- Joined
- Dec 30, 2010
- Messages
- 12,730
- Points
- 113
This would seem less dire if Tan Wu Meng’s smear campaign and Raeesahgate were isolated incidents, but they were not. They were only the latest episodes in a long, sinister trend of weaponising difference.
During the 2011 elections, Dr. Vivian Balakrishnan and his Holland-Bukit Timah GRC teammates mounted a smear campaign against Dr Vincent Wijeysingha, and implied he was out to pursue “a [gay] cause in the political arena”.
One would hope we matured politically in the intervening years. But in 2019 alone, we were treated to the ePay/Preetipls saga, PJ Thum and Kirsten Han’s ill-fated trip to Malaysia, and Ong Ye Kung’s Parliamentary assassination of Alfian Sa’at. (This list is non-exhaustive.)
(Before you start crowing about bias: many opposition politicians have certainly not conducted themselves with grace. Lim Tean, for example, would give Viktor Orban a run for his money in the xenophobia stakes, and deserves to be called out for it. But for all this, they’re not in a position to browbeat voters.)
You could argue that this sort of gutter politics should just be dismissed. But last month, the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (of which retiring PAP MP Charles Chong is a member) issued a report declaring that structural imbalances make Singapore’s elections neither free nor fair, even in the absence of irregularities or electoral fraud.
Bullying, after all, can take many forms beyond straight-up smear campaigns. It can look like our buy-one-get-four free GRC system, which compels voters to choose between anchor ministers or diversity in Parliament. Or emotional blackmail—“What would investors think?”—as though any other country would consider a 60-70% vote share a poor result.
Collectively, all this says: the PAP, for all its technocratic brilliance, has no interest in genuine competition or making the work of building this country a collaborative effort. It stings all the more given how voter literacy and civic engagement are perhaps the highest they’ve ever been (one of the heartening things to come out of this election).
In the long run, this would only encourage Singaporeans to believe our voices don’t matter, breed apathy and cynicism, and alienate us from our own political system.
None of this is healthy for a cohesive society. It should also be deeply worrying in light of how disenfranchisement and frustration have contributed to the rise of far-right populism around the world.
Finally, it should be heartbreaking to anyone who loves this country, regardless of political affiliation. And if the outcry on the Internet is anything to go by, young Singaporeans especially will not forget the ugliness we witnessed this election.
https://www.ricemedia.co/current-affairs-ge-2020-opinion-political-culture-bullying/
During the 2011 elections, Dr. Vivian Balakrishnan and his Holland-Bukit Timah GRC teammates mounted a smear campaign against Dr Vincent Wijeysingha, and implied he was out to pursue “a [gay] cause in the political arena”.
One would hope we matured politically in the intervening years. But in 2019 alone, we were treated to the ePay/Preetipls saga, PJ Thum and Kirsten Han’s ill-fated trip to Malaysia, and Ong Ye Kung’s Parliamentary assassination of Alfian Sa’at. (This list is non-exhaustive.)
(Before you start crowing about bias: many opposition politicians have certainly not conducted themselves with grace. Lim Tean, for example, would give Viktor Orban a run for his money in the xenophobia stakes, and deserves to be called out for it. But for all this, they’re not in a position to browbeat voters.)
You could argue that this sort of gutter politics should just be dismissed. But last month, the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (of which retiring PAP MP Charles Chong is a member) issued a report declaring that structural imbalances make Singapore’s elections neither free nor fair, even in the absence of irregularities or electoral fraud.
Bullying, after all, can take many forms beyond straight-up smear campaigns. It can look like our buy-one-get-four free GRC system, which compels voters to choose between anchor ministers or diversity in Parliament. Or emotional blackmail—“What would investors think?”—as though any other country would consider a 60-70% vote share a poor result.
Collectively, all this says: the PAP, for all its technocratic brilliance, has no interest in genuine competition or making the work of building this country a collaborative effort. It stings all the more given how voter literacy and civic engagement are perhaps the highest they’ve ever been (one of the heartening things to come out of this election).
In the long run, this would only encourage Singaporeans to believe our voices don’t matter, breed apathy and cynicism, and alienate us from our own political system.
None of this is healthy for a cohesive society. It should also be deeply worrying in light of how disenfranchisement and frustration have contributed to the rise of far-right populism around the world.
Finally, it should be heartbreaking to anyone who loves this country, regardless of political affiliation. And if the outcry on the Internet is anything to go by, young Singaporeans especially will not forget the ugliness we witnessed this election.
https://www.ricemedia.co/current-affairs-ge-2020-opinion-political-culture-bullying/
