[MUSIC]
I am seven.
Everyday before school, I turn on the TV and
watch my favorite science show for children.
It is nerdy and science and marvelous, there are colors and bubbles and
explosions, I love it.
Now one day before school, I turn on the TV,
it's not playing, very weird.
Day two, same thing.
Mommy, what's happening?
My mom tells me that the show's been moved,
it now plays when I'm in school.
Why would you play a children's show when children are in school?
How dare you?
Adults are so stupid.
My mom says chill, bro chill.
She says that I should write a letter to the TV channel.
She doesn't think I'd write the letter.
I am angry and I write the letter.
We mail it in together.
Now the next week I turn on my TV, and
like magic, my show is back.
Now, once again, every day before school I get colors and
bubbles and explosions and my life is once again amazing.
What did I learn as a seven year old?
Anger ignites action, ignites change.
As a young boy, however, I was always told that anger,
[FOREIGN] in Malay, is not part of Malaysian culture.
[FOREIGN], good boys.
[FOREIGN] Literally being soft spoken was synonymous
with being polite, talking back was bad,
raising your voice was bad, anger, [FOREIGN] was bad.
Yet as I grew up, there are feelings stronger,
deeper, and harder to suppress injustice incited,
indignation, unfairness, and leashed umbridge.
Yet growing up in a semi democracy meant that
I couldn't fully express these feelings.
[FOREIGN] yeah, you don't talk so much.
You talk, okay.
The government will come for you, you watch out.
Warn my parents, my teachers, adults,
no wonder the government had never lost an election.
People were angry, yes, but people were even more afraid.
My friends, let me ask you this.
When was the last time you were truly, deeply angry?
And how did you react to it?
Did you embrace it?
Did you let it move you or did you distance yourself from this feeling?
I asked you this, because in my experience at Stanford, and at Harvard,
I've found that America isn't so different from Malaysia after all.
At business school and at public policy school,
there is this reticence, this distance, this distancing from anger.
We the learned are intellectual,
we're cerebral, we are above this.
Fury is seen as uncouth wrath, shameful,
anger, unbecoming, outrage undignified.
Now, I think this is wrong.
And this is why I'm telling you a story about an uncouth,
unbecoming Andrew, who used anger to change lives in profound ways.
2018, my Prime Minister steals $4.5 billion from my country.
The Guardian calls it the world's largest financial scandal.
Your department of justice calls it the largest kleptocracy case ever.
His cronies spend our money partying with Paris Hilton and
Leonardo DiCaprio, his stepson spends our money to
fund the Wolf of Wall Street, that's right.
These guys stole Malaysian tax money to make a movie that
glorifies how Wall Street stole from American investors.
You cannot make this up, how dare you?
$4.5 billion stolen,
Malaysians are livid like never before.
My Prime Minister knows that he cannot suppress our anger any longer.
So he decides to suppress our votes.
The economists proclaims, stop thief,
Malaysian prime minister is about to steal an election.
Financial Times blares, Malaysian election falls prey to gerrymandering.
And as if this was not enough, he decides to hold polling day on a Wednesday,
midweek not on a weekend, as is our tradition.
This is a blatant attempt to stop urban voters from traveling home to
their hometowns to vote, suppressing turnout.
How dare you?
Furious, my friends and I decide to act.
We found a movement to mobilize votes.
We call it [FOREIGN], go back to vote in Malay.
We ride the pulse of a nation, we harness the anger of thousands and
turn it into real, tangible action.
We are an overnight success, [FOREIGN] becomes the top
trending hashtag on Malaysian Twitter, we are winning.
And then, And then 17,000
Russian bots attack us, 17,000 Russian bots.
One month before this, the world had learned about Cambridge analytical.
We had seen how Russian disinformation swayed
the results of an American Election.
And against this backdrop of global outrage and
global questions around the future of democracy,
we wondered what Russian bots were doing in a Malaysian election.
And then the next day, our friends in high places
told us that the Secret Service was watching us.
We didn't know whether this was true, or what this meant.
But if these threats were true, real or perceived,
where our lives and liberty at stake.
This is how they get you.
Intimidated, half of my team wanted to shut our platform down.
Like so many before us, we were angry.
Again, we were also afraid, so
we sat down over zoom.
We named our fears.
We told our stories and we were honest to ourselves and
we listened intently, truthfully.
And yet, I pushed.
I challenge my friends to close their eyes and
remember why we started in the first place.
Remember the $4.5 billion stolen?
Remember the mid day polling week to suppress turnout,
remember the gerrymandering, together we remembered.
Together we see and together once again, we chose to fight.
My friends, in 2018, directly
helped 10,000 voters travel home to vote.
Indirectly, we energize online mobilization,
helping contribute to an 82% voter turnout.
We the people, kicked out a corrupt Prime Minister.
We the people were angry, we took action and we won.
My friends, I am so proud, so proud to be a small part
of the first regime change in Malaysian history.
So proud to help end the reign of the longest continuously ruling party in
the democratic world.
Anger ignites action, ignites change.
Plato tells us that anger can be powerful.
He calls it thymus, a special type of anger,
a deep dissatisfaction, a spirited zeal that one can use,
and harness to overcome fear to turn inaction into action.
I see thymus in the global reaction to stand with Ukraine,
because we must stand up to mad men.
I see thymus and the 20 million Americans who march for George Floyd,
the largest Civic Movement in American history.
Because Black Lives Matter, I see thymus in Hogg and
Gonzalez who awaken the consciousness of millions of students as
a survivor of the Parkland High School shooting.
Because we call BS, I see thymus [FOREIGN] global
leaders into climate action because how dare you.
My friends, there's so much injustice in this world.
And sometimes the only way out is to be still and
listen to that voice in your heart.
That pinch, that fire in your soul.
When I am angry, I am closer to the truth.
And when I am still and listen to this truth and
let this truth move me, I am powerful.
Anger ignites action, ignites change.
So I ask you this, ladies and gentlemen,
what are you angry about?
>> [APPLAUSE]
[MUSIC]