looks like somebody is reaping what he sowed:
Modernity without grace
Singaporeans are richer, smarter but short of something that makes them a truly developed people.
By Seah Chiang Nee, littlespeck.com
Jan 27, 2008
FOR years image-conscious Singaporeans have been buying expensive pedigree dogs and abandoning them shortly afterwards when they get tired of them.
This perverse hobby is prevalent among the rising upper middle class, which thinks nothing about throwing a few thousand dollars on a high profile pet for their children – and then discarding it.
Every time a popular movie that features dogs – whether Shepherds or Dalmatians – hits town, sales go up, invariably followed a year or two later by more abandonment.
That would happen when they find out that the glamour of owning these pets wears off after a while.
Animal organisations have had a hard time advising people about the social responsibility of ownership and, when that fails, of looking after their mistake.
The level of graciousness in Singapore, whether towards people or animals, has improved through the years but lags the pace of its economic progress.
With better education and numerous government campaigns, Singaporeans are more courteous today than 40 years ago.
They spit less, cuss less and are generally more helpful to people in need compared with the past.
But weighed against its ambition to become a vibrant global city, Singapore is pathetically short in social graces.
Stories abound of bitter feuds between neighbours over petty matters like a pair of shoes, housewives abusing their maids on a daily basis, or road rage flared over a parking space.
Singaporeans still jump queue, litter public places, shove their way into trains or cast racist remarks.
“Many commuters do not give up their seats to a pregnant woman or a senior citizen,” said a student. “They pretend to sleep when they see one.”
Another common complaint: Young people walk past you without a word of thanks when you open the door for them, or talk loudly on the mobile phone in a restaurant.
Smiling salesmen turn impolite when you bargain too hard or, worse, leave without buying.
To be sure, boorish people are a minority. Most Singaporeans do act responsibly and considerately, but there are enough rude, ungracious people that cast a shadow over SingaporeÂ’s clean and green image.
Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew does not believe that a gracious society is achievable during his lifetime.
“I will not see it. Maybe you will live long enough to see it. I wish you well,” Lee told an audience of diplomats, academics and government leaders last week.
Even the British, with 150 years of lording over an empire and a high level of culture, are still being invaded by football hooligans; and new foreigners are coarsening their society, Lee said.
“So it’s very difficult to get a rough society onto a cultivated plane, and it’s very easy to bring it down,” he concluded.
For Singapore, the idea of a gracious society, “where people are considerate to one another, where you don’t make more noise to upset your neighbour than you need to, where you tell the other motorist 'Please have the right of way',” was hard to come by, he added.
On a similar theme a few days later, Lee called for a cultural renaissance in Singapore to the levels of Italy and Austria in 10 to 15 years.
“If you go to Florence, Venice or Rome and see their churches and museums, you will see sculptors and painters sitting outside trying to copy Leonardo da Vinci. You know that was the beginning of the renaissance,” Lee said. “That is a great civilisation.”
These things take a long time to nurture, but Singapore was achieving some success, referring to home-grown troupes featuring traditional Indonesian and Chinese musical instruments.
The push for a cultivated society must be buttressed by economic growth.
“You cannot have a cultivated society if you have an underclass sleeping under your bridges, in the (street) corners, or in the parks; nor can you have your old abandoned,” Lee added.
Some people say that, while pursuing economic growth, Lee had neglected this area for too long, and itÂ’s something that has to be corrected urgently.
Several factors make SingaporeÂ’s task a difficult one.
Firstl, it is a small, overcrowded place where millions live in tight apartments on top of one another – a living that requires a great deal of patience and tolerance.
Second, amid this sardine-packed environment is added a million new foreigners, who bring with them their diverse habits, languages and cultures with little bond or loyalty to the country.
Third, is the nature of Singaporeans. They are highly competitive and kiasu, many of them tending to fight hard for their space in society.
The older generation tends to be influenced by what Lee says and does.
The trouble is that, in his earlier days, Lee often showed his rough and arrogant ways when confronted by political rivals.
He often talked of breaking heads or meeting them with a knuckle-duster in a back street.
“He showed little graciousness towards people who disagreed with him,” one former journalist said.
Some of this arrogance has rubbed off on SingaporeÂ’s scholars and better educated citizens who grew up with the belief that they had to talk and act tough in order to impress.
Singapore’s longest serving senior civil servant, now retired, Ngiam Tong Dow, said that many of Singapore’s civil servants thought of themselves as “mini Lee Kuan Yews.”
The difference is that Lee had achieved much in history, not them, he said. The same can be said of many Singaporean citizens as well.