djkr and friends take on Life

poor ris low. fresh off singaporeans mocking her for her poor english, it has to come to light that miss ris low yi min was once convicted for credit card fraud. her plight curiously mirrors that of carrie prejean, the dethroned miss california, who first raised the ire of the LBGT community with her statements during the miss USA Pageant (‘i think i believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman’), which she credited to her faith. eventually, topless pictures of her were dug up and displayed on the world wide web for all to see, leading to furore (‘which good christian woman would pose topless?’) and her eventual fall from grace.

credit card fraud is no small matter. unlike miss prejean, whose only offense was speaking her mind and posing topless, what ris actually did was criminally wrong. stealing credit cards that were left on the counter by absent minded patients, she went on a shopping spree, pampering her self with gold chains (loud i am sure) and luxury meals.

by keeping quiet on the issue, ERM World Marketing, the organisers of the pageant, have done nothing help their own cause. if ris did not declare to ERM that she was once convicted in a court of law, ERM should speak up now to avoid further bad publicity. by not saying anything now, their silence is an admission of knowledge of her past. absurdly, in the straits times today, one ERM employee was quoted to have said “singaporeans did not pay for her’, in response to being told that Singaporeans were asking ris to be stripped of her crown.

it is a slap to the cheek really; while is true that we did not pay a cent for her, she is going to be representing singapore at an international event. we definitely have a stake in her and ERM should respond to the public appropriately. it also insinuates that ERM has a certain ‘control’ over the selection process; something which questions their intelligence. really? you let a person convicted of credit card fraud to join the pageant and even let her win it? you paid for this to happen?  naturally, i foresee a negative impact on the next edition of the pageant.

to be fair to ris, if razor tv did not run the embarrassing expose on her poor english, none of this might have happened. but in today’s day and age, especially with the rise of social media, one cannot expect to hide any details of one’s life, even more so if you are a celebrity. she (and the rest of the contestants) should have expected this to happen when she joined the pageant.

eventually, the biggest losers in the entire saga might actually be Singapore. with local pageants losing the public’s interest (that was once a time when mediacorp used to sponsor the pageant, i think it all went down hill after they pulled their sponsorship), poor results on the international stage, this farce might be a hammer blow to the ailing scene.

not that i actually watch TV anymore or care for who wins really.

how safe is one’s blog? and how private is private? i have been following with some interest over the last month about a few incidents in singapore where personal blogs and forums have taken centre stage in singapore.

the latest incident is regarding a lady who claims to have been molested by her friend while in korea. the problem is objectivity. while yesterday’s new paper came up with a story on the lady’s point of view gave some support for the lady online, today’s article about the man’s story has created a backlash for her, criticizing her for not giving the full story. however, when blogging or describing any situation concerning yourself, it is hard to be objective. to be honest, how many people are truly objective when they feel wronged.

face it, unless you lock your blog’s entry to friends via password, it is open to whole wide web. that is to say any tom dick or harry and/or people who blog surf incessently for juicy bits of gossip . that leaves your blog (and mine too) and open target for commentators, who have every right to flame or support you. when making a statement in cyberspace, it is nearly as important as doing it in real life. thats how technology has become so intergrated in our lives.

similarly, other bloggers, such as the female blogger who criticized mindef about NS and the blogger who got caught by the police for writing racist remarks online, have been in the headlines. while some posts are deserving of flaming , some online readers are taking their brand of online justice too far.

forums are ablaze with these stories, with each forumer either criticizing or supporting these bloggers. i myself have been reading on ongoings for the past 1 month and i am going sit on the fence for all of them. because none of us truly know the full story. however, with heavy handed criticism of these blogs on forums, i can’t help but wonder: if bloggers are subject to being pointed fingers out, how about the forumers who point the fingers?

the internet gives a cloak of anonymity. however, this cloak is more false for bloggers who post with their real names then forumers who post under a handle. in fact, bloggers should realise by putting their real names on their blogs, they have lost that anonymity. fourmers on the other hand are protected by this cloak, as long as they don’t reveal their names. are forumers
and/or people who comment on blogs drunk on this power by lashing out at anything that displeases them? sometimes, the comments they leave on other people’s blogs and tagboards begs to question if they have any maturity. this goes the same with their posts. its a standard case of the pot calling the kettle black.

for example, if you check out the blog posts (locate them yourself) i mentioned above, or rather the blogs that have not closed down due to comment abuse, reading the comments by a poster who identifies him/herself as a user of a popular forum online questions the poster’s intellect. another comment example is insulting the blogger’s grammar and spelling when the forum’s own writing style is a grammatical nightmare.

to the credit to some of the forums/fourmers/posters though, they have shown fairness and objectivity when writing online. instead of joining the mob and setting everything they see in flames, some posts have shown fair handedness and level thinking. some posts also have exposed scams in singapore, such as the recent paperclip scam by some youths.

we need to practice fair argument and reasoning when posting, for all bloggers and forumers, even in ‘casual’ blogs and forums. or in the end, we will be empty vessels.

–

that make the most noise.

for a journalistic entry on the ministerial forum today at the nanyang audi: refer to terence’s blog.

for the other things (but still truthful nonetheless) read on:

when mm lee arrived in nanyang audi, people got off their seats, applauded him. after all, he is the founding father of modern singapore. i don’t give my applause so readily to anyone, but i found myself clapping quite readily. i am politically apathetic but here is man who has done more in a lifetime than most.

in a summary his opening address was about singapore’s future and how we were to keep ahead. first, he said, in this period of prosperity, there must be planning for troubled times. this comment was also rather common sense, but surprisingly, many people do not heed it . we are kind of blinded by the good news that we don’t know what to do if the bad news strikes.

second, the need to bring our neighbours up to speed. singapore’s economy depends on them too. if we have rich neighbours, we will be rich too. also there will be less tension between them and us. and i think there was a third point.

but i digress. the main reason, though, for me being there was for the discussion between him and students.

i am glad terence was the first to go ahead to speak today. it probably takes a lot of guts to do it (he told me that his legs were shaking whilst asking the question thought) but if he didn’t do it, he probably would not have a chance to speak. “with the advent of web 2.0 and the new forms of media, how is censorship relevant today” – or something like that was his question.

after terence, were a string of foreign students. chinese, indian, vietnamese. but where were the singaporeans? zak was queuing up in line but he never got his chance in the end. i think it kind of annoyed mm lee in a sense that no singaporean student wanted to ask him a question. so much so that he extended the forum another 10 minutes to answer 2 more singaporean’s questions.

there was this girl, called michelle, from english literature, who i thought had the balls to actually ask mm lee to wait when he wanted to close the session. she stated that there weren’t any arts questions and when she did ask a question about arts, she didn’t have the substance to carry it through. too bad though, she was quite daring. how many people can ask mm lee to wait?

now, after this forum, i realised why mm lee is good at what he is doing. he of course, is a politician. in all the questions he answered (or could not answer), he sidestepped them. but did he really sidestep them? if you read into his responses, you can actually find some truth in them. when answering terence’s question about censorship, he did not exactly answer the question per se, but if you read deep into his answer (‘we don’t track what you do on the internet, you are free to access any site, we have credible publications in st and zb’), he actually is challenging you in a sense to answer your own question. or rather, the tools are there, but it is up to you to use them.

same with michelle’s question. i found it highly amusing when he replied michelle’s question (censorship is limiting singaporean’s exposure to the arts and hence their creativity in the whole) this way: ‘you mean that censorship is making us less creative and suppressing your own individual creativity?’

you better phrase your stuff right before you ask mm lee anything.

whenever a foreign student stood up to ask mm lee a question, he would always ask them one question. where do you come from and how long have you learnt english? it may have been a question to let him compose his thoughts and think of an answer, but what struck me was something different. why did always ask the same question all the time? these mainland chinese are catching up. fast. although these are the brightest of the lot, it doesn’t take 10% of the chinese and indians to be bright for them to be leaders of the world economy. just 0.1% is enough.

he always commended the chinese and indians who took the mic to have good english. and if i read his purpose correctly, it was a pseudo-warning to us singaporeans: the chinese and indians are coming, and if you don’t buck up, ship out.

where were the singaporeans? i will never know whether those in queue were singaporeans but the first few speakers were all foreigners (bar terence), which is worrying for us locals. has the silver spoon jaded us to this degree? i would have asked him a question, but i had nothing to ask, which now on hindsight is a pity.

another piece of trivia was revealed too when a vietnamese (sci year 2) asked him if he could a course in ntu now, what course would he have taken if he was 19 years old. he said economics and maths (for the economy) and political science (for politics). but the thing is, he said he would not have taken law again. the reasoning i found strikingly similiar to mine: in law, the better paying clients are usually the ones who are least morally credible. and all they(lawyers) had to do was to use their skills to prove who was right and wrong. and of course, with more money, you can afford better lawyers. but i guess, for the lawyer who is defending the better paying client, the cost of it is your moral soul.

it was interesting to observe mm lee and the things on the table during the forum. he touched his nose at least 5 times during the entire forum when he spoke, probably a bad habit. and the water on his table. how many security checks must it have gone through before he finally got to drink it. my roommate mentions whenever he said “the government”, his hand was on his chest.

there were times in the answers to the questions, he sidetracked badly. there was this chinese student who had asked bout migration of people from singapore and to singapore. and somehow he got lost in climate change in the end while trying to link the two together. age may have finally caught up with him….

but he is mm lee.
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mm lee is really old by the way.
i mean sitting in the same room as him shows his age.
lol.

recently, there has been a great hoo-ha on about the proposed pay rise of ministers. there has been a war (one sided really) on the internet forums, a barrage of letters and articles in the newspaper and even MM Lee commenting on the topic himself!

while i am not a political blogger, or one that likes to comment on politics itself, i feel a bit obliged to comment on this episode. (for various reasons i don’t want to comment here) this is my view, from a person who does not read or post in political forums and is politically neutral.

the proposed pay-rise is an ill timed announcement. the lay man will see the gst increase to 7% connected to the ministerial pay rise increase and complain. even i see it that way! why increase the pay of ministers at a time when people are griping over paying more for a loaf of bread?

of course, forumers are up in arms. but MM Lee did raise one very very valid point. on the point that the increased ministerial pay was to ensure a competent government, he said that a ‘cure’ for these complains was an inept government.

that is so true. we only complain if we have it good. maybe that is what we need.

-end of first (and possibly last) political comment.-

politics. don’t talk too much about it unless you intend to do something about it besides being a closet activist.

but the way, i think what i have done by linkin park off their new album is gold. woohoo!