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Wednesday, 3 April 2013
Talk about stupid, ignorant Singaporeans
Hi, a quick one from me today, I just have to bitch about this. Some Singaporeans are bloody stupid and ignorant and they make utter fools of themselves on the internet. Here's what popped up on Facebook within the last hour. Come on readers, do me proud and spot the glaring error in the second sentence.
No, I don't think it is acceptable for the Pentagon Channel to make a mistake like that - however, I don't think it is acceptable for Singaporeans to be ignorant about other countries in the world as well. Now I am not religious, but there is a lovely quote from the bible to describe this situation, ""Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?" (Matthew 7:3)
Needless to say, that post on Facebook generated a lot of anti-American racist rhetoric from the usual Singaporeans on Facebook, none of whom noticed the mistake in the original post ("president of Malawian"). Good grief. So before you wanna bitch about Americans being ignorant and poor in current affairs - how many of you Singaporeans can actually find Malawi on the map of the world? How good are Singaporeans when it comes to current affairs? They are probably just as ignorant as the Americans who made that mistake. Am I the only one who spotted this glaring error? Can we assume that the rest of the Singaporeans who posted those anti-American comments are bloody ignorant and stupid as well? So for all you ignorant Singaporeans out there, please click on this link and educate yourself about Malawi today, thank you.
lmao! Too bad I cannot find the original video anymore ... my hypothesis was that the clerk made an off-by-one (by date - the Malawi visit happened the day before the Singapore visit) error when accessing their video archives. Their mistake was probably the result of omitting a validation check by their protocol officer.
I like how the people putting up that RealSingapore article then proceed to tag "Americans" as "poor in current affairs". Sure, the statement is probably not false, but that video mistake was almost certainly not proof of such :P.
It really doesn't matter. It was an embarrassing error on the part of the Defense Department and they are not going to worry about it. Maybe I am engaged in hyperbole again, but my expectation of the Singaporean reaction to a similar thing happening with the SAF is to bay for the blood of that poor clerk. It is really a crying shame that I'd expect my fellow citizens to react in that manner.
To be fair my friend, I think there are a whole range of Americans and Singaporeans, ranging from those who are extremely knowledgeable to those who are totally ignorant (and everything in between). You should read my stories about my travels in Croatia and trying to tell people that I am not from China, I am from Singapore and nobody in Croatia knows where the hell Singapore is and I had to get my phone out, get a world map up and show them on the map. Are Croatians ignorant? No more so than Singaporeans, I tried to tell my family and friends in Singapore that I went to Croatia and how many of them actually knew where it was? Nobody. That's right, nobody.
Perhaps it's rather arrogant of me to say this - but given how widely travelled I am, how many languages I speak and how I am very good at keeping up with current affairs (and hey, I did get a distinction for geography S paper when in VJC), I can probably sit down and tell you everything you need to know about Malawi. I have read about Malawi and my head has stored a lot of information which I can access from my brain about the country. I don't expect people to have the same kind of gift that I do - it doesn't matter what country they're from, I just expect people to be ignorant.
This is why I went for the jugular vein with this article - the bodoh goondu fucking stupid Singaporean idiot doesn't know the difference between Malawi (the country) and Malawian (the nationality); that's why I have to scream "you fucking stupid Singaporean idiot!" to prove that Singaporeans and Americans have so much in common - both Singapore and America have the same ratio of stupid and ignorant idiots.
I have a sister who is very widely travelled and has been to more countries in the world than I have - she expresses the same kind of disdain when it comes to suaku, ignorant Singaporeans abroad who are just so bloody IGNORANT about what goes on outside Singapore. She has so many stories to tell - but I will save those for another day.
Well, it is rather sad and yet true that Singaporeans are often a largely misinformed or ill-informed group. It does not mean all of them are like that, but somehow, you have to admit that like attracts like in such an environment over there. Your note about the racism in the post is not unusual, because as I noted, Singaporeans--as a result of the policies which have gone wrong seriously--have turned to 'demonizing' others such as foreigners when the real enemy is within them(the government and the apathetic or fearful Singaporeans).
One of the greatest examples of such Singaporean ignorance is the claim that all the rest of the world--including Asia--is way way worse than Singapore. I always hear how 'lousy' Taiwanese are, how 'rough and rude and patriarchal' South Koreans are, and how 'racist' white men and women are from a bunch of Singaporeans who are out to paint the rest of the world through tinted lens. Needless to say, I found none of these stereotypes to be ever true. It baffles me where they come from to begin with!
Hi Kev, there are such misinformed people everywhere lah, to be fair, that's not a Singapore-specific thing - you get ignorant people all over the world I'm afraid. It's the people who are really frogs at the bottom of the well who come up with that kinda shit. I'm afraid my father is totally guilty of that - he has spouted some really nasty anti-French racist bullshit before and I'm like hello dad, excuse me:
1. Your son speaks French better than Chinese 2. Your son has been educated at the Sorbonne. 3. Your son has lived in France. 4. Your son worked 7 years for a French company and has worked stints in France, Belgium and Switzerland.
Surely rather than assuming that French people are racist, why not ask your son what he thinks about French people, after all, he probably knows quite a lot more than you about France especially since:
1. My dad has never been to France. 2. My dad has never met a French person. 3. My dad obviously doesn't speak French, nor has he ever, say watched a French movie or read a French novel - not even one that has been translated into Chinese. 4. In short, my dad probably knows virtually nothing about France.
Yet he is willing to assume the worst of them - all I can say is that people of his generation tend to be rather racist.
Yes, to be fair, such racial prejudices exist even in Korea and Japan, the most obvious one being the notion that only a 'white' can teach English, because they have the accent to teach it, or look that part. Asian-Canadians and Asian-Americans are often passed over in favor of white candidates in some situations for employment in teaching English here, as I heard from an American friend myself. I think that I was lucky insofar as the university needed someone with a PhD to teach, and I had Singaporean and Hong Konger colleagues before me who were employed, or else that same age-old stereotype might have applied. Whenever someone here in Japan asks me about my job, some would register surprise as if they did not expect a yellow-skinned Asian can do that job as a 'native speaker' here.
lmao! Too bad I cannot find the original video anymore ... my hypothesis was that the clerk made an off-by-one (by date - the Malawi visit happened the day before the Singapore visit) error when accessing their video archives. Their mistake was probably the result of omitting a validation check by their protocol officer.
ReplyDeleteI like how the people putting up that RealSingapore article then proceed to tag "Americans" as "poor in current affairs". Sure, the statement is probably not false, but that video mistake was almost certainly not proof of such :P.
It really doesn't matter. It was an embarrassing error on the part of the Defense Department and they are not going to worry about it. Maybe I am engaged in hyperbole again, but my expectation of the Singaporean reaction to a similar thing happening with the SAF is to bay for the blood of that poor clerk. It is really a crying shame that I'd expect my fellow citizens to react in that manner.
To be fair my friend, I think there are a whole range of Americans and Singaporeans, ranging from those who are extremely knowledgeable to those who are totally ignorant (and everything in between). You should read my stories about my travels in Croatia and trying to tell people that I am not from China, I am from Singapore and nobody in Croatia knows where the hell Singapore is and I had to get my phone out, get a world map up and show them on the map. Are Croatians ignorant? No more so than Singaporeans, I tried to tell my family and friends in Singapore that I went to Croatia and how many of them actually knew where it was? Nobody. That's right, nobody.
DeletePerhaps it's rather arrogant of me to say this - but given how widely travelled I am, how many languages I speak and how I am very good at keeping up with current affairs (and hey, I did get a distinction for geography S paper when in VJC), I can probably sit down and tell you everything you need to know about Malawi. I have read about Malawi and my head has stored a lot of information which I can access from my brain about the country. I don't expect people to have the same kind of gift that I do - it doesn't matter what country they're from, I just expect people to be ignorant.
This is why I went for the jugular vein with this article - the bodoh goondu fucking stupid Singaporean idiot doesn't know the difference between Malawi (the country) and Malawian (the nationality); that's why I have to scream "you fucking stupid Singaporean idiot!" to prove that Singaporeans and Americans have so much in common - both Singapore and America have the same ratio of stupid and ignorant idiots.
I have a sister who is very widely travelled and has been to more countries in the world than I have - she expresses the same kind of disdain when it comes to suaku, ignorant Singaporeans abroad who are just so bloody IGNORANT about what goes on outside Singapore. She has so many stories to tell - but I will save those for another day.
Well, it is rather sad and yet true that Singaporeans are often a largely misinformed or ill-informed group. It does not mean all of them are like that, but somehow, you have to admit that like attracts like in such an environment over there. Your note about the racism in the post is not unusual, because as I noted, Singaporeans--as a result of the policies which have gone wrong seriously--have turned to 'demonizing' others such as foreigners when the real enemy is within them(the government and the apathetic or fearful Singaporeans).
ReplyDeleteOne of the greatest examples of such Singaporean ignorance is the claim that all the rest of the world--including Asia--is way way worse than Singapore. I always hear how 'lousy' Taiwanese are, how 'rough and rude and patriarchal' South Koreans are, and how 'racist' white men and women are from a bunch of Singaporeans who are out to paint the rest of the world through tinted lens. Needless to say, I found none of these stereotypes to be ever true. It baffles me where they come from to begin with!
Hi Kev, there are such misinformed people everywhere lah, to be fair, that's not a Singapore-specific thing - you get ignorant people all over the world I'm afraid. It's the people who are really frogs at the bottom of the well who come up with that kinda shit. I'm afraid my father is totally guilty of that - he has spouted some really nasty anti-French racist bullshit before and I'm like hello dad, excuse me:
Delete1. Your son speaks French better than Chinese
2. Your son has been educated at the Sorbonne.
3. Your son has lived in France.
4. Your son worked 7 years for a French company and has worked stints in France, Belgium and Switzerland.
Surely rather than assuming that French people are racist, why not ask your son what he thinks about French people, after all, he probably knows quite a lot more than you about France especially since:
1. My dad has never been to France.
2. My dad has never met a French person.
3. My dad obviously doesn't speak French, nor has he ever, say watched a French movie or read a French novel - not even one that has been translated into Chinese.
4. In short, my dad probably knows virtually nothing about France.
Yet he is willing to assume the worst of them - all I can say is that people of his generation tend to be rather racist.
Check out my latest blog post about democracy.
Yes, to be fair, such racial prejudices exist even in Korea and Japan, the most obvious one being the notion that only a 'white' can teach English, because they have the accent to teach it, or look that part. Asian-Canadians and Asian-Americans are often passed over in favor of white candidates in some situations for employment in teaching English here, as I heard from an American friend myself. I think that I was lucky insofar as the university needed someone with a PhD to teach, and I had Singaporean and Hong Konger colleagues before me who were employed, or else that same age-old stereotype might have applied. Whenever someone here in Japan asks me about my job, some would register surprise as if they did not expect a yellow-skinned Asian can do that job as a 'native speaker' here.
DeleteThanks for highlighting this LimpehFT.
DeleteIt was indeed a typo. We will be more careful next time when posting.
Have a nice day!
-TRS admin