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- Dec 30, 2010
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Here’s the one thing the PAP should do, but won’t: Self Reflection.
I’ve been reading comments and there are people who took the ‘attack’ on the government as an attack on ‘Singapore’.
Anti-establishment whiners and TRS’ small village people aside, there’s actually a sizable group of people who support the attack. Now, a lot of people’s first reaction to it is defensive, i.e. “HOW COULD YOU!” or “AN ATTACK ON GAHMENT IS ATTACK ON SINGAPORE”, etc. Thing is though…why should we even be surprised? I know I’m not.
In fact, if I were the government, after issuing the obligatory announcements about hunting them ‘baddies’ down (I mean, which government would say “Hey, ok, do what you want”), I would be asking myself this question:
“Why are the same people who put me in power not treating me as one of them?”
Not sure about you, but as the government, this would be a big bloody wake-up call for me, and I’d be spending a lot of time thinking about it.
Think about it: People will only take ownership and treat the government as part of the them if they feel that the government is looking out for them… and I’m not talking about a popularity contest. To put this into perspective, there are many who think that Lee Kwan Yew was a bit of a tyrant, he sure as hell wasn’t popular because he was charismatic and ‘nice’, and yet, if this were to happen during his time, I’d bet the response would be very different in 2 ways: First, there probably wouldn’t even be an attack by anonymous in the first place and second, the majority of Singaporeans would instantaneously rally behind the government as a single entity known as ‘Singapore’.
I’m surprised that everyone’s focused on the attack and nobody’s worried about the response of the people.
To me, this simply reinforces the fact that the current generation leaders are not respected at all.
I personally feel that the words ‘Ivory Tower’ and ‘Righteous Ignorance’ are part of the problem. Interestingly, Singaporean ministers also remind me of the 2 kids in ‘Ender’s Game’ that assumes that just because they didn’t win, it means that the others must have cheated.
Ultimately though, given our current government’s inability to handle criticisms and rejections and their misguided belief that they’re god’s infallible gift to Singapore, the predictable thing is for them to dismiss what has happened here as a minor annoyance, missing out on what’s possibly one of the most important calls for self reflection to date, which will, ironically, if done properly, actually help them connect better to the people of Singapore and win back the support they sorely need.
But then again, maybe I’m just overcomplicating things, since all the PAP needs to do when the time comes is to tabao chicken rice, rally a planned crowd to give the impression of support, give some GST angpaos and they’ll be set for another 4 years.
http://www.theaaronloy.com/pap-vs-anonymous-the-one-thing-the-pap-should-do-but-wont/
I’ve been reading comments and there are people who took the ‘attack’ on the government as an attack on ‘Singapore’.
Anti-establishment whiners and TRS’ small village people aside, there’s actually a sizable group of people who support the attack. Now, a lot of people’s first reaction to it is defensive, i.e. “HOW COULD YOU!” or “AN ATTACK ON GAHMENT IS ATTACK ON SINGAPORE”, etc. Thing is though…why should we even be surprised? I know I’m not.
In fact, if I were the government, after issuing the obligatory announcements about hunting them ‘baddies’ down (I mean, which government would say “Hey, ok, do what you want”), I would be asking myself this question:
“Why are the same people who put me in power not treating me as one of them?”
Not sure about you, but as the government, this would be a big bloody wake-up call for me, and I’d be spending a lot of time thinking about it.
Think about it: People will only take ownership and treat the government as part of the them if they feel that the government is looking out for them… and I’m not talking about a popularity contest. To put this into perspective, there are many who think that Lee Kwan Yew was a bit of a tyrant, he sure as hell wasn’t popular because he was charismatic and ‘nice’, and yet, if this were to happen during his time, I’d bet the response would be very different in 2 ways: First, there probably wouldn’t even be an attack by anonymous in the first place and second, the majority of Singaporeans would instantaneously rally behind the government as a single entity known as ‘Singapore’.
I’m surprised that everyone’s focused on the attack and nobody’s worried about the response of the people.
To me, this simply reinforces the fact that the current generation leaders are not respected at all.
I personally feel that the words ‘Ivory Tower’ and ‘Righteous Ignorance’ are part of the problem. Interestingly, Singaporean ministers also remind me of the 2 kids in ‘Ender’s Game’ that assumes that just because they didn’t win, it means that the others must have cheated.
Ultimately though, given our current government’s inability to handle criticisms and rejections and their misguided belief that they’re god’s infallible gift to Singapore, the predictable thing is for them to dismiss what has happened here as a minor annoyance, missing out on what’s possibly one of the most important calls for self reflection to date, which will, ironically, if done properly, actually help them connect better to the people of Singapore and win back the support they sorely need.
But then again, maybe I’m just overcomplicating things, since all the PAP needs to do when the time comes is to tabao chicken rice, rally a planned crowd to give the impression of support, give some GST angpaos and they’ll be set for another 4 years.
http://www.theaaronloy.com/pap-vs-anonymous-the-one-thing-the-pap-should-do-but-wont/
