Responding to Dewdrop's attack on Xiaxue

Call me a kaypoh (busybody) if you must, but I must disagree with Dewdrop's latest attack on Xiaxue's comment. It's not that I want to take sides here, but I feel that I have something to say on the issue as it did touch a raw nerve with me. Firstly, here's Xiaxue's comment that kicked off the whole argument:  “We cannot return to a kampong state … Yes it is stressful, it is tough – But we must progress WITH Singapore … Or get out.”

Okay, even I have to say that's a rather callous comment. Highly educated skilled professionals like myself can have the pick of a number of countries to emigrate to and I have worked in several countries over the years - but what about those lower down the food chain who would never accumulate enough points in the Australian, British or Canadian emigration system? They are those who are squeezed hardest by the influx of PRCs - yet they are the ones who are the least likely to be able to get out, I'm not even sure a country like Vietnam or Thailand would want to welcome a lowly educated Singaporean only capable of unskilled labour. Yeah, so Xiaxue has unfortunately misfired on quite a few levels with that statement. 

Ooooh flame war ahead. 

Therefore I do agree that Xiaxue is guilty of being tactless once again - and dear me, the amount of abuse she has received on social media as a result of that statement. Aiyoh. Well, I hope she will learn her lesson and be more tactful and considerate in the future when making such comments. Let's move on to the blogger Dewdrop (Mr Chan Joon Yee) who made this attack on Xiaxue. Granted I agree that Xiaxue's comments were inappropriate (and that's putting it mildly!), I still profoundly disagree with Dewdrop's remarks here: 

"Maybe she has forgotten that she is not immortal and definitely, she has forgotten that the majority of far more talented people out there are not as fortunate as she is.

But the party won’t last forever for anybody. Like most celebrities, she too has a lifespan. One day, she too will be “dethroned” and end up like our 40-something middle management professionals who are now begging for jobs, willing to do the same work for half their previous salaries. In Xiaxue’s case, she may not even be able to earn a living by blogging anymore. What next? Will she get appointed as CEO of some big company?"

What would she be doing at the age of 45? 

Now the part that made me sit up and scowl at my computer was this: "the majority of far more talented people out there are not as fortunate as she is". Fucking hell. No no no no. In saying that, he is implying that Xiaxue got to where she is because she is fortunate or lucky - that yeah somehow this Singaporean lady started blogging and because of her good looks and luck, people started paying her to blog. Hell no. Anyone who knows anything about Xiaxue will realize that she didn't achieve fame overnight - rather she worked hard over the years, made many mistakes and enemies along the way and somehow still manage to stay on top of her game after this many years. It's not luck damnit, it's not just good fortune. Trying to account for her success by using the word "fortunate" is misrepresenting the situation altogether. You may not like her but this lady has more business acumen in her little finger than the vast majority of Singaporeans out there. 

I am not a fan of Xiaxue's blog - I just had a look at it a moment ago and frankly, her articles are of no interest to me. Her latest post was about some make up product from Korea - no thanks. I pressed page down a few times and closed that page within like ten seconds. Probably less. I'm a 36 year old man, I'm not in her target demographic as I'm not into the kind of things she is into. However, as a fellow blogger, I know there is a simple way to know how good your writing is - the number of hits you get. 

What tends to happen is this: if I write a good post, people will share it on social media. Take my most popular post from last year: it was recommended 16 times on Google+, it was tweeted 83 times and there were a staggering 915 "likes" on Facebook. That's when I know I have a hit on my hands, when I have written something people like so much that they want their friends to read it too. However, take something like my post when I interviewed the porn star "Regina" - her story fascinated me and I wrote that piece with passion. But nope, no one picked it up on Google+, no one tweeted it and no one liked it on Facebook. I guess it wasn't that well written after all. 

Anyone can write a blog but how many readers do you have?

This reflects on the number of hits I get on my blog. When I write pieces that no one really cares to read about, I get about 4000 hits a day. When I write about a piece that people do what to read about, I can get over 20,000 hits a day. The figures don't lie and it's not like, oh just because I've managed to attract over 20,000 hits a day or 1,000 hits an hour to my blog, I'm in the league of super-bloggers now and people will read any bullshit I write. No, I have to constantly write stuff that people do want to read about or else the traffic will drop off just like that. That is what I admire Xiaxue for - she understands her audience, is able to sustain their interest and has kept that going for a long time. I'm not sure how many hits Dewdrop gets on his blog - he describes his blog as "Stories, music, photos and poems by Singaporean writer Chan Joon Yee". Well Mr Chan, is your writing as interesting as Xiaxue's? Can you sustain a following the way Xiaxue has as a blogger? 

Respect where respect is due to Xiaxue. It is not just good fortune, it is not that she is simply "fortunate" to get to where she is today. Good grief. Tolong lah. please lah Mr Chan, with all due respect, let me put this to you. Achieving success in life is not about being talented - I do not doubt your talent as a writer, musician and poet, but I am a hard nosed businessman. I understand the difference between being talented and having natural business acumen - being talented helps but you need good business acumen to be able to make something of your talent, even if it is simply a question of knowing which employer to offer your talents to in order to earn the most amount of money or get the best career progression.

Xiaxue has natural business acumen. 

Having worked in media, I have seen this time and time again. I have come across so many talented but unemployed creative people (actors, dancers, writers, film makers, composers, producers etc) who bemoan that they are talented but not appreciated and thus unemployed and somehow all this isn't fair because bankers are paid big fat bonuses even when they underperformed but these creative people are unemployed despite trying to make an honest living. Good grief. What the fuck has talent got to do with anything? 

Now I remember my late-granduncle fondly. (Forgive me please if you have heard this story before.) He really wanted to encourage me in anything I did - be it my studies, music or sports. So whenever I did well in an exam, won some award or won a gold medal in gymnastics, I would show it to him what I have achieved and he would reward me with an Angpow (a red envelop containing money, a Chinese tradition of offering a gift of money on an auspicious occasion). I remember his words, "wah ani kiang ah, 很厉害啊!" (Wow you're so smart, so talented.)  The more I impressed him, the more generous his Angpows were - but that's a doting grand-uncle for you, the job market today doesn't really work like that at all.

Wah ani kiang ah, lai lai gu-gong hor lr ang pow...

Allow me to break it down for you. Here's how the labour market works - it is demand-led, not supply driven. There aren't any kind grand-uncles out there waiting to reward you for being talented. That means that nobody is going to create a job for you just because you're oh so freaking talented. Rather, companies decide what kind of individuals they need to hire to perform certain tasks and depending on whether or not you have the right skills to match what they need, they will decide if you are what they are looking for.

So the person responsible for recruitment will have a short list of boxes to tick, "I'm looking for someone who can do A, B, C, D and E." There's really no point in you turning up and saying, "I can only do A and B but look, I can do J, K, L, M and N! I'm talented right? So you should give me a job." They are only going to turn around and say, "That's not relevant to our company, you should be applying to the company who are looking for someone with those skills." 

What does this mean in practice? It means putting everything from your ego to your personality aside, studying the job market in order to figure out what skills are in demand. You may enjoy doing ABC but the demand out there is for EFG - so the sensible thing is to acquire the relevant skills pertaining to EFG rather than sulk and complain, "it's not fair! I am so talented in ABC but no one will give me a job that allows me to do what I enjoy and am really good at!" 

Do you know why are some talented people unemployed? 

So it's not about being talented - hell no. It is about having the business acumen to put yourself in the right place at the right time, understand what skills are in demand and making the most of the opportunities that you have been given. That may sound like common sense but you'll be amazed how many people lack this basic common sense and focus solely on 'talent'. Tthat is why seemingly talented people remain unemployed or at least not fulfilling their true potential. Furthermore there is also an element of making the best of the few good opportunities you are given - that is when it boils down to your performance rather than your talent. Allow me to use an example from the 2012 London Olympics to illustrate my point. 

Now there was a really interesting battle between the USA and Russia in women's gymnastics for the all-around title between Gabby Douglas and Victoria Komova. Now some of you may remember that Victoria Komova won the all-around title at the Singapore Youth Olympics Games in 2010. The two gymnasts couldn't be more different. Komova is tall, slender, blonde and looks like a graceful ballerina. Douglas (who is African-American) is shorter and far more explosive - what she lacks in grace, she makes up with power. Traditionally, Komova fits the mould of a more classical gymnast and has been compared to other previous great Olympic champion gymnasts like Svetlana Khorkina, Nastia Liukin and Tatiana Gutsu. Douglas on the other hand challenged the stereotype of what a gymnast should be like - she performed her floor exercise to techno-dance music rather than a far more classical approach from Komova. 

Komova won the qualifying competition (when both Komova and Douglas made mistakes notably on floor exercise) but in the all-around finals, Douglas defeated Komova by a resounding margin of 0.259. Many gymnastics fans were outraged by the result - claiming that Komova should have won because she is more graceful, she is more talented and her kind of gymnastics is more beautiful. And I'm like, whilst all that may be true, don't forget that in the finals, Komova landed her vault so badly that she stumbled off the landing mat. (See video below, sorry for the poor quality.) That's a huge error - that's why she scored only 15.466 for that poor vault compared to 15.833 in the team finals when she performed the same vault but with a near perfect landing. Now do that maths - that's a difference of 0.367 for that awkward stumble and she lost to Douglas by only 0.259.

So it's very clear to me at least - had Komova not stumbled awkwardly off the landing mat on her vault she would've won. She opened the door for Douglas with that mistake and Douglas didn't put a foot wrong in the finals. That is why Douglas won the gold medal and Komova wound up with the silver. There is no doubt that Komova is probably one of the most talented gymnasts alive today - but when it came down to it, it wasn't her talent that mattered, it was her ability to perform under pressure. Such is life - talent only gets you that far - the rest is up to you to make the most of the chances life gave you. Komova had one chance to perform that vault and she blew it. Harsh but true - life can be cruel.

I hear you saying, "but that's just sports, the world of business is different." No, it isn't. I remember something very similar happening last year in Kuala Lumpur. I had managed to set up a meeting with a major distributor in Malaysia and I rocked up to KL with one of our head of sales. We really wanted to get these distributors to distribute our funds for us in Malaysia - and our head of sales blew it. Sure he was extremely knowledgeable and talented when it came to finance but he made the mistake of giving such a technical presentation that none of the Malaysians understood the product he was selling. Because they didn't really understand what he was selling, the Malaysians turned around and said, "no thank you". So you see, it's not about being "talented" or "smart" - it is about making the most of the few vital opportunities that life gives you. My head of sales screwed up in KL, the same way Komova screwed up on that vault in London. It's really about being able to deliver the performance of your life when it counts. Good things don't happen to you just because you're talented, smart or deserving -  you have to go one step further and that's what Xiaxue has done. 

My head of sales got waaaay too technical in that meeting.

As for Dewdrop's assertion that the party won't last forever for Xiaxue, good grief. Are you for real dude? Dude, seriously dude, that kind of sour grapes attitude is not gonna endear you to anyone. Do you have a crystal ball that can accurately predict what life will be like for Xiaxue in 2030? No? Then don't try to try to second guess her future like some mystical gypsy soothsayer. I don't know what lies in the future for Xiaxue, Limpeh doesn't have a crystal ball either - but what I do know is that this lady has exhibited an incredible amount of natural business acumen and she would be the kind of person who would be able to make the most of any money-making opportunities that will come her way in the future.

This reminds me of yet another hater who attacked me on my blog not so long ago. He came up with this whole stupid argument of, "look at Singapore, look at China, Asia is on the rise, the West is going down, you're doomed cos you live in the West" (cue anti-white racist chest beating). And I responded with my usual "averages don't matter" argument - ie. it doesn't matter how rich your country is, the only thing that matters is how rich you are personally, because the wealth isn't shared equally amongst all the citizens in a country. And I added, "and by the way, regardless of my country's GNP per capita, dude - I'm still freaking rich, bwahahahaha."

Did I mention that I am quite comfortably rich? Bwahahahahaha.

His response to my revelation that I'm still freaking rich was this: he gave me this long, long story about how this banker he knew in Singapore used to be freaking rich too and had a nice car, nice condo etc. Then he hit hard times, lost his job and now that ex-banker has resorted to taking on a job that pays a lot less to make ends meet and has had to eat humble pie. And I'm like, duh, so? So one rich guy in Singapore lost his fortune - are you implying that because of what happened to this guy in Singapore, somehow I will also lose all my money one day in the future? Duh. Fucking duh dude. Talk about illogical arguments. Where is the correlation between my wealth and this other random stranger in Singapore who lost his wealth? Duh.

Why is Dewdrop is freaking pessimistic about Xiaxue's future? I don't know - maybe he is usually this pessimistic about most things? I had a read of his latest blogpost: No Money No Honey, the guy is clearly a very good writer but dude, why are you so pessimistic about the issue of love & romance? Is he simply imposing his own pessimism on Xiaxue without actually considering if it is justified? Granted Xiaxue's blog is mostly about beauty & fashion - what makes you think that women stop being interested in beauty & fashion once they turn 40? Quite on the contrary, the 40 to 60 older female market is an extremely lucrative part of the beauty & fashion industry!

Firstly, these women have more money than their younger counterparts who haven't been working as long - most people earn more as they get older, it's not rocket science dude. Secondly, there is a huge anti-ageing market when it comes to beauty products. "Use this wonderful product on your face and you will look ten years younger, rather than the haggard, tired middle age woman you really are." Yes it is appealing to a woman's vanity to want to look younger than she actually is and it is a huge market that is highly lucrative. I can quite easily imagine Xiaxue in 40 years time, still looking beautiful and stunning - teaching other middle aged and older women how to instantly take ten years off their face with the right cosmetics regime.

I can easily see Xiaxue promoting expensive cosmetics targeting rich older women - oh she would move up the food chain and stop reviewing cheap made in China products and move on to the much bigger names in the industry. Just look at Jane Fonda's ad below - this is a very lucrative market and one that Xiaxue actually understands very well. I wonder if Dewdrop has any idea how your typical products from Max Factor, L'Oreal or Clinique costs. Dude, it's not cheap, oh no. Just go have a look at the prices at the Clinique counter at somewhere like Isetan, Metro or Robinsons and see how much such products aimed at older women cost.

Perhaps I can give Dewdrop the benefit of the doubt that as a man, he really doesn't know anything about the female cosmetics market at all. Or perhaps he's jealously looking at Xiaxue, thinking "you may be beautiful but I'm smart and your looks will fade one day and I can't wait for that day to come". Who knows - but he seems determined to assume that a bleak future will await Xiaxue. I beg to differ - yes Xiaxue has made some silly gaffes over the years but she seems to be able to bounce back each time.

Oh wait, maybe Dewdrop is doing a Chinese thing - he is trying to 咒 (curse) Xiaxue. When I was in primary school, I would hear kids say things like, "我咒你PSLE不及格!" (I curse you to fail your primary school leaving exams!") Of course, this whole thing about putting a curse on someone could be dressed up in far more colourful language, but you get the idea. To 咒someone  is the act of telling the other party that you wish great misfortune to befall them. It is meant to be taken as an insult, rather than a serious prediction. None of us have any Harry Potter type super powers to make our curses potent. Oh well, maybe I can interpret Dewdrop's rather outrageous prediction of Xiaxue's future in that cultural context, otherwise it would make Dewdrop seem really quite silly indeed.

I put a curse on you! 

And you know what the irony of the whole situation is? I don't even like Xiaxue's blog nor do I agree with her opinion in that PETIR interview. I'm not sure if I am all that fond of her at all. But I have to stand up and say something when people attack her unfairly in cyberspace because people like Dewdrop have to learn to disagree with Xiaxue in a more respectable manner rather than resort to this Chinese 咒 thing: "I don't like you! I put a curse on you!" Please lah, that's so lame and childish. Even I thought it was lame when I heard my classmates in primary school talk like that. Duh.