?  WRITER –  Marina Mahathir – ANN

‘Take care of non-Malay votes too’