Once upon a time, 'five young, silly and immature' (quote) men cracked their brains together to come up with a show with which they intended to do nothing and yet everything.

It was a political satire show that would poke fun at the absurd, laugh at the ridiculous and point out the obvious in hopes to 'sedarkan (make aware)' the ordinary Malaysian, and it was called That Effing Show (TES). Yes, That Effing Show.

"That Effing Show... well, it is a five to eight minute online show that takes up on issues that have happened in our country in the past week and essentially makes fun of it."

They (the team behind TES) are, according to host Ezra Mohd Zaid, 27, just stupid punks trying to make sense of the world around them. And it works.

"The way it works in this country," says Ezra, "is that things can get awfully heavy and serious. So the purpose of the show is to get people to get engaged. Because if you cannot make sense of what's around you, chances are things are going to change and you won't even notice it."

"After all, we're distracted with so many things - school, family, the weather, MTV even. So we're trying to fuse all the elements that are youthful -and comedy is a great way to get attention - so that audiences are more engaged, more 'terjaga' (aware)."

And now, twelve episodes of hilarity and one music video later, the show has started to gain steady attention. Their music video, I Am a Macha, made with borrowed equipment and a DIY-spirit, has gotten 13,000 views on YouTube so far. Their tongue-in-cheek take on issues past (such as the Nasir Safar issue, or Anwar's sodomy trial) has gotten quite a few sniggers, evident by comments left on the website.

And perhaps this is where TES tries its very best to make sense of the issues swirling around us - after all, they are just five late-twenties men trying to teach Malaysians that hey, we have to laugh at ourselves and poke fun at some of our absurdities once in a while, because almost everything in Malaysia that is remotely serious has to deal with many and different 'sensitivities'.

"If Malaysia were a high school girl, nobody would want to talk to her on account that she is so sensitive!" he points out jokingly.

"We're such a young society, and our experiences are so diverse that we have different perspectives of things. We have not yet managed to come to the moment where we immediately get what each other is saying."

"I mean, we do have moments: We all know what nasi pattaya tastes like. But beyond that, we are compartmentalised, or, to put it simply, we aren't rojak enough yet."

So hopefully, says Ezra, TES will be able to bulldoze past that.

"Hopefully, what we bring up in our show will be able to bring that collective shared experience closer - for example, if I make fun of issue A with person A, and he gets what I'm saying, regardless of who or what he is. And once he gets it, he will laugh, whether or not he is Malay, Chinese or Indian." 

But it is not the intention at all to provoke or incite controversy. Rather, all they want to do is point out the absurdly obvious and bring it to light - literally, by making it light-hearted and humorous.

"We take onus on ourselves on what we can or cannot do. We're playing within the perimeters of what is acceptable discourse; we know we can go the way of being terribly provocative and out of the box. But we won't. There has to be a practicality to what we do. I could say libelous and irresponsible things just for the shock and awe and funny, but we want the show to have some leg, and not get shut down after five episodes."

"Our intent is to not be left or right, up or down. We are, really, just young Malaysians trying to make sense of what's happening around us and nobody can deny us that voice. What we are saying may not be representative of every Malaysian but it is representative of some and you're free to disagree or agree."

And in many ways, (although Ezra hesitates when asked about this) this is freedom of speech.

"Freedom of speech is such a big, grand notion you know? But if I were to say anything about it, I think that as far as freedom of speech is concerned, we have it. Anyone can say anything but we self-censor ourselves. When we hang out with friends of different races we check ourselves in our kepala (head) straightaway - what we can bring up, what we can't."

The core of the entire concept of freedom of speech is not the ability to mouth off and say what you want, explains Ezra. It's about honesty and keeping one's head screwed on tight.

"We must be able to talk about things honestly, without getting too emotionally wrapped up. Sometimes these pent-up emotions explode (on blogs or whatever) and there is a backlash, which in turn, becomes a vicious cycle."

What's really important, says Ezra, is that we make the best of the avenues and opportunities given to us to express ourselves.