The hero seems strangely familiar. He brandishes his weapons of choice in each frame: effortlessly: fearlessly. Built like a nondescript, he wields his truncheon like a ninja.
In one, he’s a Spartan holding the pass at Thermopylae against hordes of invading Persian barbarians. In another, a soldier of the Holy Roman Empire or the Kingdom of Gondor – singlehandedly keeping the murderous Huns or those Mordor Orcs at bay – like Horatio held the bridge. 
In other less war-like captures, he’s a champion World Cup footballer gyrating the athletic dance of leaping over opponents to get at the ball; dribbling, passing. Or an oddly khaki-clad ‘Maori’ leading the victorious All Blacks on to the rugby field. And elsewhere, helping Miley Cyrus to, er, twerk herself.
But in real life, which inspired the rash of Facebook memes above, our hero is hardly gallant; or valiant; or a hero at all even. He’s simply a Sri Lankan policeman demonstrating how the use of ‘minimum force’ can crack open skulls, cause recurring head pain for female students with headaches enough of their own, and baton-charge an unarmed student protest until there’s bloodied faces like it was Richie McCaw taking a boot in the head at the recently concluded rugby World Cup finals.
Memes are fun. They amuse and entertain. But the larger-than-life original photographs which inspire them challenge stunned viewers and – hopefully – will teach our society that all is not well in our country as it is.
Pass the baton
One might have thought that it would be better than this… By now – After nearly 10 months of righteous rule (or ‘good’ governance, as some say it is). Defenders of this much-vaunted #yahapaalanaya will rush to issue an apologetic, which will no doubt run something like this… Police using necessary (if minimal) force is an occasion-driven street tactic and cannot be attributed to strategic-level state policy; If there was unwarranted action involved in containing the student protest, it can and will and probably shall be investigated; The National Police Commission (NPC) has been tasked with investigating the incident anyway, and the Prime Minister (PM) has commissioned another special committee of investigation also… so let’s just wait and see anyway, shall we?
The usual problem with ‘wait and see’ (what happens) is the standard appointment of the regular investigative probes. It is the same problem as the traditional issue of committee work… A committee, they say, is where – after all has been said and done – more has been said than done! Far be it from anyone critical to attribute apathy to the first serious commission given to the all-new NPC. But to cynical observers it all smacks of cunctatory (or customarily delaying) tactics in the first place. The PM asks the Minister of Law and Order (MOL) to start a probe. The MOL instructs the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to conduct an enquiry. The IGP orders his senior officers to institute an investigation. (And the seniors hold a press conference where they absolve and exonerate their juniors – and their mutual state/service department – of any wrongdoing, or blame for it.)
Can it be that the buck (oops, the baton) is being passed? Or is this more than a SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) to Cerberus – being, in truth, the way that things need to be done if indeed the probe into what happened last week is to be properly conducted? Point is that this is the way that the baton (sorry, the buck) was also previously passed under autocratic and antidemocratic regimes not too long gone… So the average citizen will be forgiven for their smidgen of scepticism (which resonates with the Inter University Students’ Federation’s own expressed cynicism) that probes will get to the bottom of the problem at all – if ever…
Probes in this nation rarely have in the past. Probes under even this present administration probably never will. QED? We hope!
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