Welcome to Loserville – The Place Where the Majority Need to be Protected.

 

Today is Singapore’s National Day. It’s day where we celebrate 56-years of Independence or the day that we got ourselves kicked out of the Malaysian Federation. Our celebration is unique. Unlike other nations, like say, the USA or India, our “Independence Day” is not a celebration of Independence but a celebration of survival. We didn’t fight for our Independence. The rallying cry from our first leaders was “Merdeka Malaysia” rather than “Majullah Singapura,” and the person who gave us Independence was actually Tunku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia’s first Prime Minister, who booted us out of the Malaysian Federation.

Singapore, as is often said in the international press, a wonderful example of how to create everything from nothing. The strategy for doing so was simple. We became a bastion of stability in a turbulent nation and in age where everyone was rejecting “investment” from former colonisers, we welcomed them.

One of the things that made us so attractive to the community of investors was the fact that we were officially governed by laws and we made it clear that unlike other places, we would not be a place that was governed by ethnic or religious concerns. We have found through our collective experience that approaching things “regardless of race or religion,” has been good for our prosperity.

Yet, despite years of enjoying a system of “regardless of race or religion,” there were a few events prior to National Day, which gave a sense that all was not that well with our state of religious harmony. There was, for example, the incident of a racist lecturer who accosted an interracial couple and started haranguing them in public for being – “interracial.” What was disturbing about this incident was the fact that he actually received sympathy in some quarters for losing his job and one commentator on TRemeritus actually questioned how I would feel if all the Chinese girls went for Indian men (the answer being my d*** is not racist and I would have looked for a cute Indian chick).

This experience isn’t totally unique to me. Singapore’s Magically Unconflicted Writer and Enforcer of Laws, Mr. K. Shanmugam was asked by at forum organised by Lianhe Zaobao, our Chinese language daily; “Chinese Singaporeans, the largest group in Singapore, are now asked to be sensitive to the minority. But shouldn't the largest group have the right to decide on Singapore's direction, such as education, language to be used, like other countries?”

 

What makes this question particularly interesting is the fact that it indicates a sense of vulnerability. As the largest ethnic group in Singapore, the Chinese inevitably have the largest influence in deciding the direction of Singapore’s culture.

Take the use of language. Malay is Singapore’s national language. However, for my generation (Gen X), we only use the language for singing the national anthem and army drill commands.  Then, there’s English, which is the official working language of the country. We all grew up learning and using English is everyday life.

That leaves Mandarin and Tamil (the majority of Singapore-born Indians being descended from people from Tamil Nadu). Of the two, Mandarin is considerably more significant in as much as the Chinese are the larger group. However, if you consider the fact that Mandarin is not actually the mother tongue of Singaporeans of Chinese descent (Lee Kuan Yew had an obsession with eradicating Chinese dialects), you’ll find things even more interesting.

Singapore is filled with Tamils who may not necessarily be able to speak Tamil but will speak several Chinese dialects fluently. I think of the conversations I used to have with one of my former father-in-law’s businesses associates. The man spoke better Mandarin than me and if you shut your eyes when speaking to him, you wouldn’t realise he wasn’t Chinese. On the reverse, you’re not going to find a Chinese who speaks Tamil, with the exception of a few curse words (which my Tamil friends from India are quick to assure me are words they would never use because it’s so crass)

Why is that? The answer is simple. The Chinese are in the majority and so there’s no need to learn Tamil. By contrast, the Tamils living in Singapore and to an extent in Malaysia learn Chinese dialects or the language of the streets.

An ethnic majority has an automatic advantage by being the majority. Minorities by default need to adapt to the majority. The situation is not much different elsewhere. Just as Tamils learn Chinese dialects in Singapore, Mexican migrants in the USA are quick to learn English for the simple reason that English is the language of the majority.

Chinese in Singapore are not about to lose their status as the dominant group just as White people in America are not about to be displaced in the immediate future. What is clear though is that the minority populations in both Singapore and USA are growing.

Is this a bad thing?  I don’t think so, or at least I don’t think it should be. Cultures are constantly evolving and I believe that everyone takes a bit of everyone else’s culture and it evolves into something different and unique. If you want the Chinese to be the majority in perpetuity, there is the option of greater migration of people from Mainland China. However, that creates another problem – the differences between Singaporean Chinese and Mainland Chinese are actually greater than between Singaporeans of different races.

As a majority, we need not fear the loss of any advantages in life. We merely need to understand that our fellow citizens of different races and religions also have certain needs and values too and they are deserving of respect as much as we are. “Dark jokes” towards darker skinned people for example, are not funny when repeated often enough, especially when you’re on the receiving end. Minorities by default are the ones adapting and what they’re asking from the majority is merely a bit of sensitivity, which we, as the group in power should provide as a sign of strength.