http://www.facebook.com/sociologicalthoughts
http://www.sociologicalthoughts.com/2012/10/09/reflexive-analysis-of-recent-outbursts/
Picture credit:
http://asiasingapore.blogspot.sg/2012/10/ntuc-fired-amy-cheong-for-racist.html
The recent Amy Cheong incident comes as no surprise to me and I
believe many others in Singapore society. For one, such racist rant
on social media is not a first and no longer an unthinkable taboo.
It comes as no coincidence that I have recently been thinking and
writing about the culture of hate and the impact of the social
media platform. These are institutions tightly related to one
another; giving rise to one another.
To expand my own reflection about this issue, I spoke to my dad
whose perspectives I cherish as a well socialised member of the
previous generation. To dad, such an outburst is completely
pathological and his rationalization of the act was that to some
extent, Amy “must be crazy” as any sane person would surely have
known that he/she can “never talk about race in this manner in
Singapore”.
My dad’s perspective is a completely logical presentation of
Singapore society of the previous generation. Socialised in the way
of racial harmony – fully aware of consequences of a multicultural
society that does not live with respect for one another. This
institutionalized norm that is so well socialised in him and many
others sets up the context for us to think about this present
generation – let’s call ourselves “the status generation”.
Picture credit:
http://blog.hubspot.com/Portals/249/images/social-media.png
I use the term “status” because of how prevalent this notion of
updating status on the internet has become – whether it is through
microblogging on Twitter, Facebook updates, Instagram, Tumblr,
etc.. you get the picture. We are a generation that seems to (I am
obviously lacking empirical evidence so I want to stress that this
is just a personal reflection and I hesitate to generalize) want
the world to know what’s going on in our lives – as far as
possible.
It is not difficult to argue this point simply because so many of
us subscribe to it (myself included) – consciously or
subconsciously – and it is fast institutionalizing into a norm of
status update rather than a purposive and narcissistic showcase of
self to the world. This has come to a point whereby a person who is
completely inactive on Facebook or Twitter would be known as
someone who has “completely disappeared from the face of the
Earth”.
This brings us back to the Amy Cheong incident. Setting up the
premise of this article the I have done is not my way of defending
Amy Cheong’s actions as an outcome of society and institutions. On
the contrary, I am completely against what she has done and there
is absolutely no excuse that she could come up with that would
allow her to get away with her actions (of course this doesn’t
necessarily means she ought to be harshly sanctioned as a example
to Singapore society – we are more liberal than that). I have set
up the premise in this way because I want us all to look at all the
possible mechanisms in the current Singapore society that have
propelled such racial or general outbursts to occur on a more and
more frequent basis. So for a start, let’s focus on the
institutions.
As I have argued thus far, our “status generation” has normalised
updates regarding personal opinions and issues but not remove our
consciousness from basic social decorum such as upholding racial
harmony. However, there are institutions in place that have
inadvertently encouraged and increasingly normalised the expression
of disdain in Singapore society and one such example is STOMP.
Picture credit: www.stomp.com.sg
For all those reading this that aren’t familiar with STOMP, it is
a citizen-journalism website with user-generated material
fuelling its readership. While its bottom-up approach to hearing
the voices of the people is recommendable, it has created a
community where people can share pictures and thoughts of acts in
public that are perceived as undesirable; usually in a voyeuristic
and anonymous fashion. Increasingly, this culture of sharing is
being institutionalised and the support of others within the
community for certain issues have given many Singaporeans the moral
courage of openly expressing their disdain for others away from
this parent medium of STOMP.
Of course, this is all a personal analysis of the situation at hand
and many may disagree and argue the positive aspects of such a
community. I do not disagree of these positive aspects but at
present, we have to acknowledge the impacts of all influential
institutions on our civil society.
Having discussed examples of institutional influence, we have to
analyse Amy’s actions for what it is. Racism. Fundamentally, humans
are ethnocentric creatures with empathy. While there may be
cultural performances that are difficult to comprehend or accept at
first glance due to our ethnocentric instincts, our rational and
empathetic minds would easily bring us to a positive resolution.
The problem is that the issue which Amy gave such a strong reaction
to was neither difficult nor foreign to any person in any society.
It is a simple celebration of love that is recognisable in all
forms and all types of ceremonial celebrations. The fact that Amy
has failed to appreciate a celebration of love and chose to express
disdain over it shows the possible problem which may arise from our
progressive society.
I argue that there is a rising class within the middle class – the
educated middle class – that has a shared consciousness and belief
that they are above the rest of society in terms of absolute
knowledge. When this class of people argue, they leave no room for
others to voice their opinions as they are in the belief that they
knowledge is flawless and their opinions are right simply because
it is their opinion and they are too well educated to be wrong.
This is one of the unintended outcomes of our knowledge-based
society.
To me, being educated is a gift – a gift that does not justify
dismissal of culture or others alike. The truly learned will
understand that there is no knowledge that is complete and in every
discourse, there will be room for debate. No one person in the
world will possess such absolute knowledge to dismiss others as
insignificant or unworthy. Yes, we are backed by google; yes,
wikipedia says so much; and yes, infinite information lies at our
fingertips via the internet. Such power from knowledge should be
pushing us towards a more understanding and empathetic society as
it is ever so easy now to gain contextual knowledge of any culture
or tradition that we may fail to comprehend at first glance.
We are the educated generation that can contribute positively
towards the progress of societies in general and as a start, we
should acknowledge that as citizens of this civil and educated
society, we are all equals that can benefit and learn greatly from
one another’s cultures to become more diversified in our identity
and ever more depth in our characters.
It is always easy to criticise – especially when a particular
incident is blown out of proportion and expression of anger is just
jumping onto the bandwagon that was well on its way. What is
difficult is showing tolerance in the face of absolute ignorance
and using such a challenging time to reflect on our own
positionality within this educated society – to ensure that we do
not fall into the trap of taking the moral high ground and yet
fighting hate with hate – intolerance with intolerance.
