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By Mihar Dias January 2026
If Art Buchwald were alive and posted on Malaysian social media, he would be cancelled by breakfast, sued by lunch, and forced to issue an apology video by dinner — preferably with subtitles, just to be safe.
Malaysia has entered the Golden Age of Selective Hearing. This is a remarkable condition where what you hear depends entirely on who you voted for, what you retweeted last night, and whether you are already angry before breakfast.
Consider the UMNO General Assembly, where a crowd shouted something. Now, crowds have been shouting things since crowds were invented. Romans shouted. The French shouted. Manchester United fans shout things they later deny. But this particular shout caused national distress.
One newspaper reported that the crowd chanted “Hidup Anwar”. Dr Akmal Saleh immediately corrected the nation’s collective hearing: it was “Hidup UMNO”. https://newswav.com/A2601_06bZft?s=A_k1w9c0E&language=en
The newspaper apologised, blaming audio translation, subtitles, acoustics, perhaps the alignment of the moon. The article was deleted, the damage undone, and Malaysia could sleep again knowing no forbidden slogans had accidentally escaped UMNO mouths.
What fascinates me is not the mistake, but the panic. “Hidup Anwar” was treated not as a misheard chant, but as a national security breach. https://newswav.com/A2601_06bZft?s=A_k1w9c0E&language=en
It was as if someone had shouted “Free parking in Bangsar” — clearly impossible, therefore defamatory.
But selective hearing is not limited to politics. It is also excellent at shopping.
In Kuchai Lama, gold stamped AU 999.9 turned out to be more like AU “don’t look too closely”. Tests showed purity hovering around 77 per cent, which in gold terms is the equivalent of ordering wagyu and receiving slightly ambitious tofu. https://newswav.com/A2601_OFsHI1?s=A_uOeOMkd&language=en Buyers saw the stamp, heard the sales pitch, watched the social media videos, and believed. Why? Because nobody wants to hear, “This is too good to be true.” That sentence has very poor engagement metrics.
Here lies the genius of selective perception. In politics, we overhear threats that aren’t there. In commerce, we under hear warnings that are screaming at us. We will interrogate a chant syllable by syllable, but accept fake gold with a smile and free shipping.
The government, bless it, used X-ray machines to discover what common sense could have told us for free. Legal sections were cited, fines announced, WhatsApp numbers provided. Justice, like the gold, was finally tested for purity. https://newswav.com/A2601_OFsHI1?s=A_uOeOMkd&language=en
The lesson is simple. In Malaysia, your ears are not neutral organs. They belong to your political party, your shopping habits, and your desire to be right. You don’t hear what was said. You hear what you need to hear — until someone brings an X-ray machine.
And when that happens, everyone suddenly claims the audio was unclear.
Mihar Dias (mihardias@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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