Probably not even the most avid Singaporean fans of The Hunger Games would have come across a site called “Hunger Games Tweets”. Not surprising, because it’s not your typical fansite.
Hunger Games Tweets was set up to address an America-specific social problem: racism against African Americans.
This is how it all started.
You see, many who read the trilogy before watching the movie didn’t know one of the key characters in the first book, Rue, was an African American girl. The result was sporadic racist rants on Twitter by Hunger Games fans who couldn’t believe one of their favourite characters in the book wasn’t Anglo American.
Hunger Games Tweets was set up by a 29-year-old fan to name and shame racist twitterers (or twits?) and has since evolved to carry articles and videos deconstructing negative racial stereotypes.
In Britain, the organization Unite Against Facism (UAF) is a pressure group supported by all Members of Parliament of the mainstream political parties. UAF organizes counter-protests whenever anti-immigration and racist parties like the British National Party and similar parties gather in public.
Similar anti-racist coalitions exist in much of Europe.
So recently, I started thinking about why nothing similar exists in Singapore.
Some websites I’ve come across are fuelled almost exclusively by stalking and targeting foreigners, with most of the comment threads awash with invective. The term “foreign trash” is one of the politer terms I’ve come across.
Almost everyone I’ve spoken to in person finds the content objectionable, which should lead a right thinking person to wonder why so few people online dare to take a stand against such content.
Perhaps part of the reason is the perception that to speak up against such xenophobia is somehow “pro-government”.
The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) has imported foreign workers to a point that ordinary citizens have been physically discomfited by their increased numbers. This is exacerbated by buckling infrastructure and depressed wages.
This leads Singaporeans to inextricably link their perceived foreigner-related-woes to the PAP.
However, it would be a pity for sensible Singaporeans to remain silent while the virtual pogroms rage, all because of an irrational fear of being tarred as “pro-government”.
Surely, a basic sense of human decency is not the exclusive preserve of either the government or opposition.
It is perfectly possible to criticize government immigration policies without having to stoke xenophobic sentiment.
For instance, one can disagree with the number of permits given by the Ministry of Manpower to foreign construction workers and still take a strong stand against unscrupulous construction companies who exploit these workers.
The same sense of social justice that leads us to speak out for a fellow Singaporean hard done by as the result of government health care policies must surely demand that we respect and affirm the dignity of foreign labourers. After all, aren’t both instincts derived from a shared sense of common humanity?
Recently, Minister of Law Mr K Shanmugam said that “We must affirm our Singaporean identity and must protect it. (But) at the same time, let's not turn this into a xenophobic attack on foreigners in general”.
This is fundamentally correct, but many Singaporeans will remain cynical that the government’s motive in making such pronouncements is to dismiss rational criticism against the open-door policy as xenophobia.
For the Government to head off such concerns, it needs to show that it has heard the concerns of ordinary Singaporeans expressed in GE 2011 and which are continuing to boil over.
It also needs to demonstrate that the recent “Occasional Paper” by the National Population and Talent Division that recommended 25,000 new citizens a year is open to re-negotiation after broader consultation with Singaporean. We need to have broader debate on what it means to be Singaporean and the value of citizenship before citizenship numbers are increased.
Unless the above is done, the cynicism will remain and the gap between the rational discourse Singaporeans deserve and the invective that we are currently being treated to will only continue to grow.
I’ll end this article with a quote by a commenter on The Online Citizen’s Facebook page.
“This isn't about politics people. This is about who we are. And there is no justifying the actions of those who slam the foreigners for all the little mistakes they make. Just with the comments made here, you have people trying to justify their actions, essentially saying "It's the government's fault that I'm doing this".
But no, I do not believe that is right. Blame the government all you wish, hate on them all you want, but do not use it to justify the hateful mindset against foreigners that do not deserve it."
(Zheng Xi is a co-founder and former Chief Editor of The Online Citizen (TOC). He is now a Consultant Editor with TOC. Professionally, Zheng Xi is a lawyer in private practice. Read his previous article on the population paper.)
(The views and opinions expressed by the author and those providing comments are theirs alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of inSing.com and SingTel Digital Media Ptd Ltd.)
http://news.insing.com/tabloid/are-people-afraid-to-speak-up-against-xenophobia/id-be453f00
