The cringe that is "Malu apa Bossku".

I cringe whenever people say, even jokingly, "Malu apa bossku".
Even when it is used in the context of encouragement to do something positive.

The origin of the phenomenon of "Malu apa bossku" is an indicator of the moral
standard of this country, or to put it bluntly, the lack of moral standard.

Its origin has "baggage" and it implies do not be ashamed when you commit a crime or do something immoral. Those who first coined the phrase do not see anything wrong in the acts that was done by their leader, even though it was as clear as daylight, that they cheer him on, "Malu apa bossku" in that condescending tone that implies there is nothing to be
ashamed of, since, in their mind, no wrongs were committed.

If you uphold a truly good value system, you should feel ashamed or embarrassed when you commit a crime.
If you uphold a truly good value system, you should stop supporting leaders who are clearly corrupt and who commit crimes to cover up their corruption.
If you uphold a truly good value system, you should demand explanation from your leaders for perceived hypocrisy and if no clear explanations are given, you should stop supporting them or at least criticise the hypocrisy instead of making excuses for them.
If you uphold a truly good value system, you would never say that breaking the law is OK as long as you are not caught by the authorities.

In western countries, those who are accused or perceived to have acted illegally or immorally, have the decency to resign from public office, even if they were not prosecuted.
In Japan, two hundreds ago, the shame of such a situation would drive them to commit harakiri. Personal honour and integrity is their highest calling and without them, life is meaningless.

But now, we in Malaysia, turned illegal acts and crimes into humour to make it acceptable and palatable. It is not even satire, which is commonly used to shame those who deserved to be shamed.
It is just plain good-natured, joking around type of humour as if nothing wrong were committed. The humour, in fact, is used to wash away the shame, to make the corruption shameless and acceptable.

"Malu apa bossku" may have been appropriated by the general public as satire to ridicule the corrupt. But now people are using them even to encourage positive behaviour that may be deemed embarrassing or caused by shyness (for example first time public speaking).

It is commendable to encourage positive behaviour, but using a phrase that has shameful origin is cringey. I do not want to be uptight, but I wish people would stop using that phrase and find some other neutral phrase for positive encouragement, like "Good job!" or "Never say never!" or a simple loud cheering.

That is just my two cents worth of ranting.

Ciao.