post #56 on December 14th, 2009 2.08 pm

can you quote sentences those you deemed were my attacks? i did not mistook her lighthearted humour for sarcasm, she said so herself (that it was such) if you have read her replies, so how can i have mistaken? as for me “nitpicking each & every word” she uses i guess its not just me. afterall, in an online forum if not words what else is there? tone of her voice, hand gestures, body language…? lol…

you can start a discussion by quoting my sentences (which to you seem like an attack) to start a discussion, rather then out out nowhere & in your 1st post you already seem to have chosen who’s side you’re on?

////… you have attacked the young lady there with an attitude that is so difficult to withstand.////

i dun get what you mean, its a rather vague. please do explain further. thanks, professor.

Legitimate questions were raised but you have attacked the young lady there with an attitude that is so difficult to withstand. Being a professor for over 20 years, I have never stopped telling my students to ask, ask and ask! All the who, what, where, whys. I do not think that her questions are amusing but I find your attitude amusing.

By your indication that she was being sarcastic when she mentioned “… like when I was 14?” tells me that you are so out to win this discussion that you mistook lighthearted humour for sarcasm. Honestly she has been quite diplomatic towards your patronising remarks. You have obviously been nitpicking each and every word that she uses. What is the point?

Discuss, for the sake of discussion. Not for the sake of winning or losing.

That’s all I have to say after following this for the past few days.

Rachel,

It is a waste of time giving him the attention. By the way good luck for the campaign, I am anonymously supporting all of you in my own ways.

post #52 on December 13th, 2009 12.44 pm

hmmm, who is to say that people who champion causes in their own free time do it for altruistic reasons alone. anyway, why not let your work do the talking for you (& others like you) instead?

which questions of yours did i answer with more criticisms?

is it the following from my post #13 on December 11th, 2009 1.15am?

quoting myself:
////how you are associated with SADPC will likely be viewed with suspicion than a stamp of approval.////
highlighting working or personal connection itself is a double edge sword, just look for examples of posts that speaks positively of MIW or PAP.

////when a “why” is raised, it gives rise to a “why not” rebuttal.////
like the above mentioned it does little to convince critics.

i think you need to evaluate how you go about engaging critcs. sarcasm is not the way. as of now, you are still like when you were 14? :P no wonder you “catch no ball” what i have been trying to say. lol…

Hang drug trafficker Vui!

post #46 on December 12th, 2009 12.50 am

“new faces showing up for your cause does not equal to a show of support, dun jump to that conclusion too early.”

Indeed I agree. However things seems to be going well at the moment, people have expressed their support in many ways. We will see what happens as time goes by.

“you may be doing this out of compassion & out your own spare time, but that does not mean its worth supporting. if that is what you are getting at.”

No no, I am not insisting that everyone should find this worth supporting. There are many other causes in this world, local and global, and people are free to support any one of them. They are also free to ignore all of them. Point is that campaigners naturally want to advocate for their cause and at the end of the day, they do hope to change certain bit of society. In a way I was speaking in general about most campaigners I know about, that they do what they do out of a strong passionate believe that some things must change at their own free will without personal gains.

“critics not = antagonists. that is all i can say.”

Yup I agree with that. I guess we all should be receptive to constructive feedback/ criticisms but when we feel that someone has misunderstood what we say/ where we are coming from, we should be given a chance to try to clarify the misunderstood points (in a way, defend the cause) when that need arises. That was what I really wanted to say.

“its not that you cannot raise a question, but its about what it asked that i find amusing.”

Fair enough. I was just thinking that you could very well elaborate on your criticisms right from the beginning but felt that you didn’t, and wanted to understand your position so I began to ask those questions. In some ways, I find it amusing that you address my questions with more criticisms. :p

“as for the “thumbs up & “thumbs down”, it does give an indication how well or ill recieved a post is. most likely, most of my detractors most likely have nothing much to back up their opinion? maybe it is an immature novelty i guess? :D ”

Heck care lah, just ‘popularity’ indicator. If I actually do care about how many thumbs up I get, I think I will be a depressed person right now lol. This might be something I will probably care about if I am still like… 14? Hehehee…

“fair enough. i cant say the same for others hopping on this (Yong Vui Kong) bandwagon though.”

Oh well… I think this is worth an email discussion.

“as for mentioning Mr Chiam ST & Mr Low TK, i am not about to open an irrelevent discussion about them but to highlight real people who in my opinion have the said qualities in my earlier post. hope this clears the air.”

I think there are many other people who have supersede them in such ‘qualities’. Personal opinion only but I am not going to elaborate here. It does clear the air though. Thanks for clarifying.

“as for your sarcism, if you think its trivial, i have nothing more to say…”

To each his/ her own! :)

post #49 on December 12th, 2009 2.35 pm

i dun see how your post relates to my post #9 on December 11th, 2009 12.22 am

////In this world, there is no perfection….. is #9 hoping for perfection?////

???…

post #46 on December 12th, 2009 12.50 am

new faces showing up for your cause does not equal to a show of support, dun jump to that conclusion too early.

you may be doing this out of compassion & out your own spare time, but that does not mean its worth supporting. if that is what you are getting at.

////…. but I personally have the right to defend my position too.////

critics not = antagonists. that is all i can say.

its not that you cannot raise a question, but its about what it asked that i find amusing.

as for the “thumbs up & “thumbs down”, it does give an indication how well or ill recieved a post is. most likely, most of my detractors most likely have nothing much to back up their opinion? maybe it is an immature novelty i guess? :D

////Because we have not heard about other cases.////

fair enough. i cant say the same for others hopping on this (Yong Vui Kong) bandwagon though.

as for mentioning Mr Chiam ST & Mr Low TK, i am not about to open an irrelevent discussion about them but to highlight real people who in my opinion have the said qualities in my earlier post. hope this clears the air.

as for your sarcism, if you think its trivial, i have nothing more to say…

That means something to the family members of Vong.

is #9 hoping for perfection? If people cannot be perfect they should not help? A help is a help. To Vong, it means a lot. Imagine if you were in his shoes, tell me you would not appreciate it?

But the apathetic population may never know about this points/questions raised by RP.

So, am i right that the problem is Apathy? Mr TKL, would you be so kind as to respond to this assumption of mine? Would you not agree ?

Actually it is up to people to believe it or not but in time to come, it is hoped that our actions will prove otherwise. I do know personally that at the end of the day, the people who will truly know the sincerity of our work is us. We see new faces coming to our events and strangers discussing the topic with us on here. It is not a “friend-friend” support that we have.

Look, and this is just fyi, we are people with day jobs too and we could have just ignored the whole issue or just let him hang but we disagree with his sentence hence we spoke up. You have the right to doubt, I have never said no to that but I personally have the right to defend my position too. It is all equal here, no?

“this is not a can or can’t question at all. the fact you raise such a question really amuses me.”

So I can’t raise a question for discussion too? That was in fact a question in response to your doubts because you have not elaborated or made suggestions there. Was merely trying to engage you in a discussion because I want to understand more about your views. Otherwise I won’t bother to keep coming back to respond.

“then what am i? lol…”

Same thing, a member of the public too. Campaigners hold no superiority over anyone else. The whole point of campaigning is to advocate and generate support. If anyone doesn’t agree with us, there is no reason to force but to be patient while continuing to clarify the doubts they hold. That is what I am personally doing. Campaigners are merely a group of people who happens to be members of the public, who comes together to speak up on an issue.

“there is a certain amount of biased in this statement, on the flip side people who raise questions and probe further deeper (like me) into the said causes are not welcome? the “thumbs down” on my posts vs the “thumbs up” on yours is telling isn’t it?”

Once again let me reinforce the fact that I have never said that people with different opinions/ who are critical are not welcome. With regards to the thumbs up/ down, I never really give it much attention. Just a little novelty I think and it is a little immature for anyone to see any importance into that (only speaking in general). It is my own opinion though and am just sharing with you. You may of course, feel free to think otherwise.

“Mr Yong Vui Kong is not the 1st person to be tried under such a law. so why the surge in interest? how families & friends of those before him think & feel?”

Because we have not heard about other cases. That is why we have been appealing for lawyers or anyone to approach us if they are handling/ heard of such cases so that we can render them the support they need.

With regards to the “Uniquely Singapore” thingy, I use that often in speech/ on my personal blog. Not targeted at you personally but at the end of a ponder about certain situations in Singapore. Since you specifically asked about that, so I thought I should be honest with you that it was a sarcastic expression of mine. Yes I realised that I did not elaborate in response but I thought it wasn’t important, just a trivial matter.

post #38 on December 11th, 2009 8.16 pm

eh, maybe its not about understanding your work? maybe its more like how naive you come across?

example (from post #11 on December 11th, 2009 12.51 am):

1) “We are not using Yong Vui Kong as a tool. We are campaigning against his death sentence… ”
my response: do you expect people to believe you right off the bat? or are believers your friends or those who know you?

2) “Why can’t activists and politicians be genuinely concerned about the issue without people doubting about their agenda.”
my response: this is not a can or can’t question at all. the fact you raise such a question really amuses me.

3) “We are still members of the public…”
my response: then what am i? lol…

4) “In other countries all over the world, Asia included, it is typical for politicians to raise their concerns about such issues and the whole world welcomes their participation.”
my response: there is a certain amount of biased in this statement, on the flip side people who raise questions and probe further deeper (like me) into the said causes are not welcome? the “thumbs down” on my posts vs the “thumbs up” on yours is telling isn’t it?

5) “I wonder why this is so.”
my response: Mr Yong Vui Kong is not the 1st person to be tried under such a law. so why the surge in interest? how families & friends of those before him think & feel?

////Was just a sarcastic expression.////

so this is your way (in your own words as follows),…
////trying to reach out to engage with them so that we can exchange ideas and opinions with the intention to understand each others’ perspectives.////

http://news.sina.com.cn/o/2009-12-10/083016749087s.shtml

also, dun bother to ask for electoral map when cant even field one GRC team…field also can kena ‘vaporised’ on cooling off day

Who, me? A Malaysian who was about to be hanged who I am not related to in anyway. There was a load (super lot more) of foreign interference during the Nyugen Tuong Van case. Did anyone complain? Not even PAP. I can understand UMNO not wanting to save a poor Malaysian Chinese citizen, but a near total news blackout by PR and their politicians, especially the socialist one with the “multi-racial” composition?

Face it, the Malaysians got caught out with their hypocrisy. They dont even acknowledge Mr Yong’s existence until the last minute for Malaysiakini and not at all in the MSM. Seems to me like there is some secret pact is going on between the Malaysian opposition (especially that one component) and the Singaporean governing party.

“Besides, it is just as wrong to hang a Malaysian just as it is to hang a Singaporean (rich or poor, Lee or not). ”

Nice sentiments but there will no reciprocity I can assure you whoever is in power in Malaysia, although on our side even PAP will take care of its citizens and duly report the news. If ever the Singapore opposition were to take power, it would be expected to do so to. It is their DUTY.

P.S HTML allowed?

Why should SDP and RP stick their necks out to save a foreigner when his country’s political parties should be the one making the noise, providing the assistance and doing the work?

I assure you that you will be shouting “foreign interference! foreign interference! foreign interference!” when you find out UMNO or Pakatan Rakyat is campaigning for Vui Kong’s clemency. Besides, it is just as wrong to hang a Malaysian just as it is to hang a Singaporean (rich or poor, Lee or not).

really ? how to ask ? majority ? must have permit or not ?

You mentioned,

“your reply sums up why there is the fence & why there are people on boths sides & that the fence remains. people like you do not understand why there are people who are critical, some who are not & some indifferent.”

It is inevitable that there will always be people who are critical. ‘People like me’ are always trying to reach out to engage with them so that we can exchange ideas and opinions with the intention to understand each others’ perspectives. I feel that you have not fully understood our work but it is understandable and we need to evaluate upon that ourselves.

“how you are associated with SADPC will likely be viewed with suspicion than a stamp of approval.”

Maybe you would like to elaborate more upon this point? If you firmly believe so, then I believe that you do have a reason too. Point of this discussion here is to share opinions (IMHO), not to just whack.

“when a “why” is raised, it gives rise to a “why not” rebuttal. being critical has its merits, this is how people improve, by winning critics over, just like movie critics. of course, there are idiots who pretend to be critics. but further probe will reveal their true self.”

Yupp, I agree. So elaborate on the “why not”. I am not saying that no one can criticise anyone. In fact I do welcome it that was why I bothered asking all the whys. Otherwise I will just slam all the way in a very offended and offensive manner.

“i do believe campaigning a cause requires certain qualities, an infinite amount patience & steely will be among them. sounds like local politics, do you see Mr Chiam ST or Mr Low TK quitting?”

Not everything is black and white. Activists campaign, politicians campaign, union groups campaign, social welfare groups campaign… all over the world. A politician can also be an activist but an activist need not necessarily be a politician. I prefer not to comment on Low and Chiam here. :)

“what is the “Uniquely S’pore” you were saying?”

Was just a sarcastic expression. Maybe you can read the whole paragraph again, maybe you will get it. Otherwise it isn’t all that important yea.

you must be joking lah. I thought MAS was locked up literally in a place full of security people. and MAS was labeled as a terror and by the way it was said that he had a limp.

his photo was pasted almost every single corner that you were able to think of and the whole nation of security forces was mobilized just to get him.

what hawk ? do you mean Tweety Bird with one-man assembly law to fall back on ?