Tuesday, September 2, 2008

If there’s one website that is irresistible to youths, friendster would be it. Yes. You heard me alright. FRIENDSTER!!! Our blog team has done a survey regarding the rates of most visited websites among students of University Science Malaysia and the results are spectacular. Friendster was top of course, followed by Facebook, MySpace, Yahoo, Hotmail, Google, and Wikipedia. Many of them go for their own blogs and friends’ as well but they are just a teeny weenie bit compared to the examples above. Apart from that, students who lived outside the campus loves downloading from websites like youtube, xunlei, baidu and the lists go on. Interestingly, youths only go for certain websites created by Malaysian. Even if they are interested, they only choose local news websites such as malaysiakini, sinchew, and the star online. This shows that Malaysian is more socialize to foreign website, mainly western websites. Our survey indicates that western websites have a better market among youths compared to local ones.


BUT WHY???


Why do these phenomena occur? Why do the youths of Malaysia prefer searching for data through foreign websites rather than websites produced by their own country? And why does youths from foreign countries are capable of creating their own information but the youths of Malaysia are just gullibly accepting rather than creating information or new websites? It’s simply because we as Malaysian youths are mostly passive. It’s quite unfair if I were to point fingers to all the youths out there for I am sure there are a handful of them who have done their fair share of contribution. But what has happened to most of them? They had rather stay in their own shell, staying far from the sensitive issues and having the attitude of ‘Mind your own business’. Youths of Malaysia have become followers rather than leaders or creators. They focus too much on studies by studying hard when they can study a smarter way. Good results are their biggest goals but are that enough? We need more than good grades to survive in this world, honestly. So who are we to blame here? Does this happen because youths do not have enough freedom? Or youths lack of opportunity to present their abilities? There is a comment from Umminajah Salleh and she has shared her views and said that she has confidence that Malaysian youths would rise to the occasion if they were given the chances to do so by authorities. She also said that youths have the potential to lead and make a mark in civil society or even in the political scenario, if they were given the faith, the trust and the chance to show their prowess (News Strait Times 2006).



THEREFORE, WHAT DO WE WANT???


We want progress, we want determination and we want to be a step above others. No more excuses of overprotective or spoon-fed education system and the lack of chances to grab to be more active. Back in the 1970’s, students were more dynamic and patriotic. Thus, many of the student leaders have become Ministers in the government. They are not under act like ISA and AUKU. To become like the pass leaders, we have to educate ourselves to be like them, to be even better than them. We owe the next generation a better tomorrow. Therefore, we as youths should buck up in order to achieve this dream. According to Saidina Ali, one of the closest companions of Prophet Muhammad, “if you want to see the future leader of a nation, look upon their youth.”


RESOURCES

Survey from 50 random University Science Malaysia students

News Strait Times 2006

Quotations from pass leaders

Labels: foreign websites versus local ones, youths