Welcome once again to my blog. Its the beginning of a new year (sorry actually its been more than half a month already) and I am very very very glad to say we have new literature books! (sorry for the propaganda too)
I have started to read To Kill A Mockingbird, a story about racism and racial inequality in America. The first time I read it it was boring boring and even more boring. To be honest, I could not even get past the first chapter. Now that I think of it, Animal Farm was much better. The story was quite easy to understand as a whole. The dynamic characters made it easy for the reader to sympathize with the mistreated animals. The relation to real life was very eminent throughout the entire story.
Now back to the point. I was like trying to remember all those projects that I saw last year to try to improve my own project. I randomly recalled one that had a twenty word title! Mind-blowing? It was something like: examining the extent of the xenophobic tendencies in Singaporeans; case study of the Serangoon Gardens incident... This surprisingly random topic caused me to think about whether racism or Xenophobia is more prominent in Singapore.
For those of you who do not know what is Xenophobia, it actually means "intense or irrational dislike or fear of people from other countries". For example, many Singaporeans dislike Chinese nationals etc.
Note: This blog post is based on my own opinion, not on any statistics.
Racism
In Singapore, there is no laws to enforce racial segregation. However, racism is still prevalent, whether we want to admit it or not. Studies show that racism exists in the subconscious (surprise!). Some employers only want to hire people of certain races, for example. Even so, racism is less in Singapore than in other countries. This is because almost all Singaporeans were brought up in a multi-racial community, with government imposing national education to teach children about the importance of Racial Harmony. We are taught and conditioned to accept everyone as Singaporeans, not Indians or Chinese or Malay.
Xenophobia
Have you forgotten the meaning of this word yet? If you have not, then try saying "Carl's Junior Portebello Mushroom Burger" 10 times very quickly and you will forget. If you happen to still be able to remember then say it another 100 times.
Finished? Ok, let us continue. Xenophobia is a very pressing issue here in Singapore. Since we can't be prejudiced against other races (who are born in Singapore, of course) we sort of turn our racism into Xenophobia. Foreigners are often made fun of in school. Most of us in school hate International school children. We think of them as rich BRATS, who cut the queues in the canteen or even if they do not cut the queues, we blame them for making the queues so much longer.
This scene can also be represented in the Jobs scene. Foreigners are blamed for taking up jobs which the local Singaporeans desperately need. Foreigners are also associated with crimes committed in Singapore. For example: theft, rape, burglary etc. are thought to be common around foreign worker dormitories. Once some Singaporeans signed a petition to move a foreign worker dormitory away from their houses as they thought that having it nearby would cause their houses to depreciate in value.
Final Verdict
Xenophobia is seen more in Singapore than racism. But racism still exists, as part of human nature.
Amazing....
3 comments:
Isn't Xenophobia present in other countries as well? Like Ms Soh said in class, the Americans have stopped being prejudiced against the African Americans. However, they turn to the Chinese immigrants in America. Isn't this out of human nature as well? how can you say that it is on purpose since it is so similar to racism? What is the difference? Actually, both are out of human nature, so you can't say that only racism is from human nature.
I did not say it was not prevalent in other countries. The question at issue is Singapore. The main difference between Xenophobia and Racism is that Xenophobia can be the dislike of foreigners, not just other races. But racism is only directed at other races.
Yes, both are human nature. Again I did not say Xenophobia is not part of human nature. Read through my post again thank you.
Well, as per what you have definied:
Xenophobia - dislike of foreigners
Racism - deliberate prejudice against other races
I don't mean to sound rude or aggressive here, but since your question at issue here is Singapore, and after all the majority of our foreigners are foreign workers, who some of us have racist feelings against, isn't racism and xenophobia just about interchangeable in SG? Do note that foreigners are not totally comprised of foreign workers, there are still the expatriates and their children.
Anyway, we don't think of international school students/expatriates as rich brats because of xenophobia, but because we did have nasty experiences with them which led to the widely circulate belief (i believe it is only eminent in HCI, i hope).
Good post though, I like your insightful analysis.
ryan.
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