Not So Royal, After All....

Perhaps in some way, this posting is intended as an open letter to the house of johor's royal family. But then again, who am I to invoke action in a revered institution of the Malaysian monarchy. Alas I shall succumb to this nagging feeling inside me that insists I jot down my thoughts on this matter anyway. Even if it doesn't reach the upper echelons of the Johor society, it might give all of us some food for thought on matters pertaining to proper conduct.

Last night, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince of Johor took to his twitter account yet again in an online feud with a local celebrity. I use the term celebrity loosely here because that is what this other person appears to be. Although prior to last night's debacle, I didn't even know this “celebrity” existed. But for the sake of his alleged celebrity-ship, let's just refer to him as that for the remainder of this posting. HRH the Crown Prince, who from this point onwards shall be referred to as simply TMJ, apparently had some beef with local celebrity, Caprice. I have no idea how the whole thing started, but from what I managed to dig up, based on tweets going back a couple of days, TMJ is of the opinion that Caprice is a Fake. Upon further digging, one twitter user had this to say, “Someone asked if TMJ likes Caprice, TMJ answered no, and Caprice sounded TMJ off, TMJ replied saying Caprice is fake because in one of his songs, Caprice claims to be the Prince of Damansara.” So my guess is this whole thing started simply as a product of one person trolling the other. I did not see evidence of any direct bashing prior to what happened last night. Perhaps TMJ is simply not a fan of Caprice, or maybe in some of his tweets, Caprice said some hurtful things about Johor or the Johor Royal Family. But nothing was mentioned directly. Well, at least nothing until I saw this tweet from TMJ:

The tweet came with a photo that read some people just need a high-five. in the face. with a chair.

Then Caprice had this to say the next day:

And here we have the respond from TMJ that sparked the whole mess last night:

After that, TMJ had this to say:

Some of his followers then asked him about his apparent hatred for Caprice:

From what I can summarize, TMJ's answers are not befitting his title as the Crown Prince of Johor. Here are a few more tweets from him that further proves he needs a refresher course on how to conduct himself as a royalty.

Let's backtrack a little. Who is Caprice? Honestly I don't really care. But apparently, dude is a rapper. According to his YouTube channel, he's a 23 year old artiste and producer, and he has been doing music since high school before taking it seriously in 2008 after setting up his own company/studio/record label. He has been known to make famous the phrase “Damansara Boy” in his rappings. So apparently, recently dude has been proclaiming himself as the Prince of Damansara. Any half-witted fool can see that this boy is just a delusional nuthead who's nothing more than a fame-hungry rapper. So he says he is the Prince of Damansara. Yang prince betul kat Johor tu nak terasa sangat apahal? Biaq pi lah kat budak setengah tiang ni nak mengaku dia Prince of Damansara ka Prince of Sentul ka Prince of Balakong ka sekalipun. Kenapa TMJ perlu sentap?

As TMJ's twitter timeline got heated up last night after he indirectly called Caprice a dog, another well-known rapper, Mr Joe hasbeen Flizzow decided to jump on the bandwagon and stick his finger in the middle of the whole mess. 

And of course, TMJ who is well-known for responding to almost all of the tweets directed to him, replied to Flizzow.

And here is an exchange between TMJ and Flizzow that I think was in complete violation of both their positions as public figures:

So kesimpulannya, kenapa TMJ sebagai seorang yang berstatus kerabat diraja, perlu bersikap seperti seorang kanak-kanak di dalam twitter nya? Kenapa perlu melayan Caprice? Kalau TMJ tak minat dengan Caprice, tak perlu menghentam sebegitu rupa. Sah-sah Caprice tu pun dari awal memang perangai macam tak cukup umur, kenapa TMJ sanggup menyemakkan timeline nya malam tadi dengan isu ini? Hampir 5 jam lebih TMJ sibuk melayan twitter dari peminat-peminat tegarnya yang memuji tindakan beliau menghentam Caprice.

What I could see from all of this is that TMJ has quite a following. And for someone who already has that kind of adulation from the public, the behaviour he is portraying makes one wonder, is the adulation misplaced? I can safely say that whatever respect I had for him completely vanished after what I saw on his twitter last night. The words he used, the tweets he retweeted, most of them were not befitting of his status as a member of the royal household. Here are some of his replies to his 'ardent' followers:

He even retweeted this:

I know the guy did not mean bomb literally, but the implication the word has is just not something I think a royalty should be retweeting. Retweeting in some ways, denotes acknowledgement of approval.

Here's another one he retweeted. Does this mean as a kerabat, he promotes bashing other people?

I guess you pretty much get what I'm trying to say here. I don't have anything against the royal family of Johor. But since TMJ started “reaching out” to his people through twitter, I believe he is doing more harm than good. Especially since most of his followers seem to be in support of his bashings. Perhaps the royal household of Johor should intervene and insist TMJ suspend his twitter account before he says something that may cause more damage. What he should do is take some pointers from the Crown Prince of Perak, Raja Dr Nazrin Shah. Now that is one man who embodies the true meaning of royalty. The way he carries himself, the way he speaks, the substance in his speech and how he commands respect wherever he goes. I highly doubt that Raja Nazrin would stoop as low as to entertain a wannabe-rapper on twitter. What puzzles me is the amount of support TMJ has managed to garner on his twitter account despite the fact that he is exhibiting un-royal like behaviour. His choice of words, as well as his choice of retweets are simply appalling. In any case, I hope TMJ will not succumb to anymore emotional outbursts on his twitter account. Sometimes that is the price one has to pay for the station one holds. If TMJ was a nobody like me, then he can bitch and vent and yell and bash all he wants on twitter, but he does not have that luxury. And I do hope that his followers will be a bit more critical instead of menyokong membuta tuli. All you're doing is encouraging him to stay just the way he is without feeling the need to be better. Kenapa entah ramai sangat yang suka "mengangkat" dia on Twitter, bukan main lagi some of the puji-pujian he received, siapa ada hashtag #TeamTMJ lagi. He needs to remember that blind adoration is not something to be proud of. Someone in his position, who has the power to influence so many people, should use the power properly and inspire his followers in a good way instead of behaving like an adolescent. To quote Benjamin Disraeli, Circumstances are beyond human control, but our conduct is in our own power.