Sunday, November 13, 2011

Singaporeans Are a Little Bit Crazy

Singapore is a very nice place to live: clean, safe, pretty, with excellent public transportation, schools, parks and roads. And Singaporeans are very nice people: and quite polite, remarkable for a largely Chinese population (Chinese people individually tend to be incredibly thoughtful/generous/kind, but in groups, or with strangers, it's a whole other story. Beware the old ladies in particular!)

But Singaporeans also tend to be a little bit crazy: obsessed with rules, order and the "right" way to do things. It becomes very rigid, and slides over into virulent, rage-filled ranting surprisingly frequently. I think many people are  full of suppressed rage and frustration, and these emotions find a target when venting about popular bete noires like immigrants, criminals, litterers, bankrupts, and the like.

Here's a video against people who park their bikes incorrectly.


Here's the accompanying text:

An inconsiderate bicycle owner is such a Major Turn-Off. The mother of 2 young girls sure is a Very BAD role model for her children.
The Courtesy Campaign (or Kindness Movement) have been going on for some 30 years, but still, many Singaporeans, natives or otherwise, choose to continue with their INconsiderate and UNkind ways towards others.
Is "public education" and "public awareness" totally ineffective if these movements do not come with imposed FINES coupled with effective enforcement by the police & community, and with some embarrassment (Hint: CWO) thrown into the mix?

The strangest thing to me about this (besides that the maker is carefully showing us their address, presumably so that the Internet audience can go stalk them  or write nasty letters) is that the bike is actually NOT in the way of anything, being very tidily tucked away. It amuses me very much that the author is calling for more punishment (Singaporeans are big on this, especially in the form of fines, which tend to be quite high: $500 for possession of chewing gum, up to $2000 for jaywalking, etc.).

Singapore is a strange place.

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