Please do support our cause. Thank you.

Put them into defensive is a very very valid point.
That is what many of these TOC posting are doing to the target party. This mode of compliants, grumblings, accussations, bringing up ever possible bad things real or percieved relevant or irrelavant about the target party will only put the target party in defensive (you would react the same way if you are treated that way) and reduces the chance of achieving your aim. It is self sabotage.

If our aim is really to help some groups, we are actually putting them into a spot with all these rnegative opinions.

All emotion here, some tact will be useful

would you like to elaborate on these points you made?

But we have to read all these stuff in the right context.

If our mind is set on witchhunt mode, we will have the tendency to dig up every fragment of info that seemingly suits our cause as evidence,

One must be aware that even the most powerful nations do blatanly ignore some of the things UN set out as “ideal” policies. And some policies of the powerful nations are put in place under clever disguise of rights but they do no more than put obstacles in the path of other less devt countries to catch up economically.

To the people who read and post in this thread, shall we spread the words to our friends, create the awareness and encourage them to sign the petition if they believe in it.

As the petition is not started by any organisation but by individual challenged people, you may meet them at the HLP today. It is a petition for the challenged people by the challenged people. I don’t know if such an effort has been organised in Singapore before, but we believe it is the right thing to do.

we are also not very computer savvy and have to wait on the help of volunteers to update our website. I hope you understand. nevertheless, I will put up the names (even if the photos are not availbale) of the people who first got this project going. But of course this is a project of all the challenged people and we cannot put everyone’s name on the website.

One thing for sure, no hidden hands in this project.

CAN profile is blank. It will be good that it has names or brief description of the team members. If team members are willing to tell the public who they are, it will remove any question on whether there is any hidden agenda. People appreciate transparency.

I believe it will take a long time (hopefully not) and great effort to get wide spread support from the public and to finally convince the transportation bodies to give the concession.

The aim is to get concession for the disable poor people who need it most and take the most appropriate actions to achieve it. Avoid turning the campaign into a fight for Right war. To do so, will run the risk of driving the disable people and their organization away from you. The disable people do not want to sign the petition so it tells us that CAN needs to be sensitive.

I think KopitiamApek made a good point about the complaint culture of Singaporeans. Yes, it is the right of citizens. But there is a danger of it being NATO.

I don’t really see why the choice for citizens is between protest/complain and doing direct action help. Why can’t citizens do both? Like what KopitiamApek noted, protest/signing a petition is simple and takes only a minute. If citizens feel passionate about the issue, he/she should not stop at the ‘one minute effort’. Unless the issue is only worth more than a minute and less than the volunteering effort.

While we look at the ‘protest’ aspect of citizen participation in other countries, let us not forget the ‘action’ aspect. In US, active participation & volunteerism is an equally important aspect of their civil society.

Let’s not be boxed in by the simple dichotomy of either ‘voice’ or ‘action’. People can do both. The danger is that protesting/complaining becomes a crutch that people use to avoid participation/volunteering!

And the United Nations Declaration on Social Progress and Development also says that, “All peoples and all human beings, without distinction as to race, colour, sex, language, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, family or social status, or political or other conviction, shall have the right to live in dignity and freedom and to enjoy the fruits of social progress and should, on their part, contribute to it”.

Link: http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/m_progre.htm

People will always complain – this is human nature that is not specific to Singaporeans. But what is characteristic of Singaporeans? It is not doing something about it. And I think TOC’s current articles on the ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ will give you a clear indication as to why.

Why are protests and petitions important? To give a voice to a marginalised group within a community. This is a basic principle of democracy and why it is better than other political systems where the citizen literally has no say. As a democratic system, petitions and protests are part of the democratic process that the authorities.

Yes, this is also about getting someone else to do what we want, but that’s also because we live in a society with quarternary industries possessing specialised capabilities, getting someone else to do something for us is part of how the system works (who cleans your pipes, waters the trees along the roads, and sweeps the streets?). As contributors to the society, we have a say in what we want.

And the ‘them and us’ attitude is very damning. The government, rightfully, represents the citizens. If we want something to be a certain way, both parties should engage in discourse and reach a consensus in how it should happen. The PAP is *supposed* to REPRESENT the people. So if people want to complain about their lifts, let them complain. You and I may not agree that it’s the most mature thing to do, but it is their rights as citizens.

It is someone else again, Aiyah”

Yes, so why the discrimination of credit when it comes to opp party if Singaporeans can even accept that LKY build Singapore even though I never see the man constructing building and road before.

Yes, complain is free until you realize that government complain too but the major difference is that government has the power to act on their own complaint. eg Money not enough, just increase own salary. Profit for GLC not enough, just ask minister to give crap. Smoking increase health cost, ban smoking in place etc.
So as much as we like to say citizen love complaining, the government isn’t any better.

“And I don’t think garmen open up HLP for protest, it is for people to voice what they want to say, and there are more ways to say what you want to say then just ape-like protest?”
Gahmen hate the taboo world “protest” and we know it is the way for them to save face to use VOICE rather than PROTEST when talking about Hong Lim Park after all for many decades the gahmen speak negatively about protest. But we citizen know it means protest, voice been the gentle word for it. A voice can be gentle and soft but Protest means emotional anger. But then whether it is opened up for Protest and for voice, it doesn’t matter because the government allow both in Hong Lim Park.

It is someone else again, Aiyah!

And I don’t think garmen open up HLP for protest, it is for people to voice what they want to say, and there are more ways to say what you want to say then just ape-like protest?

I have heard of residents complaining non stop when their lift was being upgraded, scolding those poor workers at every opportune moment as if these poor foriegn workers are part of the PAP. When a brand new lift was finally there for their use, the first reaction was to complain that the lift was too small. In reality, if they would take the effort and measure it against lifts elsewhere, it is the same size.

Complaint is free.