As I have said, it is not up to us to think otherwise, that's what other people think at large.
We all know in Singapore we do not share a common culture, if there is really any. Singlish is the only distinctive lingo we have in Singapore. However, people in China do not understand this. They just look at you, Chinese but not able to speak Chinese.
I would be happy to eradicate the requirement of second language but I would want to maintain Mother Tongue language curriculum at a respectable standards here. It is not going to do us good to force people like you to take Chinese but at the same time, we need to reduce the standards to extremely low level just to make sure everybody is happy and able to cope with it. But the catch is this, you or your children will have to be subjected to such strange looks from people in this globalized world.
You didn't get the drift. People, especially Chinese PRCs or Japanese, would expect a Chinese to at least speak Mandarin. They won't expect a "minority" to speak Mandarin. i.e. Not a Malay or Indian to speak Mandarin. It is a kind of subtle cultural expectation from them.
And the thing is this. You or your children could well pick up English any time later in life, but Chinese is hard to be learned when you pass 6 years old. It has to do with the character-based structure of Chinese while English is basically alphabet-based. In terms of phonetics, Mandarin is based on different structure which stress on 4-5 tones while English is based on phonetic combination only.
If you are happy not to learn Chinese, so be it. And I think the state/government, shouldn't force you to do it. On the other hand, I wouldn't force anyone who do not want to learn English to do it as well. I am pretty liberal on this issue. Open up the language options, as I say. I am even open to having English as second language if people chose to do so. But would you agree to such options?
Goh Meng Seng
My simple questions to you are: Does having pride in one's culture mean you have to be able to speak and write in that language EXCELLENTLY? What exactly is the culture of SG? Is it totally Chinese or Malay or Indian or others? If not, why the insistence that we attain a minimum level of proficiency in second languages? Why not go further and insist everyone, including minorities be proficient in Chinese and use it to replace English's position? The whole attitude smacks of chauvinism and discrimination.
Countries like US, Oz, NZ, Taiwan have a language that is alien to that of the original natives because they implemented it by force. Are you saying we should also do that for Chinese now? If yes, then I will agree that everyone must be proficient in Chinese.