Daughter of the Nation (But Not the Victims)

An honest biography.

Chapter 1: “The Family Name”

My feminism was born in a mansion built by silence.

I didn't choose the name.
But I chose what I didn’t say with it.

While the daughters of the nation were being married off at 18, I was being flown to Geneva for gender dialogues.
While young girls were raped and told it was their fault, I was penning op-eds about empowerment in English, for the elite.
While Muslim feminists were being demonised, detained, discredited — I was at a panel. With scones. And good lighting.

My name is Marina.
My father is Mahathir.

Malaysia’s longest-serving Prime Minister.
Architect of the New Economic Policy.
Father of modern cronyism.
And the man who made racism constitutional — while smiling for TIME magazine.

He ruled for over two decades, reshaped institutions into weapons, and taught a generation that questioning authority was dangerous… unless your last name was his.

My Father was feared throughout the nation but I was beloved.

I learned early on how to speak without consequence.
To be loud — but never dangerous.
To be radical — but never anti-regime.
To sprinkle “activist” in my bylines, but keep my passport pristine.

I learned how to wear liberalism like perfume — enough to smell clean, never strong enough to sting.
They called me brave.
I called it branding.

Because every time the system cracked a whip on women’s backs —
I wrote a polite blog post.
When people begged me to denounce the monsters in Parliament —
I sighed. I said, “We must be patient.”
And when they asked why I wouldn’t condemn my own father?

I said: “He’s from another time.”
As if the wounds he caused weren’t bleeding in this one.

My feminism existed in conference halls.
Not in the courts where 12-year-old girls were “married” to their rapists — with syariah court blessings.
I wrote about empowerment — but never child marriage.
I celebrated “women in leadership” — but never asked why women in kampungs were being denied birth control, justice, or basic autonomy.

In my world, girls wore Dior.
In theirs, they wore trauma.
But somehow — we were both “Malaysian women.”

I quoted Western feminists.
They begged for protection from men quoting religion.
I had legal literacy.
They had legal wounds.

And yet, I was the one who got the awards.

You want to know my biggest lie?

It wasn’t what I said.
It was what I let them get away with.

Every time I walked into a room and was praised as “an example”, I knew the truth:

I was never the exception.
I was the decoration.

The quiet rose on a blood-soaked table.
Proof that you can be the daughter of power, and still pretend to be powerless.

I was proof Malaysia had “progressive Muslims.”
That you could serve under a man who built racial apartheid in policy form, and still be called moderate.

But here’s the part they won’t print in The Star:

My feminism never made it to the kampung.
My silence did.

I watched as Section 375 of the Penal Code continued to define rape in a way that excluded marital rape.
Even as survivors begged for reform, I chose polite detachment.
I saw Syariah courts continue to issue marriage approvals for children under 16.
Even as activists raised the alarm, I wrote about “changing mindsets” but not the law.

In 2018, my father returned as Prime Minister at age 92, dragging back a fossilised worldview.
I said nothing about the broken promises on child marriage, on press freedom, on real structural reform.

He appointed men who praised child brides.
I praised “unity.”
He funded religious hardliners.
I wrote about “progress.”

You see, I wasn’t powerless.
I was protected.

And I chose protection over principle — every single time.

Let’s be clear:
The only reason I could call myself an activist was because I never challenged the real source of pain.
Because I never bit the hand that held the reins.
Because I knew exactly how far I could go without crossing the line.
And I never crossed it.

I said I stood for women.
But never the ones locked in Syariah custody battles.
Never the ones silenced by PAS-aligned preachers.
Never the ones my father’s policies crushed beneath racial quotas, religious policing, and institutional betrayal.

I said I was here to fight for women.
But I couldn’t even fight my own blood.

And that’s the real legacy.
Not the blog posts.
Not the gender conferences.
Not the awards.

But the decades I spent looking away,
As the house of injustice grew taller,
furnished with policies my father signed,
while I redecorated with progressive quotes.

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