The Prostitution of Journalism

This posting moved here :


http://theowlcritic.blogspot.com/2011/02/prostitution-of-journalism.html




Thanks.

And in the darkness hang them

Yong Vui Kong received a reprieve from the Court last month. He will not be hung, yet.

It is therefore not too late for him to be shown clemency.

Drug trials in Singapore have been tainted before. Once by a key prosecution witness who turned out to be a wrongdoer. And here by a presumptive Law Minister.

On 9th May 2010,  Mr. K. Shanmugam had this to say " Yong Vui Kong is young..."(a hopeful start)..."But if we let him go, what is the signal we are sending". Gasp! The Law Minister prejudges (almost instructs) the Courts. A week before it decides.
Even worse, he reveals a bloodthirsty rationale. He will see this man hung to 'send a signal'. An Incan Priest in a business suit.

Vui Kong had to start working at the age of 11. He was raised by a single mother. She earned a living washing dishes by the roadside for S$80 a month. The family lived in stark poverty, hunger and deprivation. At 16 he went to Kuala Lumpur to earn a living as a kitchen helper.

At 16, Mr. Shanmugam was at the Raffles Institution. No kitchen help, he. He would go on to NUS and earn a degree in Law. But no education at all, it would seem, in humane values, or the sanctity of life. He wishes to send men to the gallows to send 'signals'.

Vui Kong was uneducated, illeterate, poor and young, he was easy prey to be manipulated.

Spared and rehabilited, he would serve as well an example of the dangers of drugs.

The Too Strict Mr.Lee

In an astonishing feat of self-delusion, Mr. Lee Kuan Yew has labelled Singaporean Malays 'too strict' in his new book. Their  'strictness', Mr. Lee, is nothing compared to yours.

These statements by Mr. Lee, and the furore they have ignited, in fact transcend the issues relating to the Singapore Malays. The real issue is Mr.Lees continuous and unrelenting attacks on all Singaporeans right to liberty and their freeedom as individuals.

Your press publications laws , Mr. Lee, are too strict.
Your limits on free assembly of citizens, are too strict.
Your limits on public speaking , are too strict.
Your curbs on the forming of Societies, are too strict.
Your crackdown on freedom of expression in its last bastion, the internet, is too strict.
Your laws prescribing corporal and capital punishments, for far too many offenses, are certainly too strict.
The list goes on.

I am being too lenient of course, by only calling 'too strict', what is in fact draconian and repressive.

Those few Singaporeans brave enough to stand up against this tyranny, are harrased and hounded by the police, and then, fined and imprisoned by a compliant judiciary. Equally vicious, almost embarassing, is Mr.Lees crude, bludgeoning strategy of suing and bankrupting dissidents, for 'defamations', that are in reality fair comment on matters of public interest (witness the case of Chee Soon Juan questioning loans made by Singapore to Suharto).

So insidious is this repression, that Singaporeans have taken to censoring themselves. This is evident in their bland newspapers. And it extends to television and the cinema. Suffer creativity and originality.
The Web, online journalism and the freedom to comment offered Singaporeans a chance to finally freely express themselves. But the recent crackdown on The Online Citizen shows that even this will not be countenanced by an insecure government.

Fear, suspicion and a siege mentality is indoctrinated in Singaporeans by constant invocations of the 'threat' posed by their neighbouring countries. Yet, in all these years, not a single skirmish. Mr. Lee has read Sun Tzu, it would appear, while dismissing John Stuart Mills.

And so the educated, intelligent, and for the most part prosperous citizens of Singapore meekly return the ruling party to power at every 'election' (suppressed freedom of expression, state-subservient media and a gelded hustings do not free and fair elections make). Thus perpetuating the toxic politics of a one-party state.

While Mr. Lee squats, like a grim, geriatric Nosferatu, sucking the soul out of his island nation.






"If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind " -John Stuart Mills

The Xenophobe in Winter

Mr. Lee Kuan Yew, in an interview with National Geographic, displays a shameless bigotry that one could be forgiven for only expecting from the KKKs Grand Wizard; or other such luminaries.

As reported in the Singapore Democrat Mr Lee says of Singapore Malays, “Well, we make them say the national pledge and sing the national anthem but suppose we have a famine, will your Malay neighbour give you the last few grains of rice or will she share it with her family or fellow Muslim or vice versa?”

He makes them say the national pledge and sing the national anthem. Remarkable. No doubt they would sing Rasa Sayang otherwise.
The second part of his statement is even more objectionable. It depicts the Malays as being uncaring, self-centred and racially biased. Based on his comments, it is perhaps a description that better fits Mr.Lee himself.

He also goes on to question their donning of head-scarves, a habit that seems to queit irk Mr.Lee. After all, he doesn't wear one himself.
I suppose, Mr. Lee, that its up to me if I want to walk down Orchard Road wearing a sombrero. Or will I be arrested and find that it's already been legislated against in Singapore?

Mr. Lee Hsien Loong, the Prime Minister, then, in a craven abdication of responsible leadership, refrained from condemnning those grievous remarks. Instead, he mouthed empty patronising words.

Mr. Lee should apologize of course, for his careless, crass and hurtful words. But it is never in the nature of autocrats to admit to their mistakes.



"Cuiusvis hominis est errare; nullius nisi insipientis, in errore perseverare"  - Cicero