Tuesday, November 18, 2008 9:13
Letters to TOC: Casino, minibonds and ragging
In Uncategorized • 1,034 views • 17 Comments
Casino
From “concerned”:
Hearing the news these days is worrying. Hearing the Las Vegas Sands Ceo assures Singapore on the casino project reminds me of the man in the gambling addiction advertisement that does something like this: “Give me your money, I know what I am doing, my luck is changing, etc, etc.”
The fact that many analysts feel that the casino project is too large for the government to allow it to fail is worrying. I believe that the government should pull the plug and not care about political face-saving if Las Vegas Sands
becomes bankrupt. I mean, why should the government gamble the people’s money on something that may not materialize as the next engine of growth? Since the government always pride itself as doing the right thing instead of caring about losing votes, it should do the right thing and not gamble Singapore’s future away.
Mis-selling
From Roger Lim:
The whole minibond saga shows how easy we can be victims of mis-selling. Education, income level, age and even past experiences do not protect us from mis-elling.
Take Mr Tan Kin Lian for example. When a picture of a sobbing aged lady with stories of lost retirement savings hit our media, we were all sold that we better save these angels and get even with the financial institutions.
Please do not ignore the fact that whether you classify investors as “vulnerable” or “others” these people sign or put their thumbprint on the dotted line because of higher returns.
These people had a choice and they made a very smart and rational decision. They enjoyed higher returns before, but when their investment turns sour, they demand compensation.
Would Mr Tan like to also represent the insurance policy holders [regarding] critical year issue, airline customers who had to pay more than the advertised prices, property buyers who were shorted some square feet from developers, MLM members who were mis-sold by overly enthusiatic direct sellers. There’s more. Mr Tan, your effort in getting the financial institutions to admit mis-selling is honourable. However, is compensating the investors correct?
With regards the compensation, put aside a small amount to feed these “poor vulnerable victims of minibond” for the rest of their life.
Whatever balance should be redirected to setting up a trust fund for all Singaporeans. Set up a proper board to supervise collections and dispensation. Use this fund to save mega projects that is of national interest like the IRs.
Any project that could. Mr Tan, the least you should do is to represent all the loyal and faithful
depositors who did not shift their investments for higher returns. Do you think they need to be compensated from financial institutions for ”mis-selling” them a product with lower returns?
Definition of fun
From Lisa Li (Teacher)
Yes, maybe it’s true that no one was hurt. That the birthday girl had fun. That ragging is all in good humour. That it’s a sign of popularity. That it’s tradition, youth culture, all part of growing up….
Even the SAJC birthday boy who was ‘poled’ and thrown into a ice-bath dustbin apparently wrote on STOMP to defend his mates:
“It may appear violent but my team knows the limits and this is purely done out of fun and I was expecting it… The ‘poling’ does not hurt as much as it may seem because they are not out to hurt people. Hence I must say that this incident is clearly exaggerated and STOMP is pretty pathetic and so are those who think this is outrageous… As you can I see I was laughing all the way…”
I’ve had my fair share of ragging too, and yes, it’s funny. My memories are of harmless pranks that my friends and I laugh at even years later – and certainly I am glad that this seems to be the case for the ACJC and SAJC students involved too.
However, this is NOT the point.
Firstly, the fortunate fact that the ‘victims’ in these two specific ragging cases were not hurt does not take away the potential danger of such acts.
In the midst of the struggling and screaming, one of the ACJC girls pushed the ‘victim’s’ head towards the concrete ground. What might have happened if the ‘victim’ had hit her head on something sharp? The fact that nothing of the sort happened does not excuse her ‘victimizers’; it merely makes them lucky.
Secondly, anyone who has any knowledge of abuse might be genuinely tortured by such extreme forms of ragging.
Surely you don’t need to experience abuse to know that being dragged and tied up against your will, having things forced down your clothes, and having screams ignored and laughed at, can sometimes be extremely humiliating and frightening.
Thirdly, when you commit such ragging in ‘fun’, you are desensitizing yourself to the nature of such acts.
Good-natured pranks are fun, yes – but the ragging I saw in the videos too closely resemble cruel acts of power-control and humiliation of another human being. I cannot ignore its play-resemblance to the recent horrors of Josef Fritzl in Austria, American soldiers’ abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib, or even maid abuse in Singapore.
But don’t get me wrong. I am neither condemning the students nor accusing them of horrific crimes. And I know that such ragging has been around for years.
However, we cannot continue to condone such acts because while these two students may have emerged unscathed and smiling, this society will not emerge so unscathed if this continues as anyone’s definition of fun.
———-
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17 Comments
Children live what they learn
“over exaggerating the possible consequences” – just do a “google” on ragging and bullying and one sees the damage that has been done to victims of both .
It is easy to say that people who object to ragging are “prudes” or “retards”. But if a person loses his self respect , self worth and sense of dignity , the damage done is too high a price , just for the sake of “fun”. When an entire group has fun and make a fool of themselves for laughs , it is a totally different matter from one person being the object of fun and having the “fun” things done against his/her will ; ie being tied up or mouth taped etc. So please don’t use “fun” and “freedom” as excuses for the tyranny of the majority over an individual’s free will , self esteem and dignity.
gemami
Mis-SellingB/b>
There was a man who wanted to catch the National Day parade at the padang. He went to the padang lawn and stood there thinking it was the best spot to be. On came a sweet-talking young warden who stood next to the man. She advised him to go take a seat in the stand for it was much safer there and the view much better. The man listened and took her advise.
The parade started and the show was going smoothly when suddenly there was a loud ‘BANG!‘ and ‘CRASH!‘. The spectator-stand collapsed all of a sudden without warning. Many were groaning and in lots of pain. Panic-stricken family members and friends did not know what to do. The organizers stood in complete shock! Paralysis took control.
Out of the mayhem, one man ran out to take control. He tended to the injured. He gave his undivided attention to the grieving. He gave them both his ears. His heart was completely and fully poured out.
Many hours later, things began to cool a little.
Bystanders started making snide remarks that he only did it for his own glory. They challenged that he ought to have offered his help not only to the injured at the padang but also those that had been injured in traffic accidents and through illnesses elsewhere.
Some others commented that the spectator ought to have known better and that there was always the possibility that the stands would collapse. They should have seen it coming, or, that they went to the stands with eyes wide open.
Others still, blamed the young warden for directing people to the stand knowing full well that there is a chance that the stand would collapse, remote chance not withstanding.
No one blamed the construction company that built the stands. No one blamed the people who hired the construction company that built the stands.
The Hirer and the Construction Company now holds the decision on how much to compensate these victims, whether to compensate at all. They are also at liberty to decide who should or should not be compensated.
This is just a story after all.
#2, if they don’t mind it, who the hell are we to tell them they can or cannot do things?
You may not respect personal liberty, but there are many of us who do.
Children live what they learn
DC ,I am looking at personal liberty – of the individual , not the majority who ragged her. And if you seriously think she enjoyed all that stuff done to her and have the video posted on youtube , then you are entitled to your opinion. As a mother of teens and having gone thru teenage yrs in a JC, I know how important it is to not be seen as “ratting” on your friends and to be “cool” with the social trends of the day. Like I said , don’t take the “prudes’” or “retards’” view of ragging and bullying , google the topics and see the experiences of other countries who have seen the backlash of these activities on their youth.
AhKao
AFAIK, hasn’t TKL been complaining abt most forms of investment vehicles that he felt DIDN’T benefit the investors at all?
He had complained about various unit trusts and investment-linked insurance policies.
So this isn’t a sudden platform he’s campaigning on.
Dr. Albert
Dear Roger Lim
Tan kin lian interview had stated very clearly, that for this
Sort of high risk investment, your so call high return is a joke! Like what Tan had mentioned, if DBS in the first place tell investor that if any of the 6 insitutions were to collapse so gone your investment. Well there anyone dare to even have interest in such scheme? I think your reasoning is very far fetch in the actual situation.
As for the construction of casino, I think you really miss the point. It Is not so simple as to abundant the project and leave it as it is at this stage. It is not about face as you have put it! You know how much jobs this project actually provided so far? Just look at the number of cranes. Even the biggest project I managed before only consists of 9 tower canes and 6 crawler cranes. It is already consider as big scale compared to the norm. You can argue that most job only go to the FT but do you know how many Singaporean involved as mangement position?
When Sand say that they will cease Macau project and focus in Singapore I thinkin it is very reasonable because mainland china refuse to issue visa to their PRC into Macau when they found that a lot of these money were lost to gamble over there. Meaning, having Singapore as a regional casino would therefore divert this potential gambler to our shore because issuing of visa for the PRC is up to Singapore to decide. This make a lot of sense why Sand will not give up the project here. In the end, question is about how much and if it is enough after giving up the Macau project to complete the Singapore casino.
You like it or not, Singapore has to go into casino. But my concern is, when PAP make money out of the casino, how much of these profit will go into the welfare of Singaporean? Do we have more subsidies on the medical, education and general standard of living? Or are they just going to increase their own salary only?
For your info, I am only of the Singaporean that wrote to the government forum to support having casino. Not that I want social problem for Singapore. But we have no choice because for the past mistakes PAP had made. For failure to keep our education relevant to the demand of the world in the past.
Have you ever wonder why we need so much FT when most of our Singaporean haven’t got a job? The fact that we have produce so much engineers and management people that it is no longer able to move our industrial to that of the most advance one. Such as bio research, R&D, IT etc. While amazingly, so call not so developed country like India, philipines and china had made those changes long time ago. Ask yourself how many management insitutions such SIM, SMU the government kept building and yet we are not looking into how to have more scientist and advance engineering people for the next generation? Do we have so many business to manage in Singapore?
Dr. Albert
to be frank, Singapore is already very late to start of the casino, given one party nomination they sure took a very long time to do it! My point is, how many engineers graduate from my generation can find a job in Singapore and without moving to places like china where it is more relevant there. Those that stays either take a management degree again and go into insurance, sale etc.
You can’t talk about the next generation when you can’t even take care of this one. Btw another thing that I have found out is that we are building alot of ITE in Singapore. Does that mean that not only we did not upgrade our people, we are actually thinking of downgrading them! Why I say that? Look at the ITE now, look more like a polytechnic to me by the scale of the buidling. Statistic speaking, for every ten Singapore children, at least 3 to 4 must go to ITE in order for it to be cost effective running the insitutions. Say 2010, out of 8 children, 7 actually go into university, 2 go to poly and only 1 will go to ITE. This mean that ITE will be running at lost at the expense of tax payer money.
But PAP will not do that. They will make sure they rise the standard of the education system and effectively ensuring there will be a significant number of people go into the ITE. I mean this is the only way, can we leave the ITE empty not? This is not the first time PAP do this. Just look at sengkang and pongol. HDB kept building there just to justify their water front over there because they don’t want some people to put a white elephant posters over there. Forgetting the fact that other have parents staying at the other side of the island.
Dr. Albert
now you know why we need FT?
Dr Albert Winsemius
Referring to 8):
Out of 10 children not 8
I sincerely hope Mr Roger Lim reads this. There are products tat give 5% and Guarrates the Captial u put in. These products are called Low Risk. Where at the end of the lock up period the worse case is u get back 0 profit.
The Mini Bonds was marketed as Low Risk. Get it? Investment tat may result in losing 100% Captial is never Low Risk. Thus High Risk marketed as Low Risk. It’s like wolf in sheep clothing. Is tat Mis Selling?
3) gemami
Nicely done. Maybe the stand is alrady a bit shaky but the Pple who build it insisted they used the best materials and the Usher Warden insist tat it’s ok. And the pple who employ the Builder just can’t be bothered as long as it can increase the number of Humans Per Sq Meter on the Stand. Like a certain Long Long White with Small Windows Thing tat Pple Take almost Daily.
Sigh, if they enjoy it, they enjoy it, who are we to comment?
However, I DO worry about ‘poling’.
Daniel
“Would Mr Tan like to also represent the insurance policy holders [regarding] critical year issue, airline customers who had to pay more than the advertised prices, property buyers who were shorted some square feet from developers, MLM members who were mis-sold by overly enthusiatic direct sellers. There’s more. Mr Tan, your effort in getting the financial institutions to admit mis-selling is honourable. However, is compensating the investors correct?”
Roger Lim,
What stopping you from doing the right thing then ? If you can do the the right thing by <> , so much the better, at least better than languishing your time thinking and writing some article throwing cold water at others who take the first step doing the right thing.
If you are so damn afraid, helpless and useless to do the right thing due to sheer effort and size of it, why discouraging others from doing so ? If you are incapable and inept, why even bother to write such crap to make up for your incompetence to make yourself feel good ?
I’m sure TKL will be happy if you just get your bum off the warm seat and do something about the thing you just mention.
Daniel
“Would Mr Tan like to also represent the insurance policy holders [regarding] critical year issue, airline customers who had to pay more than the advertised prices, property buyers who were shorted some square feet from developers, MLM members who were mis-sold by overly enthusiatic direct sellers. There’s more. Mr Tan, your effort in getting the financial institutions to admit mis-selling is honourable. However, is compensating the investors correct?”
Roger Lim,
What stopping you from doing the right thing then ? If you can do the the right thing by “representing the insurance policy holders [regarding] critical year issue, airline customers who had to pay more than the advertised prices, property buyers who were shorted some square feet from developers, MLM members who were mis-sold by overly enthusiatic direct sellers.” , so much the better, at least better than languishing your time thinking and writing some article throwing cold water at others who take the first step doing the right thing.
If you are so damn afraid, helpless and useless to do the right thing due to sheer effort and size of it, why discouraging others from doing so ? If you are incapable and inept, why even bother to write such crap to make up for your incompetence to make yourself feel good ?
I’m sure TKL will be happy if you just get your bum off the warm seat and do something about the thing you just mention.
gemami
14) Daniel
Yah, how about it Roger Lim?
It’s either you put your money where your mouth is, or;
add more shit into it so that you can be kept busy trying to clean it.
aygee
to the point on ragging,
if we live in a world without camera phones, wi-fi, youtube, social media, would this even be an issue discussed with such passion?
the generations that went through it before the arrival of social media did it – and i dont think it had any adverse effect on our society, nor were there reports of kids getting hurt, at least to my recollection.
kids will be kids. let them have their fun, whatever that definition of “fun” is these days. i would just say “please be careful and dont get hurt”…
lookingout
“Some may be startled to know that hazing is banned in over 40 American states. Penalties can range from fines to jail terms, depending on the severity of offences.” My Paper, 19 Nov.
Isn’t it worrying that hazing (ragging) is banned in over 40 states in the US, yet is accepted as the ACJC culture, and even justified by the principal ?
My guess is that if what happened in the recent ACJC case had happened in the US, there would be consequences for the culprits involved.
And the ACJC principal Kelvyna Chan would be singing a totally different song.
With regards to ragging, there’s a price to pay for freedom, and nothing in this world is safe. To put all the blame that ragging causes harm is just trying to oversimplify things. We can get hurt anytime, anywhere with or without ragging.
I believe in freedom, and we cannot deny participants from their rights. Who are we to judge whether or not the ACJC kids were wrong in ragging their friend. Sure, its dangerous, but people’s reaction to punish these ‘raggers’ and to find solutions to prevent these sorts of thing happening again is just over exaggerating the possible consequences.
Why cut down the whole forest (denying freedom) just for one tree?