Greeting Readers,

I just browse through the interenet, and I find some of the arguments against the Khmer people as indicated below. Of course every single one of these mentioned arguments can be easily disproved, but I choose to leave the rebuttals out just for the purpose of having an argument. So let the game begins.


Thach (1996) wrote, “Kampuchea Krom history, its geography, its people, its culture, and its people identity are now being questioned by [Vietnamese] scholars”. Vietnamese academics said that there wasn’t enough linguistic evidence to point out that the people of the Funan empire (present-day Kampuchea Krom) were Khmer because the Khmer ethnicity arose after the existence of the Funan empire.

Thach, B. (1996) “Kampuchea Krom: The plight of a people”. Retrieved February 27, 2004 from
http://www.compnow.com/homepage/users/chon.../KKromhist.html

An American scholar named Stark (2001) wrote that despite the fact that there are available pieces of information about how the people of Funan lived and did, there is no information of the language they spoke. Thus it continues to be an unanswering question to whether they were Khmer or not.

Stark, M. T. (2001) “New perspectives on early Cambodia from the lower Mekong archaeological project”.
Retrieved February 27, 2004 from http://www.khmerinstitute.org/

Touch (1999) wrote that the Thai royalties and academics had a THEORY about Cambodia. Their theory stated that Cambodia used to be inhabited by a group of people called Khom. However, the Thai invaders killed most of the Khom and chased the rest of the Khom back to India, their native homeland. As a result of the Thai invasion, the Thai immigrants moved into the land of the Khom and became the present-day Khmers who have 90% of Thai blood and call their newfound country Cambodja but retain the strinkingly identical civilization, culture, tradition and arts of the Thais in Thailand.

Touch, B. (1999). “A Khmer view of the Thai view of the Khmer”. Retrieved February 27, 2004 from
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/TXT/comments/akhmer.htm


MayMalay Ako (2004) wrote that “…Funan was another Kingdom of the Malay ethnicity”.“ The The author based his claim on the following reasons: “…The Khmer themselves [did not] directly create Funan”; the Malays were in Funan before the Mon-Khmer people; Funan’s neigboring kingdom of Champa was inhabited by the Malay people (Chams); the Malay people (Chams) of Champa also shared the Naga legend of the Khmer; the Khmer legend of Naga Soma and the Indian adventurer alludes to ISLAND origins, where Malay ethnicity was originally identified with; the Naga stories of Southeast Asia and Indian Subcontinent are of Malay origins; the Sailendra who speak an Austronesian language are Malays and they are the direct descendants of the Funan royalty; and the ethnic Malays today still continue their “naga snake cult”.

Malay Ako (2004). “Why I think Funan was a Malay Kingdom: Another Kingdom of the Malay Ethnicity?.” Retrieved February 27, 2004 from http://www.asiafinest.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4314


From some Vietnamese to some Thais to a certain American scholar to a Malay Filipino, those foreign people can choose to argue against the Khmer people all they want; however, they are still ignorant of facts about the Khmer people. The foreigners can choose to butcher our names from O’ Keo to Oc Eo, from Chen Lea to Chenla, from Banam to Funan, from Khmer to Khom to Camarini to Kumar to Kui Kmi to Coa Mein, we are still the Khmer people whose legacy is long lasting and influential as long as this planet earth remains.

To those Vietnamese and Malay Filipinos who want to deny the Khmer legacy to the Kampuchea Krom or Funan, they must know that Chenla or (Chen Lea in Khmer) was a sister state of Funan and the two states reunited. If the Sailendra of Indonesia claimed to be a direct heir of Funan, why then after controlling Chenla for 12 long years they did not liberated their beloved “Funan” from the grips of the Khmer? Funan was Khmer then as it is still Khmer now.

As far as a certain American scholar is concerned who claimed that the language of the people of Funan remains a mystery, why then it is so easy for a certain Malay Filipino to claim that the “Funanese” were actually the Malay people because of this and that evidence? How come the American scholar could not pinpoint or trace the spoken language of the Funanese? After all the ancient Funanese were well known about their ambassadorial contact with the court of China, so why then there is no record of their spoken language? One can manipulate the ignorant outside mass, but the Khmer people always know their roots.

To those Thais who claimed that they killed off most of the Khom and claim that the Khmer people now have 90% of Thai blood, then their false logic betrays their intelligence. If the “Khom” were all killed off by the Thai invaders, why then according to history there were repeated wars against the Khmer and the Thais? In addition, if the present-day Khmer have 90% Thai blood, then the two people of both countries would look very much the same already. The fact is that the Khmer have a rather unique distinctive homogeneous look and physical traits.

The enemies surround from every direction, but the Khmer remain.
FKR

one day i feel in my heart that you khmer will open your eyes and realize that you are not outside the world but a part of it, hopefully that day will not come after a long history of khmer rouges and kilings and more ethnic genocide. so it will not be so difficultut for you to try to take your place in the world as a fellow human being and you wont be looked at with supsiotion and aniomosty just like the japanese are seen today sometimes because of their atrociteis during WWII. there is a future out there that we can make out of it however we desire, we can learn from the past and chose to be peaceful wiht one another and live as brothers in the same region which we share, or we can seperate ourvelses even more and try to think we are superior to the other and eventually built bombs and guns and try to kill each other to extend our own territories to show that we are the top dog. I know the past was hard and full of fighting between all our ancestor with age old grudges that exist to this day, but you are not yoru ancestor, and you do not have to continue yoru ancestor's fight any longer., you are their children, the NEW GENERATION and we have the oppurtunity as new born, and innocent people to mend the wound inflicted by our ancestors on one another because your ancestor's age old enemy also has birth children who are also pure and innocent just like yourself and those are the people who you will be growing up with in this life, not yoru grandparents whose life is almost over .. you don't have to continue your ancestors fight. it is already over. now it is time to rebuild our region by helping each other and respecting and equalizing. not just khmer helping khmer but khmer helping viet helping lao helping thai helping malay etc.... and try to reach that brief time in southeast asian hisotry when everyone was at peace. this moment in southeast asianis so long ago, i dont think anyone can even remember, and that just shows how we need to drop our weapons because this fight is too old to be remmebered why it originally started. And we do not need to try to return to our former glory like khmer trying to dream of attaining the moment when khmer ruled all of southeast asia because TODAY there are TOO MANY new Ethnicities who migrated into Southeast Asia since that time. And for you to dream reclaiming all of your former land would neccesstate kicking or killing thousands of ehtnic minorities out of Southeast Asia. That is NOT going to happen without a long and muerderious fight and war that will destory Asia and make it ugly and stain all our histories. I know the present boarders of Southeast Asia are unfair that some ethnciity have more than the other and even some ethncity has no land for themselves at all such as the Cham & Hmong. I dont know how to answer this problem but we can do it if we think open and respectfully, it doesnt have to be with a gun to the head. Rember we are the NEW GENERATION and we can talk peacefully without the memory of hate because we were not born with the memories of our ancestors, we are only raised and taught these memories which lead us to hate.

SALAMAT AT PAALAM

Greeting Malay Ako,

Hello I'm FKR. I don't think that we are properly met. Hey I like your link to the chamyouth website. I like your advice very much, Malay Ako. I personally do not think that it is hard at all to dream of a peaceful cooperative world working toward similar human needs. However, it is a sad reality for the Khmer that their stronger neighbors still control parts of their legal territories. The Khmer people need peace but peace is always hard to come by as they are surrounded by arrogant neighbors There is more to me than just my Khmerness. Until next time, my brother, I thank you for your comment.

I agree to that. Unless someone can prove to me that Funan was something else, so far, no one has and so Funan is still a Khmer Kingdom.