January 18, 2010
It was supposed to be a routine run of the mill
article on Temasek Review on the issue of foreign workers, but it
ended up being the most commented article in its history. (read
article
here)
In the span of four days, the article about a young Myanmar
lady working as an accounts executive in Singapore and
taking English lessons at a Community Club at the same
time had atracted more than 5,000 readers and 400 comments so
far.
Apparently, somebody had tipped off the Burmese community in
Singapore who flooded our site posting comments berating us for
“insulting” the Myanmar lady by posting her particulars online when
we had obtained the information from Straits Times.
Some posters accused us of poking fun at her language skills and
demanded that we apologize and delete the article. Others slammed
us for being “unprofessional” and threatened to sue us.
Though we have explained repeatedly that the gist of the article
is about the immigration policies of the ruling party and not
on any particular persons or nationality, the flaming continue
unabated till it becomes a mud-slinging session for both the
foreign workers and locals to vent their frustrations, resentment
and anger.
Judging from the comments posted, it is quite obvious that the
tension has been building up in both communities for quite some
time already. Our article is merely a spark which triggered the
storm.
While the Burmese felt that they were being bullied by the
locals, Singaporeans are of the view that they are here to snatch
away jobs are otherwise taken up by them.
This is probably the first time that an all-out “flame war” has
broken out between foreigners and locals, a reflection of how
serious the problem has become which continues to be ignored by the
ruling party.
In an ambitious plan to increase Singapore’s population to 6.5
million people, the ruling party had allowed too many foreigners
into Singapore in too short a period of time without taking into
consideration the interests and feeling of Singaporeans.
After realizing the extent of the problem, they decided to throw
money at it in the form of a $10 million dollar Community
Integration Fund which proved to be “too little, too
late.”
The root cause of the social tension lies in the fact that
Singaporeans feel they are not getting a fair deal from the
government as rightful citizens of the nation ranging from housing
subsidies, places in primary schools to jobs which pay well.
Singapore had accepted many immigrants from Malaysia,
Indonesia, Hong Kong and Taiwan in the 1980s and 1990s and
Singaporeans never had any issues with them as they are similar to
us in culture and had come in smaller numbers.
The latest wave of immigration saw the ruling party opened the
floodgates to the world, especially Chinese and Indians who flocked
to Singapore in such large numbers that they do not see the need to
integrate into Singapore society.
Some questioned why we did not close the article for comments
which appears to be inciting hatred between the Burmese and
Singaporeans.
We are leaving it open for the authorities to see for themselves
the mess they have created for Singaporeans and if they do not
revamp their policies radically and reverse the intake of
foreigners, the flaming they see on TR now will spill over into
real life one day.
http://www.temasekreview.com/2010/01/18/protracted-online-flame-war-between-foreigners-and-locals-on-tr-a-warning-for-future-social-unrest/
http://www.temasekreview.com/2010/01/14/myanmar-national-with-poor-command-of-english-working-as-accounts-executive-in-singapore/
