Hi guys, we have our very first non-white prime minister in the UK, Rishi Sunak. It is an exciting time and I'm thrilled with the result after months of political turmoil here in the UK. There are so many questions about the implications of having our first non-white PM and thus in this post I'll try to deal with some of those questions today in my usual Q&A format.
Q: Sunak got into power as Mordaunt and Johnson dropped out of the leadership contest, so it was a walkover. Could he have won if he had to run against Mordaunt or Johnson, given how racist the Conservative party is?
A: Good question. Your guess is as good as mine because it was never ever put to a vote, but there was every possibility Johnson could have run against him and won, or even after Johnson dropped out of the contest, then the Mordaunt camp would have hoped to have picked up a large number of the supporters who would do anything to block Sunak from becoming the new PM - that never happened. We all know what happened the last time the vote went out to the Conservative party members, they picked Truss over Sunak because she's white and he's Asian. She turned out to be a total disaster, but we have already dealt with that in my previous post. Were precious lessons learnt? Well, let's see.
Q: Could Sunak actually lead the Conservative party to victory in the next general election then?
A: It's hard to say at this stage because he has inherited the country in quite a mess, if he can clean up this mess then yes he would have a lot of credibility with the voters. Remember, I don't get to directly pick my prime minister in the UK (unlike say in America, where there is indeed a presidential election). Instead, in my general election, I only get to pick my local MP and it is the party with the most number of MPs that get to form the ruling party in government, then the leader of that ruling party automatically becomes the new PM. So even though Mr Racist in a little village in the North of England is a Asian-hating bigot, he isn't going to be voting for Sunak directly, but he would be choosing his local MP who might be the kind of white, older, male Conservative candidate selected specifically to appeal to Mr Racist. So even if Mr Racist doesn't like Sunak, he would probably like his local MP and thus it would at least be a dilemma for him that isn't as straight forward as "would he vote for a non-white PM?" Such a choice doesn't exist under our system. Whether or not people support him, Sunak has been given this opportunity to prove himself and I wish him all the best; for the sake of the country, I really hope he does well and succeeds. Our country has gone through too much crap already recently.
Q: Can we talk about that racist caller who accused Sunak of not being British?
A: There was this incident whereby a creepy old racist white man called up a radio station and said some very racist crap about Sunak a few hours after it was announced that Sunak was the new PM. I'm not going to pretend that there aren't any racist bigots in this country, of course there are but the fact is Sunak is untouchable, he has met the king and he is now the prime minister. He is also one of the wealthiest men in the country - he has money and power the way many people in this country don't. I compare this to when I saw someone leave a negative comment on one of Rihanna's music videos on Youtube, criticising the song and bitching about how bad it was. I wanted to write in response to that, "Rihanna doesn't care if you liked her song or not, she is a billionaire. Even if she found out somehow that you didn't like this song, it wouldn't matter to her, not at all." But is that fact going to stop that person from leaving that negative comment? Of course not, some people are desperate to let the world know what they think, whether or not anyone is actually cares what their opinion is. I often say that politics is a popularity contest but you don't need everyone in the country to like the PM before he or she can take power - there isn't any need for this kind of 'unanimous' agreement because there will never be; that is simply not how democracies work. Heck, I really hated both Johnson and Truss, so it's hardly surprising that Sunak will be unpopular with some people for a range of reasons, racism being just one of them. A lot of people resent him for being so incredibly rich and thus accuse him of being out of touch with the vast majority of ordinary people.
Q: America had Obama as president back in 2009, what took the UK this long to get a non-white PM?
A: We've always had plenty of non-white ministers in the cabinet and that's nothing new for the UK. There is one reason why I think a lot of Asians stay away from politics - they want to get rich and politics is not the way to get rich in the UK. The salary for a UK prime minister is only £161,401 (at the time of writing in 2022), whilst that is a nice figure compared to people in working class jobs, it is shockingly low compared to what one could earn in other sectors. I refer you to the example of Sajid Javid who took the biggest pay cut that we know of to enter politics - he took a 98% pay cut to enter politics when he left banking. The thing is for super rich Asians like Javid and Sunak, they have already amassed so much wealth they're not that bothered about how much they earn on a monthly basis, that's why they are free to pursue other ambitions like power and influence which may not necessarily be rewarding financially. We need to look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs to break this down: politics is the ultimate form of self-actualization. But of course, you need to be ridiculously rich to be in that privileged position to say, "I already have enough money, I'm not interested in making even more money and I would like to do something else to fulfil my ambitions." I can imagine how your average older British Asian parent would react to Javid taking that 98% pay cut to enter politics! Most first generation Asian migrants are keen to make as much money as possible, so even if they do become rich, they are also keen to send money back home to help their extended family. However, both Sunak and Javid were born in the UK and thus do not share that immigrant mentality which may deter most of the first generation Asian migrants away from politics for financial reasons.
The other factor is that British-born Asians are a lot better assimilated than first generation migrants - since politics is the ultimate popularity contest, it is a game that first generation migrants have decided not to take part in but their children do not feel the same way. It's the elephant in the room and I have to address it; recently I wrote a series of blog posts looking at recent migrants from Hong Kong who have moved to the UK and in researching the topic, I watched a lot of Youtube news reports following these migrants. Some of the people featured in these reports brought their young children with them to the UK and I saw how some of these children not only had a really strong accent, but even struggled with English. I did wonder if these children were going to adapt quickly, if they would pick up English fast enough and lose that strong Cantonese accent within a year or two, or would they always be that awkward immigrant kid who doesn't quite fit in and has no friends because of the language and cultural barriers? I am sympathetic to these kids of course as I'm now in a Spanish speaking work environment - Spanish is my fourth language for crying out aloud (after English, French and Mandarin), I'm not fluent yet and I do struggle at times when my colleagues and clients are speaking to each other at native speed rather than slowing down so I can catch every single word. But then again, I'm an adult with the right kind of social skills that help me cope with such situations - it is a big ask to throw an eight year old kid into the same kind of situation and expect them to develop the skills overnight to cope. That's why many immigrant kids are content simply to do well in their studies as that would ensure that they can get a well-paid job - hence they are far less interested in becoming popular, it is that mindset which keeps many first generation Asian migrants away from politics.
Whilst the UK has always had ties to Asian former colonies, the vast majority of Asian migrants moved to the UK in the 1950s and the 1960s. The British economy was recovering after WW2 and that created many gaps in the labour market that the locals simply couldn't fill - thus the UK turned to her former colonies for cheap labour to do the dirty, low-paid working class jobs that the locals refused to do. So many of these first generation migrants were not well-educated professionals, some barely spoke any English at all. Let's take the fabulously rich Sajid Javid for example: his parents came from Pakistan in the 1960s. Javid's father was a bus driver and his mother didn't even speak English when she arrived in the UK. Then there was another big wave of Asian migrants when Idi Amin expelled all Asians from Uganda in 1972 and 27,200 of them came to the UK. Thus given a combination of these circumstances, many first generation British Asian migrants were either poorly educated or simply not interested in taking part in politics at all - those who came from Uganda had lost everything when they had to flee as refugees and were more interested in simply rebuilding their lives. But now it is at the children of this first wave of Asian migrants who were born in the UK in the 1970s and 1980s - they have grown up in the UK and thus are completely assimilated culturally, putting them in a good position to engage in politics. They have reached an age where they are ready to take very senior positions in government and hence it was only a matter of time before we had an Asian PM. It couldn't have happened with the first generation of Asian migrants but finally the conditions are right today for Sunak to take the top job in the country and be our new PM.
Q: What percentage of the UK is Asian?
A: The total percentage of Asians in the UK is 7.19% - of which, you have several sub-groups like Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Chinese, mixed-Asians and others. However, I don't want to put too much efforts into the statistics for now as the 2021 UK census results have yet to be published on demographics and the only information we have is from the 2011 census and that would be way out of date. For example, the percentage of Asian would have undoubtedly increased since 2011. Of course, there are huge regional variations - so there are certain areas of a few cities which have a much higher concentration of British Asians whilst you have big swathes of the rural countryside with very few ethnic minorities. Then of course, the census data often fails to capture data from non-British Asians who are resident in this country, such as the many foreign students or people on short-term working visas. So the bottom line is that Asians are around 7 in the UK but we are the biggest minority (only about 3% of the UK is black), though that's a fallacy as you're putting all 'Asians' (from Koreans to Thais to Indians) into one category as if we're a monolithic entity. If you were to start breaking it down into countries of origin, the biggest minority would be Indians, closely followed by Pakistanis.
Q: Are there any British-Chinese people involved in politics?
A: There is only one MP at the moment, Alan Mak and he has held various minor roles in the Conservative government over the years but he has yet to attain the position of a minister yet. Mak is the first and only British-Chinese MP and there are others involved in much more local politics (as local councillors) but most Chinese people shy away from politics for two reasons: firstly, it's not as well paid as some other professions (we wanna make money) and secondly, there are just far fewer Chinese people than say Indian or black people in the UK. We're a tiny minority here, Chinese people make up approximately 0.7% of the population of the UK, not even one percent - thus a black politician can easily gain the 'black vote' if s/he stands as a candidate in an area with a large number of black voters. But with Chinese people, there are so few of us and we're scattered all over the country, the concept of a 'Chinese vote' is non-existent.
Q: Would the story of Rishi Sunak would inspire British Asian young people that they can do anything?
A: No, not really. Sunak's parents were rich but not crazy rich - they had good jobs and had invested in his education, making sure he was sent to the Stroud school so he could grow up rubbing shoulders with the rich kids and avoid poorer, working class kids. Many other students in this country won't have that privilege as most parents would send their kids to the local state schools and hope for the best, rather than invest that heavily in their children's education. Whilst it is not as exclusive as Eton, it is certainly one of the better schools in the country that did help Sunak gain entry to Oxford. Thus I don't think it's fair to say that Asian kids would be inspired by Sunak - if these kids had parents who are willing and able to invest heavily in their education, then they already are well on their way to a life of success. And if these kids have poor working class parents who don't just have the means to invest in their education, then no amount of 'inspiration' is going to take the place of a quality education. Talk is cheap as it costs nothing to inspire someone - what working class Asian kids need is real, tangible help in the form of funding, scholarships and bursaries to help them get the education they need to attain social mobility. It is just cruel to turn to a working class kid living in poverty and saying, "look our prime minister is the son of an Indian immigrant, you too can make your dreams come true if you work very hard!" Yeah, right.
Q: Surely you're just being cynical Alex?
A: Sunak shares little in common with the vast majority of the people in the UK in that he is very rich - it is estimated that him and his wife have a fortune worth at least US$800 million. Quite frankly, the colour of his skin doesn't matter as much as how much money he has. We live in a post-racism society where it is not your skin colour that matters but rather it is your wealth and your social class that determines your place in British society. Thus we have a country where there are many white people who are very poor and an Indian prime minister who is ludicrously rich. So if a working class, poor Asian kid wants to look at Sunak and feel some kind of inspiration because of the colour of his skin, then I can only shake my head. It is a lot easier to succeed in this country when you have rich parents who have invested in a great education that would enable you to access much better jobs - but am I saying anything new that you don't already know?
A: In a post back in 2019, I looked at a BBC report that explored how the Chinese and Indian ethnic groups earned the most in the UK, far more than the whites and everyone else. That post may be three years old now but the situation hasn't changed in that the Chinese and the Indians still earn more than everyone else and that yes, Sunak is a reflection of that determination of Asian migrants to succeed. I have just re-read that piece and I'm very happy with the analysis there so I'd refer you to it please, as I don't feel the need to repeat the points I've made there. But I think the most important point that I need to emphasize is that it is simply not enough to tell your kids, "you must study hard" and pressure them to perform well at school; parents need to invest a lot of money in their children's education in order for them to succeed. Look, I grew up in a working class Singaporean family, I saw how poor families in Singapore struggled with finding enough money in my childhood - I remember this girl in my primary school who came from a really poor family and I felt so bad for her. Let's call her Meiling, she really struggled with her studies even in primary school and her parents were barely literate, working class folks. What did Meiling's parents do every time she performed poorly in a test or exam? They would beat the crap out of her and she would turn up at school to show us the cane marks on her arms and legs, it was pretty gruesome. They didn't have the money to pay for Meiling to receive private tuition to get the kind of help she needed to improve her grades but beating her up simply didn't work either - her grades were still in the gutter, she was failing everything. No amount of punishment helped her and the school system simply wasn't equipped to deal with students like Meiling. Unfortunately, her parents just didn't have the money to pay for the kind of help she needed.
Q: So is it really all about money (or the lack of)?
A: It's not really about the culture or the work ethic, it really boils down to parents recognizing how important it is to spend money on their children's education. Meiling was never going to become a Nobel prize winning nuclear scientst, I don't think she was that intelligent. However some students simply needed a bit more help and attention from the teachers, the resources simply were not there to allow Meiling to get that kind of personal attention and help from the teachers who had big classes - on average, there were about 40 students per class in my primary school back then. Gosh, as I think about what Meiling had to go through, I really feel bad for her. Meiling was just as Chinese as I was but the only difference was that her parents were genuinely poor. If Meiling had come from a much richer family who could bought her a much better class of education, things might have turned out very differently for her. Thus by that token, Sunak was very lucky to have had great parents who made the right decisions for his future by investing in his family but don't for get that for every one Sunak, there must be thousands, even millions of Melings out there as well who weren't so fortunate.
That's it from me on this topic. Sorry it took me a while to get this out - I was having serious problems with my laptop and had to reinstall Windows along with everything else but fingers crossed everything is okay now and I'm looking forward to getting back to normal. So please do share your thoughts by leaving a comment below and many thanks for reading!
Y'know that money vs the ability to influence the world hits very hard. We have the same issue in the US where bright minorities prefer to work in high earning sectors instead of running as a politician or becoming a scientist by going to graduate school. As much as making "change" for the world matters, it matters less if your bank balance is close to $0. Also I'm surprised people attack Rishi Sunak for being rich when in America we have so many millionaire members of Congress and other politicians, like Donald Trump. As if Rishi Sunak is even that much more wealthier than the other MPs or past prime ministers. If he was a white prime minister nobody would bring up his personal wealth or past banking career. Boris Johnson grew up wealthy and well connected. Emmanuel Macron also used to work in banking.
ReplyDeleteBtw, Suella Braverman terrifies me. And surprisingly she went to Cambridge for law. She isn't some hill-billy who hates immigrants, this is an actual educated person which is how she was appointed. Or maybe it's just the liberal newspapers I read making her look like a monster, and she's not actually gonna follow up on the things she says.
The fact is Rishi Sunak acquired a lot of his wealth through work and smart decisions (like marrying his wife) - it wasn't just given to him by his parents. So I do want my PM to be smarter and brighter than me, I don't want a PM who is a failure and gets votes by blaming rich bankers for everything. Of course, that's just my perspective - if the PM doesn't connect with poor people, then seriously, would the poor people prefer to elect a bus driver to be the leader of the country? As for Suella Braverman, well there's a lot of people who respond well to her brand of rhetoric. The attitude in Europe is like, we welcome regular migration - get your work permit, sort out the paperwork and come and work here when you have a job offer, that's all fine. But when refugees turn up by the thousands, facilitated by people smugglers, then that's irregular migration and that's what a lot of people are afraid of. So Europe would welcome people like you Amanda, but not the refugees from poor war torn African countries.
DeleteYes totally, Rishi Sunak despite having parents who sacrificed to pay for private school did work his way up the career ladder. His parents didn't have the connections to give him jobs high up while he lazed around. I do want my world leader to be smart too, an Obama rather than a Trump. Even in the US, newspapers were attacking Obama as "not really black" because he was raised by his middle class white mother and grandparents, and went to Columbia and Harvard. However, many middle class children don't have the talent or drive to end up in an Ivy league or Oxbridge, so it doesn't take anything away from Obama or Sunak's competence.
DeleteHmm I don't know what newspapers you've read but Suella Braverman has been quoted by a few papers as attacking even skilled migrants and international students, in addition to the people coming on boats. I don't really think she will follow up on that, because it would mean losing NHS workers and having to raise NHS pay to attract local ones. As for the international students, people complain they steal jobs from locals after graduation, but when I looked up entry level jobs in engineering in the UK, many of them said they can't sponsor a work visa because the salary is only 50k pounds/year, while the visa costs up to 10k in legal fees. Only jobs in finance can afford to sponsor work permits, but people in finance aren't the type of voters to complain about immigration.
The fact is even if we somehow (as a bizarre social experiment) elected a black bus driver as president/PM, then yes that bus driver would be able to relate to the struggles of what it is like to try to raise a family whilst holding down a poorly paid working class job, but it takes more than that empathy to run a country successfully and between competence and empathy, I pick the former when it comes to electing the right person to run the country. People will always find a way to attack a politician they don't like, so whilst they cannot say 'I don't like Rishi as he is Indian" (as that would be blatantly racist), they will find on aspect of his life to attack, such as his personal wealth. As for Suella Braverman, bear with me, I've been dealing with stuff relating to my work trip but I clearly need to read further on what she has been saying. I do want to point out that there's often a clear difference between political rhetoric, ie. politicians giving sound bites when talking to journalists and real policy - so for example, the UK government has made a big deal about sending asylum seekers to Rwanda instead of allowing them to settle in the UK, but how many asylum seekers have they successfully sent to Rwanda? Zero, a big fat ZERO so far despite spending a lot of money. So as they say, mind the gap between what people say and what people actually do.
DeleteI did actually do a Google news search on migrants and Braverman, the news is dominated by stories of severe overcrowding at one of the detention centers at Manston, designed to hold about 1200 to 1500 but currently overstretched with like 4000 stuck there. Then there's that story about how some asylum seekers were dumped at a London railway station (in Victoria) with no help, nothing, no money, no where to go, no one to help them etc. A lot of that is all focused on the kind of asylum seekers who come here with nothing, not even a basic command of English, ie. completely dependent on the state for everything, unable to contribute to the economy, a complete burden on the country etc. There is a real issue with the Home Office not processing asylum claims quick enough so there is a genuine problem with people stuck in the system, not getting an answer either way. I have struggled to find anything attacking skilled migrants or foreign students though, the one news article on the topic was about her saying that there were too many 'low skilled migrants' and how she wanted more highly skilled migrants to come here, you know, PhD students like you. But once again, I cite the Rwanda example - there's always a gap between what the government is saying and what they actually get to do.
DeleteYeah it does take more than empathy. Because even if the black bus driver PM wanted to increase NHS funding and benefits, where will they find the money to do so without raising taxes. Someone like Sajid Javid sounds like a good compromise. He is extremely competent as he rose to the board of Deutsche Bank in Singapore, but he also grew up with poor immigrant parents and not doctor immigrant parents like Rishi Sunak. I read his life story and he wasn't even allowed to take 3 A levels in his local school because they didn't usually send students to university.
DeleteLol I've heard of the Rwanda deal but I didn't know they never really followed up with it. So the UK is pretending to be Australia with being tough on boat people and sending them to a 3rd country, but not actually doing it. And no, I don't think she will follow up, legally speaking, with attacking international students and skilled workers. As much as the Tories want the working class vote, they can't afford to lose the "rich vote" either. But I am scared she is stoking racist sentiment in the UK, which would make life harder for immigrants already there.
Do you realize that both Rishi and Suella are INDIAN? The thought of Indian politicians stoking racist sentiments, somehow that just doesn't add up. White politicians stocking up racist sentiments I get, but Asians? It doesn't quite work.
DeleteHmm, it might've been just one Guardian or the Sun article. But it was a while ago, and the article was quite vague about which immigrants, instead just saying all immigration to the UK has been too much. But it was before this issue of asylum seekers in overcrowded centers. I think it was when Liz Truss was still in charge. But yeah, the more pressing issue at the moment is the low skilled migrants from countries without strong economies and how to process them fast enough. The US also has this issue with asylum seekers at the Mexico border, which can take them forever to get their case heard in front of a judge and result in indefinite detention. I suppose people don't care as much about skilled migrants because they come with money and can support themselves, so they aren't a net negative on the welfare system.
DeleteI guess it's not really racism but xenophobia that they are stoking. Which is also ridiculous since they're both Indian. But just because they're Indian doesn't mean they're immune to hypocrisy. Here in America Indian and Chinese immigrants tend to look down on Mexican immigrants because the former are highly skilled while the latter tend to be low skilled. I dunno if you would call that classism, racism, or xenophobia, but personally I'm not sure if it's morally the right thing to do.
I found the Guardian article about Suella Braverman, but it's a week old and I think Liz Truss was still in charge: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/oct/26/suella-braverman-five-controversial-statements-home-secretary
DeleteThere is something in there about international students and even Indian migrants overstaying visas. I will say, even in America you get local born Hispanic Americans saying that illegal immigration from South America is an issue. My main gripe is not when politicians of any race point out when something is an issue. Stuff breaks, policies aren't perfect. Instead I think it's not very useful when they don't deal with it in a humane way and instead blame the people who are just trying to find a better life for themselves.
I think her statements are pretty dumb as they are not specific and they are misdirected. For example, visa overstayers are a genuine problem and there needs to be a better system to deal with illegal immigration. However, why is she even mentioning foreign students who bring in millions to the universities? They are such an important source of revenue and it is not like these students are causing any problem - they come for 3 or 4 years, they pay their school fees, they spend a lot of money then they leave. Whilst they are here, they really stimulate the economy and we need these foreign students. There needs to be a a lot more common sense here: target the illegal immigrants who do not follow the rules and break the law by all means, but why go after the legal migrants like foreign students and short term farm workers? They're contributing to our economy and nobody in this country actually has any problem with such forms of legal migration. I do have to reiterate a point I have made though: Rwanda. She can wax lyrical all she wants about sending asylum seekers to Rwanda but it ain't happening - not until at least 2023 because the courts have stopped it and she can't overrule the decision. So there's a massive gap between her rhetoric and what's actually done - the fact is people like me on the left roll my eyes at her when she spouts right-wing anti-immigrant rhetoric But as you said, Asian people can be horrifically racist as well. Being Asian doesn't mean we're not racist, there's a sense of Suella thinking, "oh you call that racism? Hold my drink, watch and learn - let me show you how it is done properly." The irony though is that the most racist British on the right actually hate people like Rishi and Suella because they are Indian, they're not white. So who is her target audience?
DeleteBut the key issue now is the broken asylum system and people being kept in inhuman conditions - that's what's in the BBC headlines today and this story isn't going anywhere, it's only going to get bigger. I don't think you can deter people from wanting to come here illegally by mistreating and abusing the illegal immigrants who are already here - process their claims and deport them if you must but keeping them in horrific conditions isn't the answer.
DeleteThis is why I don't understand who wants to be a politician. You have to deal with all these big problems without easy solutions, and deal with public criticism everyday. I don't know what they do about illegal immigration or visa overstayers, but in the US if you're caught being an illegal immigrant you are deported and can't come back to the country for another 10 years. The international students one is a bit weird because not only do they stimulate the economy, the talented ones also share their knowledge with the local students. You can't say that British universities are the best if the brightest people outside of Britain don't/can't go there. Oxbridge even has access to the Fulbright scholar system for student exchanges, which Rishi Sunak used to go to Stanford for his MBA, and many Americans used to attend Oxbridge.
DeleteOh I didn't know the courts could overrule a treaty made by the home office, but in the US judges do strike down laws all the time. See I have no clue about her target audience when Suella acts right wing. Here in America we have the Georgia Senate race where the Republicans fielded a black candidate, Herschel Walker, to challenge the democrats Raphael Warnock. But the nytimes has shit on Herschel relentlessly for his anti abortion position by finding women he impregnated and paid to have an abortion. Obviously the republicans are trying to get the black vote using Herschel Walker, but not many black people are against abortion so I suppose the anti-abortion stance is to also attract white christian voters, but those tend to be very racist and not want a black senator.
Yes we have a similar situation here of people being forced to sleep on the floor and denied medical care in overcrowded centers at the Mexican border while the courts are backlogged with asylum cases. It's very inhumane, and Biden even used a covid era loophole to force asylum seekers back to Mexico "to prevent the spread of covid." Germany seems to have a better system, or at least they're more welcoming to process refugee applications as fast as possible.
I think it's a popularity contest - allow me to look at it in a completely different context. When I was a gymnast at secondary school, I was more interested in being the best and winning all the gold medals because I could. There was this other guy, let's call him Lee - he was a so-so gymnast, he was never going to win any medals even though he attended all the training. So for Lee, he thought, I may not be the champion but I can be the captain. I am popular, I can enjoy feeling like the boss, I can be everyone's cheerleader even if I am not the best and yeah I can be a great captain to the gymnastics team. The fact is I was only too happy to let people like Lee take over in that kind of process as we were interested in different things - I wanted the gold medals, the wanted some form of power. Likewise, I can see the people who go into politics are not just those who rise to the top, there are loads of people involved in more local politics, so they join committees and influence decisions on public transport and local facilities. We have elected local councillors who wield a tiny little bit of power over issues like, "there are too many bus stops on the high streets and it slows down traffic, we need to remove one of them to improve traffic flow; we are going to decide which one would have the best impact." Little things like that - they then take great satisfaction over their 'achievements', kinda like how Lee enjoyed his little bit of power as the captain despite having never won a medal in gymnastics. Whereas someone like me, I am too busy work to get involved in projects like that and if and when I do have free time, I wanna do activities that I enjoy like gymnastics, rather than try to get my hands on 'power'.
DeleteLol I remember being in Singapore and people obsessing over the concept of being a "leader" rather than a do-er. Somehow it was more important to be a manager of other people rather than the person carrying out the experiment or whatever implementation. That's certainly not me, I don't like telling other people what to do, but I suppose I could entertain the idea of being able to effect small changes like in local politics. They say the Tories have sorta used the Ukraine war and cost of living crisis in order to implement their free market ideology of low taxes and smaller government. I'm not sure I agree with that, or that even most Brits do, but whoever was in charge had the power to implement it whether or not the public liked it, which backfired considerably.
DeleteI don't think it is uniquely a Singaporean thing - I used the example of Lee because he could have never become a medal winner in gymnastics; sorry nothing personal, but he just wasn't even good enough to be selected to be on the school team. There were 5 people on the team and he was never going to be in the top 5. So he was like, do I just train for fun knowing I would never represent the school? Oh wait, there's this other role I can play to make myself useful and feel great about making a contribution. I did greet this with a bit of skepticism at first because I had assumed that the captain could and should be the best gymnast, but it doesn't have to be of course. It's not a title conferred to the best gymnast like a gold medal, but it is a different role to play and Lee was better at it than I was. Likewise in the corporate world, many people are fussing over getting promoted to the point where you're managing a team of people; but I never wanted that, just like in my gymnastics days, I am a lone wolf who just wants to get stuff done without worrying about exerting power and influence over others. Like you said, is it about having the thrill of telling others what to do? Or is it about getting on with achieving everything on your to-do list?
DeleteThat reminds me, in undergrad the people who usually ran for student government president didn't have the best GPA. I suppose that was a way of beefing up their CV after graduation when they had to apply for jobs, because like you said it shows they have some value in management and administration even if they aren't that talented at a specific skill.
DeleteYeah, I don't want to be a manager either. In fact I'd prefer to make enough money that I can just retire early and do science as a hobby working for a startup where I don't need the money. I couldn't be bothered having to use 90% of my brain for charisma when communicating to another individual when I can spend it applying a skill instead. Some people love that stuff though, and I respect people who can manage well even if I prefer not to take that job.
This kind of leadership or management role is not for everyone and it certainly isn't for me. I prefer to keep to myself, get on with my own work without having to involve another person.
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