from green to black

singaporeans are stupid?

as usual i am less forgiving of the morons who complain
about our 1 party state without doing anything to change
it. uncle ivan was telling us about this taxi driver who
swore he would pack up his bags and leave if there was
going to be no new opposition voted in overwhelmingly in
the next general election which pundits believe would be
held soon. i believe that moron will be leaving.

singaporeans, contrary to mr taxi driver's opinions, are
generally quite smart. they know that increases in gst
(a regressive tax) hurts them. they also know that they
are paying more for less. they know that public transport
leaves them no private space, filling overcrowded vehicles
such that pregnant women and the elderly have no place
to sit. they know they have the deaf ear of the government
turned towards them such that what is decided, stays decided.
they know that they cannot prevent the autonomous increase
of parking charges and erp gantries that dont seem to do
their job other than increasing revenus for the government.

yes they know.

they also know we have a 1st class this, that, with
everything that is so nice and clean. and the best part
is they didnt do it, the government did it all. forget
the industrious, dauntless forebears, one wise leader
did it all. of course not! but that is certainly what
they are led to believe when they are faced with the
question if they can envision a singapore without the
party.

singaporeans arent as stupid as they are selfish and gutless.

that pretty much reminds me of the 3rd reich. we didnt
have stupid germans who thought that senseless killing
was wrong, we had good people who were too indifferent
to doing anything to oppose the system directly.

but i digress, the comparison being obviously unfair
because nothing precious other than our "rights" are
actually being denied. why the inverted commas? because
they would argue that my definition of rights is
probably not universal and thus should not be foisted
upon others in the workings of the state. i will let
the reader decide of course, but for a party not in
power, i wonder if it will change its tune.

singaporeans are selfish. they believe that political
activity is "someone else's job". someone else should
bear the public scrutiny, someone else should sift through
the myriad of information, someone else should make
the decisions. a job our dear party is only to happy to
oblige, and it would be a fine arrangement if only we
were not so dissatisfied with the outcomes. through
their avoidance of public activity in order to focus
on personal gains, it is no wonder that everybody loses.

singaporeans are also gutless, if they are not faced
by the prospect of changing the status quo they shy
away from taking any public stand at all. which is
quite a wonder since they dont waste time complaining,
being part of the transformative process should appeal
to them save for point one.

it follows that they shouldnt expect more opposition
to suddenly start sprouting up if these opposing parties
believe that they will not gather enough votes. its
painful to also forfeit the deposit you know. the lesson
is, singaporeans, vote for your opposition if it matters
to you.

the party in power has many a times challenged the
ability of the opposition to put together a capable team.
while i have no doubt that we do not lack talented
people, i believe the public has the perception that
civil service neutrality cannot be obtained. personal
links and relationships forged over the years of working
together are not discarded at the change of leadership.
however i feel that the bureaucracy should remember that
they are there to "serve the people" represented by
their elected leaders. perhaps we should let the situation
play out before making a judgement.

just a few thoughts before i end off.

if our leadership has done well and our economy is strong
that corporate tax revenues are healthy, why do we need to
increase other sources of government revenue such as erp
having qualified that it really doesnt help traffic flow?

if we are not doing that well, has our leadership truly
been transparent with us?

why is our leadership always hiding behind the veil of
sensitive info, do we actually have something to hide?

we never really see our reserves, is it actually there?
knowing that costs are rising internationally and that
exports and exchange contribute to slimmer margins, isnt
the first question worthy of further examination?

i am not in anyway suggesting that we have been done over
in anyway but i am questioning why we are that averse
to re-examination. in our flow of life, we are constantly
being screened over and over before being deemed capable.
why is our government not held to the same level of peer
examination?

i guess there are other cases where we should put 2 and 2
together. scrutinizing such actions could give us a better
insight to what is happening rather than accepting what
we are told. at the moment, i'd stick with selfish and
gutless. i hope i would have to change my stand to stupid.

posted by green unseen @ 2:25 AM