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Thng Yi Ren / Student
The recent emergence of the Speaker’s Corner has surfaced issues that have haunted us for many years. Is there truly a perceived ‘silent but prevalent’ atmosphere of surveillance that haunts us? Are we really subjugated within a repressive Panopticon as envisioned by Foucault, where the means and ability to formulate thought are already hampered?
As a 17-year-old who has just finished his JC Promotional Examinations, a wild streak within me calls out to launch an application for a slot at the Speaker’s Corner to voice out certain problems ranging from the sub-prime crisis to the Serangoon Gardens foreign workers issue.
However, while the young radical within desires to launch into a fierce tirade about the attrition of morality in a face of an egocentric mindset as witnessed from the Serangoon Gardens incident, the rational me went back one step to evaluate.
“I’m only 17!”
“I’m already 17!”
Do my thoughts originate from the various self-help courses that I have been subjected to from my secondary school days?
“Believe in yourself! You can do it!”
Am I simply a radical at heart?
Allow me to make a generalisation I observed from my peers in school. As utilitarian as it may sound, I do think that schools are an excellent social laboratories (pardon the utilitarian undertones).
I think that it is not the student’s lack of desire to voice out their own opinions that is the issue. Rather, putting aside all aspects of self-consciousness, it is the recognition by oneself of his or her lack of understanding and insight into the real world that discourages the expression of one’s opinion.
Of course, to make such a generalisation may potentially draw flak from many, in that I as a student may also be a guilty of it. However, I qualify my generalisation simply from a perennial response that is often heard when someone is asked to speak up: “I don’t know.” While some may argue that it is simply shyness that discourages one from speaking up, I would humbly beg to differ.
A simple analogy to highlight my point is the assessment of students’ knowledge of current affairs (secondary school students would know it as the NE Quiz while Tertiary students would have their assessment based upon their respective institute’s own initiative). How many really know what is going on in the world today? How many actively seek out these facts (and not for the purpose of the GP examination)?
Are you interested?
Before we get too engaged in this entire argument about whether students are interested, let’s take a step back to reflect. Do you yourself have a desire to speak up? Would you be contented to hide behind your computer screen, in the comfort of your armchair and music in the background, simply viewing my ‘rambling’ as a sort of entertainment? It is an amusing spectacle to watch a 17-year old boy finding some sort of glories in his own ignorance, showing the world his own inadequacy. Or would you rather see my flaws and engage me in a discussion – be it on this platform or contact me directly to enlighten me?
This entire problem of not speaking up, not understanding the world can simply be obscured and we may choose the convenient route to dump the entire burden upon that Ministry operating in Buona Vista. However, I firmly believe that it is a flawed causality relationship to say that the Education policy is flawed and therefore students have no ability or no courage to speak up. In fact, the onus, in my humble opinion, is truly with the students.
Shaping the learning community
While many may be quick to dismiss me that this has been highlighted countless times, I really do wonder how many actually appreciate the substratum of wisdom beneath the concept of the learning community. If we accept the assumption that the Ancient Greeks were the pioneers of a civilized society, then many aspects of pedagogy and education can be gleamed from the model that was formulated.
The Greeks pioneered a triumvirate approach to learning in Rhetoric, Grammar and Logic. This inculcated the various dimensions of learning, developing both the regions of the cognitive and the presentation of one vis-a-vis speech. However, while the curriculum may pay much emphasis on the development of these skills, the actual bulk of learning was done in the student community itself. Learned men like Socrates and Plato led discussions, thereby encouraging more and more people to speak up and be exposed to a great variety of topics, ranging from the hair-splitting technical aspects of philosophy to the stars in astronomy to mathematics.
What am I driving at? This article is not a policy recommendation for a Heuristic or Maieutic approach. I laud the many generations of educators, some of which have played major roles in directing me through the various challenges of life. It is my humble attempt as a plea for highly-educated individuals in society to play a greater role in shaping the learning community of Singapore.
Please stand up and speak up
Without going into specific statistics, it is widely acknowledge that Singapore has one of the highest literacy rates in the world. What happened to the many brilliant students of each generation? Are they simply too busy caught up in their own world? As a student, I yearn for access to policy-makers not only at organized national forums, but simply to be able to converse with them about my own personal response.
Please stand up and speak up. I am shifting the burden of speaking up and understanding the world onto individuals in society who have the exposure and the educational backing to enlighten and to educate. While teachers in school may provide much insight, one’s resources are ultimately limited. I give credit where it is due: my tutors in school are definitely very capable, but someone working on the ground like the MAS would be able to highlight issues on the sub-prime crisis better.
It is heartening to note that the Straits Times offers a great variety of articles across a wide spectrum, and of course, to say that the proliferation of Internet literature from Wikipedia to academic papers has aided many is a great understatement. However, to progress, I believe greater correspondence is required.
As a reader, it may be a passive activity that necessitates little or no action on one’s part. However, as a correspondence, a direct response onto the views highlighted by a particular individual would require serious reflection about one’s views.
I do dream of a day where highly skilled professionals would take on a more active role to educate us the students. Students, much has been said about apathy and indifference. It is your life, choose it the way you want, but perhaps the rite of passage would require a certain appreciation of the world around us. The avenues are present, the infrastructure is ready.
Adults, stand up to teach and educate; and students, sapare aude: Dare to know.
———-
About the author:
Yiren is 17 years old and is a student in a junior college.
———-
Please note and wake up to the fact that ability to pass an exam does not mean can do the job.
Ah Bian is an example. he can study . but did he do the president job well? Bush also.
studying is a skill. doing the job is another skill the student has to learn.
want bombastic words ? use a thesaurus.
Yiren,
This is a very well-written piece that is at least striving to be objective. However, it does take two hands to clap. Whilst individual students do certainly bear some responsibility for silence, so does the System created and maintained by the Bureaucrats @ Buona Vista, or as one Singaporean mother said, the SES (Singapore Education System, not to be confused with the SGX).
What is covered by NE Quizes is not the sum total of all General Knowledge or current affairs; in fact it is the barest fraction. Not only that, but NE because of various reasons tends to be skewed one way or another, so part of the NE “knowledge” is manufactured.
Rationalism is the first cousin of Pragmatism and the second cousin of Fear. It is something that is inculcated by the SES, that is not natural as seems to be your perception. The real truth is – and what everybody should realize – that everybody has something to share from your own perspective, your own experience (past & current). The burden-dumping route between students and the Ministry @ Buona Vista (henceforth M@BV) is a two-way street that nobody actually tries to cross physically. While students may be prejudiced in heaping the blame on M@BV, M itself does not help by trying to push the blame wholesale back to the students either.
And IMHO, the Chinese not the Greeks were the pioneers of civilized society by 3000 years. Get your history right.
Overall though, you do raise a very important point: that the best people to teach knowledge are the people who apply it regularly. So Kudos on an excellent piece!
“the best people to teach knowledge are the people who apply it regularly.”
Polytechnics hire lecturers with working experience in the field, but with all due respect, most of them do not have the skills to teach.
@1
Bombastic words do help to secure better grades. Probably he is used to them already, and can’t help himself. While he goes out to work, then he will realise the virtues of KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid)
Only when the Youths tell the world their independent views and opinions of social issues would I say that they are truely 1st world Democratic citizens.
Singapore is a Democracy, right?
Verily, I found this article most verbose; it seeks vexatiously to validate and vindicate the verisimilitude of our education system, whilst vitriolically vilifying the vacuity of the very system’s victims, videlicet, us students. While your valorous vision to vitalise the venality of our education system are venerable and valuable, the content of your article appears void of logic and continuity. Perhaps the voracious use of vivacious vocabulary is a veneer to its vagueness.
You fail to realise that education is a vassal to propagate the state’s vested interest in controlling the visceral of fear, to verify the violation of volition, and to render vox populi voiceless.
Nonetheless, I found your vanity, though vaunting, most venial.
While we can blame the education system all we want, I think we must also realise that it takes somebody to be able to stand outside the system and change it. It is true that while we must recognise that the education system does have a part to play in influencing the populace, but that shouldn’t be an excuse for passivity and silence.
Firstly, there is a typo: It’s sapEre aude. Dare to be wise. Kant said that most of us are so unwise because of our weakness and our timidness. Which is true in one sense of the word, but i don’t believe it is just a matter of wanting to know. I think everyone wants to know more (although epistemically Kant also says that you CAN’T know the absolute truth.)
The bigger problem is that the system, while not an excuse for passivity and silence, is a reason for it. Knowledge is power, but in Singapore, it’s the knowledge which helps you to score good grades which translates into concrete power. In Singapore, you should know what is given to you as well as the back of your hand or better (hence regurgitation), but the desire to know comes from thought as well – how effectively is thought inculcated in Singapore? You have Project Work but in the end is there much thought put into it? There is nothing new in society – people are trained to see what methodologically works and is sound, and to plan their thought around it. You have KI but how much of it goes into memorising facts and not trying to understand what, say, Aristotle was trying to say?
Sapere aude indeed, but in Singapore what is being preached is ‘aude sapere, quod sciendum est; non audeatis, si quo non utamini’: dare to know what you must know; don’t, when you don’t use it. So you know more – but you are not learning for the sake of knowing, you know more for the sake of scoring better. I am studying philosophy and every year the same question gets asked – ‘what are you going to do with such knowledge? Knowledge can eat ah?’ You need a change in the basic principles of society for daring to know to become significant, but so much interest is killed in school.
You hail yourself as the harbinger of change, so why don’t you actually change? Calling others to do something doesn’t mean you do it yourself – a good example would be our Gahmen, who tells us that we have to deal with less money, but who then give themselves huge bonuses every year for ‘good governance.’
The man fancies using words that are less common than what we normally see. I don’t see why some people are taking pot shots at him for that.
It isn’t a crime. This isn’t a news report where the main aim is to inform the masses. It is an opinion piece and IMO, the author can use any sort of vocabulary that he feels comfortable with. (whether he is doing so for the sake of ‘impressing’ others is a moot point)
That said, bombastic words alone do not make a good piece.
In all, I agree with what Yi Ren is saying in general. Blaming the system is but a convenient excuse for many. Not to say that the system is faultless or even close to ideal, but it’s too easy for us to jump on the bandwagon and blame the system for our mediocrity because it is so convenient to do so.
actually its tougher to communicate a sentence or idea across in a simplistic manner than using bombastic wordings.
too much bombastication means that the masses cannot understand wtf you saying. This means a big complete FAILURE in communication 101 module. Should re-take the exams.
No matter how complex is an issue, there is always a way to communicate in a simplistic manner. Else, it just means inability to do so. It takes more communication skill to communicate simplistically than bombastically which can be achieved using the online thesaurus.
do you know who speaks bombastically that turns people off? cannot say. else mati koon karli.
“actually its tougher to communicate a sentence or idea across in a simplistic manner than using bombastic wordings.
too much bombastication means that the masses cannot understand wtf you saying. This means a big complete FAILURE in communication 101 module. Should re-take the exams.
No matter how complex is an issue, there is always a way to communicate in a simplistic manner. Else, it just means inability to do so. It takes more communication skill to communicate simplistically than bombastically which can be achieved using the online thesaurus.
do you know who speaks bombastically that turns people off? cannot say. else mati koon karli.”
You are absolutely right.
The author, however, reserves the right to choose whatever style he wishes in his own piece of writing. I just take issue with some snide on-the-side remarks about his choice of big words. Even if it means he is unable to use simpler terms to communicate his point, so what?
The man has been brave enough to put up his piece up here, opened himself to arrows left right centre from ‘veteran’ Singaporeans…he doesn’t deserve to be ‘shot’ for an issue as trivial as his choice of vocabulary…
Anyway, the dude is just 17, meaning he should be in JC1. It’s understandable that he might be in a stage where he is perhaps overly enamoured with big words.
I actually appreciate the complexity of thought put forward here. Although this operates at a level of abstraction beyond what most internet blog readers are used to, I welcome the elevation of discourse. I welcome it even more since it comes from one so young, and would encourage it rather than put it down.
That having been said, Yi Ren, you should get off your chair and take to the Speaker’s Corner! Nothing ventured nothing gained.
I must say I feel proud of Thng Yi Ren even though i do not know him.
He is contributing and not doing nothing.
I have noticed over the years that many in spore stopped voicing up because they know they cannot speak as well as obama. they stopped voicing up long ago as they feel their tiny effort will mean nothing. many stopped voicing up long long ago as they do not have Doctorate or MBA. Instead of contributing a bit, they choose not to do anything about it. A great tidal wave is made up of tiny droplets of sea water. Without these droplets , there is not wave.
I feel proud of Thng Yi Ren because he is not one of this group of typical singaporeans. Thng Yi Ren needs to grow as a person and mature over time and gain more life experience by working in society and do the NS and see the many faces of humans and many types of smart but evil and smart but good people that exist in singapore.
To bring a revolutionary change to the system to improve it, we need people who can bombasticate but more importantly the ability to communicate to the masses which includes the NAIVE, the non-Engrish speaking, the old and less educated, the MEEK and Voice-less , the timid but educated and knowledgeable adults and people whose religion is self-preservation.
This is Singapore and your audience is Singaporeans.
#6 >> LOL….now that’s bombastic! i was more entertained by this than the main piece.
anyways, glad the writer has so much free time on his hands amidst his preparation for promos/prelims or what have you. Well young man, if you want things to change, pls work hard and be the country’s leader. Then i will clap ok?
if not, then we, like many others, just remain in our ivory towers and KB all day la.
SPEAK UP SPEAK UP! Now hear me all ye faithful as I speak! lol
Okie, i tell you people ar…did you ever notice ar…that now in order to call a Malaysian cellphone number previously known as 016-123456789 the telephone operator at 104 tells you that it’s the area code 019 followed by country code followed by “rest of the number”? Did you know?
What number will you now dial (for Malaysia cell phone number)? Can you now crack the code WITHOUT calling 104?
And the reason why 104 is making money at 60cents per call/enquiry is UNMISTAKABLE. Look at the Yellowpages for Malaysia and Singapore, none of the numbers are updated! Slim slime shady!!
aye lets not flame the author for using ‘chim words’. Although he could make do with simpler words for easier understanding by the masses, an online dictionary is merely a click away.
before we begin, speaking up is a and should be a, right.
and that is as far as it should go. it should never be what or how right is it, but it is it is it is it should be a right.
meaning to say there shouldn’t be hierarchy of knowledge when it comes to articulating your views.
and Yi ren, I’ve read through your article over and over again and I still have no idea of what is this ‘speaking up’ that you are advocating… is it the process of expressing your views or to have correspondence or ?
and it’s your right to choose the words you want to use, just be careful that words like Heuristic or Maieutic or Rite of Passage have a certain connotation behind what they mean other than the literal meaning.
12) Complexity of thought on October 22nd, 2008 11.02 pm
“………… this operates at a level of abstraction beyond what most internet blog readers are used to, I welcome the elevation of discourse. I welcome it even more since it comes from one so young, and would encourage it rather than put it down…….That having been said, Yi Ren, you should get off your chair and take to the Speaker’s Corner! Nothing ventured nothing gained………..”
13) good lessons learnt
“…….. must say I feel proud of Thng Yi Ren ………He is contributing and not doing nothing”.
I must say I fully agree with both of you.
To those who have posted replies to TYR’s article using bombastard words yourself while attacking him for his use of bombastic words, I can only say that you are all ‘pots’.
If you have the capacity to understand what he is sharing, then, engage him. Why attack his use of big words and the way he conveys his message? People like me have to read and re-read his article to try and get the gist of it and I am going to read it a couple more times.
One thing I already know is that TYR has a dream, and his dream is: “…..of a day where highly skilled professionals would take on a more active role to educate us the students. . . .”.
Yes; he is humble enough to admit that his life education has just begun. In case you missed it this is written in very plain and simple English.
So please, if you think you are just as good (bombastically and with notes to exchange), please engage him on what he has written here.
Stop the attacks.
A friendly adviceTo TYR:
- a very courageous piece, keep it up!
- if one day you decide to speak to the masses you WILL have to tone down your use of big words. You may need to lenghten your sentences to convey your thoughts in very simple and understandable English.
ah for we fight the adversary called Apathy, and like sisyphus, toll perennially with
inexorable inevitability and inescapable reality :(
I’ve spoken up at #15….no one’s answered me yet. :)
I also speak up!
Every Sunday i go to vivocity with my little boy. it’s his favourite place and like all kids, toys r us is a ‘must visit’ shop.
You can find me wearing my favourite soccer team’s jersey – none other than England’s mighty Liverpool.
My favourite food, you ask?
Well, it’s very Singaporean just like me – Char Kway Teow with lots of hum!
How can ‘my hum’? We are common people man! not those who eat in palaces – “my hum” —– how stupid can one be – —- “my hum” …….
OK. I finish speaking up already.
haha Gemami! You’re so quuuute! :D
Dear All,
Give this kid a break. He is still young teen and it is courageous for someone his age to do what he is doing. Back in the old days, what will we all be doing at his age?
But really, Yi Ren, tone down those vocab. It is an overkill. A golden rule for you from grand uncle here, The best form of communication to get your message across is to use simplify enough sentences or statements for the general masses to understand . Simply put, know your audience and work within your targeted range. That way, your message will come across loud and clear.
Don’t be discouraged. Speaking out is human nature and an individual’s borned Right that no policies can dictate. However, there are always going to be different avenues of expressing. Being in the lime light obviously gives you more exposure but not necessary mean that people who chooses to work behind the scenes are introverts or shy. You will learn as you grow progressively.
Grand uncle here is less educated than you are, so if there are spelling or grammar mistakes, please excuse me.
23) Observer(SG-HK)
you’ve put it across so well – thanks
24) gemami on October 23rd, 2008 10.31 pm
Thanks. This old man just sharing my two cents worth. The world is already ugly enough and people are beoming less compassionate towards each other. If this persist and if the young are being fed the wrong message, I cannot imagine what the future will hold for them. We need to encourage them not put them down like my generations. Correct them with respect if they make mistakes (we all do right?).
Funny how commenters (us) can become language critics. hehe I think TYR’s article is good. No problem with it. I am trying to follow his advise to “speak up”. :D
The masses would need something more “simplistic” – or is it “simple” – like what Gemami said at #18, as well as Laserpointer’s at #17.
The “Rite of Passage” tickled me a bit cos I am reminded where my food goes when it’s being digested! Hmmm…forget what I said! >,<
hmm… TYR….
and food.
and rite of passage…
hmm.
To be heard and taken seriously, one needs to produce strong arguments that have been well researched and well thought out.
Speaking up does not mean producing sound bytes that don’t make sense .
No thanks to the rote learning system of education who groomed excellent academic performers, struggle to think critically, rationally, or out of the box. Students are told to shut up and be attentive, and to respect and not challenge what is taught.
The classroom may be a good place to start the thinking and speaking experience.
agree with kelly especially on the “become language critc” part.
we’d also do well to remember that people like TYR are the exception rather than the norm. we’d also do well not to ‘discriminate’ against people like him as the PAP usually do with the minorities – the minority that does not support or share the same views as it does (and sometimes, even the majority).
this is why i said we ought not to poke fun at one who dares to speak up – in the manner he is comfortable with. As ‘chorus’ aptly describe: “. . . . the dude is just 17…………… It’s understandable that he might be in a stage where he is perhaps overly enamoured with big words”.
indeed, and he did open his article with a description of the internal struggle within himself – meaning -he is still on the discovery path – to discover himself. Let’s give this brave young man a chance to do that. Yes, he’s 17 but a real man to share his thoughts with us and to , in his own word, “draw flak from many”.
he will grow – by daring to confront himself – into a better person than any of us could even imagine about ourselves. when that day comes, we will surely see a different person and we would most likely see him at Speaker’s Corner – armed with a new language – the language of the common man.
TYR, don’t lose heart. You have a supporter. Keep it up – but tone down!
@Mimi
I guess the thing about strong arguments that are well researched and well thought out is that at some point of time, you got to air it out so that other people can criticize you and hopefully we can all learn from there what’s wrong what’s right and what are others views. Talk has to go back and forth, we learn about our people as other people learn about us.
Part of the nonsense being spouted by some of our politicians today, which in my view, in a small sense due to the manufactured ‘right’, in both sense of the word- a right and it’s not wrong (right) .They are allowed to spout some garbage and the common man on the street would be wrong to correct them.
I’m not sure if what i’m saying about speaking up here ties in to what is being discussed, which i think is more of a political standpoint or to project the message to the masses… but i think that both are linked together, everyday speech as well as ‘open speeches’. Both of which contributes to refining our thinking and making us better humans.
July 3, 2008
On persecution paranoia and press freedom
FOR over 15 minutes during an hour-long dialogue yesterday, Secondary 3 student Jarret Huang went toe-to-toe with Dr Vivian Balakrishnan on press freedom and freedom of expression.
At the session in Raffles Institution – marked by sharp questions – the 15-year-old’s exchange with the Community Development, Youth and Sports Minister was the highlight of the morning.
A good-humoured exchange about persecution drew the most laughs. Asked if he had been persecuted for publications or views he had put online, the youngster replied: ‘I don’t upload things on the Internet, sir.’
As for whether he ever felt persecuted for anything he said or wrote, he said: ‘Not legally, sir.’
The teen added: ‘The sense of persecution is not a reactive measure in my situation but rather it is a pre-emptive measure taken such that certain things which are deemed incorrect cannot be said in certain situations.’
It was then Dr Balakrishnan’s turn to draw the laughs as he said: ‘Let’s translate that into normal English.’
But laughter aside, the minister said there was a serious point he was getting at: ‘There is a certain almost paranoia which I’m trying to overcome here…Nobody in Singapore has been persecuted for saying the truth. Nobody is going to be persecuted for saying what he believes in and standing up for it.’
He added: ‘But if what you say is false, if what you say is motivated by malice, if your intention is to inflame religious and racial tensions, if you are a threat to the country, don’t you think something should be done?’
Dr Balakrishnan, who was second minister of information, communications and the arts until earlier this year, also responded to Jarret’s questions on freedom of the press.
Earlier in the exchange, he had asked the teen what was the one law he would change if he were a minister.
The teen’s answer: ‘Press freedom.’
Responding, the minister outlined the Government’s attitude: ‘The most important attribute is that we want accurate reporting. Because, if the journalists are just writing fiction and are just writing glowing portraits of me that nobody believes, then it is pointless.
‘Our attitude towards the press in Singapore is that they are partners in nation-building.
‘Our mass media also understand our key vulnerabilities and our hopes and dreams and are, therefore, partners in their construction.
‘But they are not the mouthpiece of the Government and they are not there to give a one-sided view.’
He also noted that if the traditional press loses credibility, people would go to the new media.
‘There are very few national newspapers with as broad a coverage and obsessive attention to detail and accuracy as our mainstream media,’ he said.
‘So don’t berate ourselves and our journalists too much. That’s not fair to them.
‘In fact, then you have to ask yourself, what is there to hide? The second question is, even if there is something being hidden, can it be hidden in this new world?’
I found this article raher flimsy. How many times have I heard in this country to call people to speak up? When will we ever mature plotically and socially?