The topic of Singapore's freedom and democracy came up in a
number of other topics concerning Dr Chee's protest in the Speaker
Corner. In an effort not to hijack the original thread, I start
this topic to discuss purely on the above mentioned issue. I remind
my fellow forumees that this is a discussion thread and I would
appreciate if we can all discuss on the basis of reasons and facts
rather than using emotionally abusive terminology or using the
thread as an emotion venting outlet.
On Freedom:
In a previous thread, I have had a brief exchange with ShutterBug
on the concept of freedom.
I refer to FREEDOM as it is used commonly and naturally as in
the phrase; "FREE as a bird". FREE like any creature warm blooded
or otherwise. FREE as we are born naturally FREE. Free as in "Born
Free".
Freedom needs not to be 'forced' onto any person or peoples.
Freedom comes with our life/lives.
And FREEDOM, depending on which country, society, and or community
you were born in, is to some extent and by conditions, controlled
and or regulated for reasons personal, governmental or otherwise
political. But FREEDOM cannot be lived in FEAR as is the case with
FEER.
In FEAR, there is NO FREEDOM. If there is FREEDOM, there is and
should not be, any FEAR.
Man are born free, but everywhere he is in chains. -
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
The freedom that is currently most commonly interpretated is the
liberal concept of freedom, a freedom from interference. In short,
the more rules there are in place, the less freedom there is
available. Yet, achieving absolute freedom may not be necessary
desirable. For if freedom is unlimited, then there cannot be any
rules and laws. Any rule, even restrictions that prohibit murder
and other crimes, is an infringement on freedom.
As you have said, freedom "is to some extent and by conditions,
controlled and or regulated for reasons personal, governmental or
otherwise political" These freedoms are regulated to eliminate
fear. Fear of being murdered is generally reduce by restricting the
freedom to kill. Fear of being stolen is reduced by restricting the
freedom to steal.
There may be some that argue that murder and theft are not freedom,
they are crimes! But until these actions are restricted and became
crimes, they are freedom. For if man are born free, they can do
anything limit only by their ability. Hence the need for a state to
limit these "freedom".
Fear and freedom are therefore not zero-sum, they need not
substitute each other, the deminish of one can also deminish the
other. This is not to say that over-restriction of freedom will not
create fear. Too much restrictions causes people to continuously
fear these restriction. The essential is therefore to balance
freedom and fear, to maximise freedom within the framework of not
increasing fear. The extremes are easily define, eg you want to
restrict the freedom of killing, but not the freedom of breathing.
But there are a lot of freedoms that fall into the grey area and
nobody exactly know the correct level of limitation that should be
placed upon them. This correct level can only be found differently
at each individual society via a long period of trial and
error.
"Freedom needs not to be 'forced' onto any person
or peoples. Freedom comes with our life/lives. Correction, freedom
should not be forced upon. If people choose not to
live in the level of freedom preferred by others, then a general
concensus must be estimated for these people to continue to live
together. There are people who believe that we should have less
restriction on freedom of speech and demostration but they may not
neccessary be the majority. Assuming that the people of Singapore
are not supporting Dr Chee out of fear and ignorant is a personal
assumption not neccessary shared by the rest of the
community.
Before liberal democracy and freedom and be attempted to be
achieved. Extensive efforts must be taken to understand if the
society of Singapore really prefer it. If the society is not
intensively keen upon it, then any attempt to change the current
arrangement by means that utilise assistence from foreign societies
would be "forcing" the "preferred level of freedom" of a minority
on the majority, which paradoxically contradict its own
ideology.
Knowledge and concept of freedom and democracy must also be
throughly explore before it can be efficiently and safely advocated
to our fellow Singaporeans. Forums such as this are social means to
explore the topic and I hope that this thread can contribute to the
effort of concept and ideology exploration as much to the general
public as much it is to me.