Real life is scarier than Halloween — issue #16

I want to talk about the monsters lurking under the bed. 

The bogeyman scares kids all around the world—it stalks the shadows, silent until it gets you for your misbehaviour. Bogeymen are imagined as grotesque, vengeful, and dangerous, but nobody really knows what one looks like. We imagine them, making them all the more terrifying.

Absent in our indigenous myths, bogeymen lurk here in Asia all the same. The Oxford English Dictionary describes a bogeyman as "a person or thing that is widely regarded as an object of fear"—and it's clear we've got some big ones. 

Nature's wrath, for one, looms over Asia each year. Over the past 50 years, nearly three of every five deaths by natural disasters in the world have happened here.  Geography plays a huge role, but climate change and environmental degradation make some disasters hit harder—and Asia's fossil fuel consumption remains slow to change.

Drug traffickers are often seen as scourges, but Southeast Asia's massive drug problem is more than just individuals. Many displaced Rohingya, for instance, find themselves turning to drug trafficking just to feed their families in dire uncertainty.

On the topic of bogeymen, it's hard to ignore Asia's political fake news. Governments here often find their fight against it dogged by distrust, not least because of how they've communicated information themselves. Wary of official sources, citizens turn to social media and its minefield of disinformation and echo chambers.

Asia's bogeymen have far more teeth than the monsters under the bed. But letting our imaginations run ultimately keeps us from facing these fears. From community-based disaster risk reduction to maritime policing and fact-checking centres, Asia is learning and improving on how to deal with its darkest issues. 

This Halloween, peer under the bed with our story lineup. Let us know what you see at hello@kontinentalist.com.



Kenneth
Editor and Content Strategist