Recently I’ve taken a keen interest in reading blogs and websites that are decidedly off the beaten track, politically or otherwise; sites like the one run by the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), the online journalistic blog “The Online Citizen”, and also recently a stomp.sg-esque site known as temasekreview.com.
The similarity possessed by these three sites are that they are not-government owned. And they make this distinction so clear, compounded on every word, picture, interview or video shown there. They call themselves the “true” voice of Singaporeans, as opposed to the “state-controlled” media.
I’ve never given any serious thought to what “state-control” would mean, until the recent events of the Youth Olympic Games (YOG). The media coverage locally and the conspicuous lack thereof is pretty disturbing. Or so it seems.
There’re so many controversies surrounding the YOG, from the behaviour of our Prime Minister allegedly dosing off during the Opening Ceremony yesterday to the bigger issues of the gross-overbudgeting SGD400 million; to the appalling “Dog-food” given to YOG volunteers and even to whether the volunteers are really volunteering themselves in the first place. It’s so easy to comment and critique. After all there’s hardly any consequence to expressing your own unique opinion in this free society. Or is it?
My purpose is to discuss the media freedom we get in Singapore.
For starters, let’s be honest and admit that the YOG is very largely hyped up in Singapore. So much so that it’s beginning to dictate how people should feel about the YOG. But the fact is that Singaporeans cannot be bought over just like that; people cannot be told how to feel and feel as they are told. More importantly, outside Singapore no one really does care about the YOG. You can’t even find an article about the Opening Ceremony or Youth Olympics on international news sites like CNN or BBC. It’s strangely missing, and its absence disturbing.
It began very subtly, but the symptoms of a very clearly orchestrated intent is so evident in every page of the Straits Times, covering the year’s biggest event supposed chased by Singaporeans through and through. Sure, it’s about national pride and identity, and it’s good to inform us; but since when should the media tell us how to think?
Most people in the loop knows that media in Singapore is held on fiercely by the Singapore government; and no sane government would invite critique to flow in and shake its position as the mantle of governance. No matter what; a strong government is still necessary to ensure its processes take place smoothly and without much hinderance.
But as to whether the policies put in place are right or not; common citizens like us should have some influence, even if we’re not the deciding factor. But sadly, if media (or mainstream media at least) is censored and controlled to such an extent; then it probably isn’t very useful as an avenue to feedback to the government.
Taking the issue back to the YOG, it’s not hard to understand why the media would continuously churn out report after reports of “great” news.
Firstly, this event, in Singapore terms, is too big to fail. Even if the event turns out to have major problems or bad commentary, the media would be stepping on its own foot to now write negative news about the YOG, especially since this has been the protocol all along.
Secondly, to the 5,000 athletes and participants that have come here, Singapore needs to portray a good impression to them; imagine the look of irony and confusion if they know that Singaporeans don’t actually care much about it. The contradiction itself is enough to void a huge part of the efforts put in in the first place.
Thirdly, it’s a fact (though a really sad one) that if Singapore media doesn’t report about YOG, no one else would. Simplybecause it’s not something people would be used to caring about. It’s something new sans the feeling of novelty. Maybe the idea wasn’t meant to be this big. Maybe expectations ran too high.
Such acts are actually found in many Asian countries like China and South Korea and North Korea especially. But you have to realise that Singaporeans are a whole lot more apathetic about almost everything, not only sports. We are apathetic about politics, arts, national development, but have a keen interest in gossips, scandals, free things, sales and those things we can be kiasu about.
At the end of the day whatever the government does there will be two sides of the coin. But more importantly there’s this huge sector that sites flatly on the edge of the coin itself; taking neither. As with the YOG, looking at it there’s 2 groups of people; one relentlessly promoting and the other slamming it, while the remaining vast expanse of us looking at them and don’t give a damn.
This is the Singaporean culture. We do nothing but stop and stare.
“But you have to realise that Singaporeans are a whole lot more apathetic about almost everything, not only sports. We are apathetic about politics, arts, national development, but have a keen interest in gossips, scandals, free things, sales and those things we can be kiasu about.”
hahaha i agree.
hahaaa =)
Great write-up, I enjoyed reading it. Just my 1 cent worth:
1. “It began very subtly, but the symptoms of a very clearly orchestrated intent is so evident in every page of the Straits Times, covering the year’s biggest event supposed chased by Singaporeans through and through. Sure, it’s about national pride and identity, and it’s good to inform us; but since when should the media tell us how to think?” – Hmmm, since when has media (regardless of country) not try to influence its readers? My assumption is that every media’s intent is to actually influence its readers. It probably make business sense to write in a more ‘politically correct’ angle. Afterall, I don’t think a paper that loses money can afford to hire journalists for long. The so called ‘overseas’ papers while supposedly ‘free of government’ also have their own agenda… and in some cases very skewed perspective of issues at hand. I am not sure that is a good thing either.
2. “This is the Singaporean culture. We do nothing but stop and stare.” – so anyone doing something about it?
As discussed earlier today, I did give credit to the local papers in that there was a purpose in being subservient to the interests of the major stakeholders; a key characteristic of firms around the world. In this case of YOG, ST had a role to play to ensure that they don’t create diversion in opinions that would threaten the identify and image of the nation. But at the same time, I feel that people do have the right to know the truth; and media in itself has a duty to provide a form of check and balance to the government. It is because the media is the only voice that’s substantial enough in influence to actually say something. My stand is that, since it’s powerful, it should be responsible.
Every country does the same thing; BBC, CNN and most western media. Even their news reporting is also bias. In particular, they are almost always anti-China.
I agree with you that there’s indeed a purpose for media to promote their own country’s interests among her people, but as for Western media, the citizens play a much bigger role in influencing the media themselves. But in Singapore, the media approach is pretty much lop-sided, revealing mostly only what is deemed “acceptable” and “fit to publish”. Take YOG for example, given the massive complaints about the organizational lapses, why is it that we don’t find a single negative letter published on ST?