Rilek1Corner

Tag: Racism

  • Quora Users Justify Unfair Discrimination Of Muslims In Armed Forces

    Quora Users Justify Unfair Discrimination Of Muslims In Armed Forces

    Responding to a question, ‘Why are there no Muslims in some sectors of Singapore Army and Navy?’, several Quora users have supported the Singapore Armed Forces’ perceived bias against Malays and Muslims.

    The following are excerpts from some of the most upvoted answers.

    “There are no muslims on the RSN’s ships or submarine. Actually there are no personnel that have strict dietary requirements on board. So if you have nut allergies, gluten allergies or very strict diet, you will not be posted to a ship.

    Why? Imagine the ship is deployed far from home. Say it heads to an Australian port to replenish resources. How easy is to obtain all halal ingredients? Not easy. And if you are very strict, once the kitchen is used for non-halal ingredient, it cannot produce halal food anymore.

    You may say it’s possible. But only during peacetime. If you are in combat, you can’t go pick and choose what food you want.” – Rhys Cheng

    “…while I don’t agree, I do understand the logic behind the practice. National defense is perhaps the most serious matter a government must handle, and there is a tradeoff between security and freedom. I can understand the government not wanting to take chances, especially since it’s very hard to tell who can be trusted and who cannot.” – Daniel Tan

    “Having Malay/Muslims in the sensitive sectors of the SAF will compromise our ability to defend Singapore. Here, many people think that we do not trust our Malays/Muslims, while the others are not given the same level of scrutiny. Many will also think we are implying Malay/Muslims are be prone to radicalisation, which is plain discriminatory. There is at least a grain truth in the assertions, and they are sufficient for SAF to justify the policy. Once again, this is for the sake of defending Singapore.” – Anonymous

    “We need to stop the smuggling of arms and other ingredients of terror attacks from entering our borders. Nor can we afford to allow hostile personnel to reach our shores. Homegrown terrorism is another issue altogether, and it cannot be denied that Muslims, and therefore Malays in Singapore, are the key targets of radicalisation efforts. As such, the same reason Malays (and Muslims today) are excluded from sensitive vocations remains valid.” – Anonymous

    In April last year, Dr Ng Eng Hen, the Defence Minister said that the “Singapore Armed Forces’ (SAF) operational concerns must come first and individual needs sometimes must (be) subsumed under that.”

    Dr Ng was responding to a parliamentary question from an opposition MP, Faisal Manap, who had asked on the lack of halal food onboard ships in the Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN). Mr Faisal suggested that this deprived Muslim men from serving in RSN ships.

    Reacting to the exchange in Parliament , lawyer and former Director of the Association of Muslim Professionals, Mr Nizam Ismail said:

    “It gets tenuous when the justification for what is essentially a discriminatory practice is on the non availability of a halal kitchen.

    Please, there are many ways to resolve this. It’s not rocket science.

    If the issue is still one of distrust of a Malay Singaporean son in defending his country, then say it as it is.

    The fact remains that there is an under-representation of Malay NSmen in several “sensitive” positions of the SAF, RSAF and RSN.

    And an over-representation of Malay NSmen in the SCDF and SPF.

    And a significant portion of Madrasah boys are not called up for NS.

    Or space for halal kitchen.

    This has nothing to do with food.

    It’s tragic that we are still debating this after 50 years of independence.

    If you truly believe in multiculturalism, there must be no space for discrimination.

    If you truly believe in multiculturalism, there must be inclusivity and equal opportunity. For all.

    When will there be a level playing field?”

     

    Source: www.theindependent.sg

  • Shanmugam Stresses Need To Uphold Racial Equality

    Shanmugam Stresses Need To Uphold Racial Equality

    The need for Singapore to remain committed to protecting its minorities was stressed by Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam yesterday, as anti-Islamic and anti- immigrant sentiments jolt the world and the region grapples with growing polarisation along religious lines.

    “In the face of all this, the Government has to convey a clear message: We are all Singaporeans. We guarantee the safety, security and freedom of religion to all, including the Muslim community,” he said. “And as a community, we must covenant to ourselves to never allow xenophobia and majoritarianism to override the protection and guarantee of equality, particularly to minorities.”

    With 74 per cent of the population being Chinese, “our system of elections means majoritarianism could have easily taken hold and can, in future, easily take hold”.

    He credits Singapore’s founding leaders for laying the foundation that includes ensuring equal opportunities for the minorities.

    Mr Shanmugam’s robust statement on Singapore’s core principle of equality for those of all races and religions follows the upheavals of the past week after US President Donald Trump’s order suspending refugee intake and temporarily keeping the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries out of the US.

    At a seminar on religion, conflict and peacebuilding, he said the US changes, made suddenly, present a serious risk to Singapore. The travel curbs, he noted, reflect anti-Islamic feelings gaining ground in the United States and Europe. “It is a groundswell fuelled by fear and a substantial element of racism. Many otherwise reasonable people are also supporting such movements,” he said.

    Singapore, with a 15 per cent Muslim population, could easily slide into a similar situation, he added. Hence, it is imperative that the Government steer clear of engaging in racial politics, Mr Shanmugam said.

    But it can do this only with the community’s support, he added.

    While the majority must back these efforts, the minorities must play their part, and not grow increasingly exclusive. Both sides need to “work together to increase common space, and work with the Government that is determined to hold the common space together”, he said.

    “That is the only way we can resist the tide of populism that is sweeping the rest of the world. We keep to our way of life,” he added.

    The two-day symposium is organised by the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies under its Studies in Inter-Religious Relations in Plural Societies Programme.

    In his address, Mr Shanmugam sketched his view on what has led to the anti-Islamic wave in the West, Singapore’s approach in avoiding the backlash elsewhere against minorities, and regional trends that could agitate Singapore’s minorities.

    Pointing to the Chinese majority, he noted that Singapore has avoided majoritarianism by ensuring equal opportunities regardless of race or religion, guaranteeing religious freedom and clamping down strongly on hate speech.

    “The result is, regardless of all else, you can walk with a sense of being yourself, comfortable in your own skin, as an equal citizen… That is the lived reality of a Singaporean,” Mr Shanmugam said.

    But this takes work, he said, noting that the Government has not taken a laissez faire approach. Without active state intervention, he said, “you will get segregated communities, segregated schools, the lessening of common space and a reduction of opportunities for minorities”.

    Urging racial and religious leaders to champion integration and interaction, he said: “This is critical… to preserve what we have in Singapore.”

     

    Source: ST

  • Abdul Salim Harun: PAP Must Stop Playing Racism Card

    Abdul Salim Harun: PAP Must Stop Playing Racism Card

    As a Singaporean Malay, I am deeply insulted with the PAP Government move to reserve the coming Presidential Election ONLY for Malay candidates.

    Frankly speaking, we need an Elected President base on his ability and credibility to lead and safeguard our Reserves, and NOT because of his race.

    By reserving the Presidential Election to the Malays, the PAP Government has in fact directly play the RACISM card, and looking down on the Malay Community as a whole.

    What happens to the values of Democracy and Meritocracy? Shouldn’t we be electing the best of the best to be elected as the President, regardless of race, language or religion?

    I will like to urge the Malay Community to speak up on this issue and say NO to this RACIST policy of the PAP Government.

    Ask the PAP Government why can’t we have DPM Tharman as our next Prime Minister, as he is the best choice to bring Singapore forward compared to the rest…

     

    Source: Abdul Salim Harun

  • Noor Mastura: Is Singapore Relatively Racism-Free Because Singaporeans Are Naturally Nice Or Because Of Government Intervention?

    Noor Mastura: Is Singapore Relatively Racism-Free Because Singaporeans Are Naturally Nice Or Because Of Government Intervention?

    Hey Singapore.

    As I read all the posts today from my friends living in America – I can’t help but reflect as a Singaporean.

    The fact that Trump has gotten so far with his racist and xenophobic views does not show how good he is. It shows what America has become.

    Of course there are still incredible people on the ground, fighting the good fight and working hard to counter these views and many of my friends are amongst them – but there are millions who actually voted and support Trump and worse- his views.

    The upside of this is – if Trump never ran for Presidency, you would never know. You would never know that so many of your countrymen support xenophobia, racism and are misogynists. A scary revelation.

    Attacks on Muslims, Blacks & places of worship are on the rise. And these actions are validated and justified according to the attackers because the guy running for presidency supports it as well right?

    I wonder sometimes if Singapore is so ‘safe’ and ‘harmonious’ because we are genuinely nice people or because the government has set such stern laws against racism. What if that was lifted?

    How many of us would fight tooth and nail to keep the peace of our people?

    And would there actually be a bunch of us or worse, a whole lot of us – who will use that opportunity to finally vent out their vitriol and hate?

    What do you think?

     

    Source: Noor Mastura

     

  • More Diversity In Voices Need To Be Heard On Racism In Singapore

    More Diversity In Voices Need To Be Heard On Racism In Singapore

    This article, “Racism in Singapore: Stop telling us minorities how to react to it“. has been shared widely, and I definitely think it is an important voice. I see a growing number of articles/conversations about racism, and a wider range of people speaking up, which I think are encouraging signs that there is more awareness and willingness to talk about race in Singapore.

    I hope the conversation doesn’t fixate on or stagnate at individualised, interpersonal instances of microaggressions, exclusion or privilege. Of course, these experiences aren’t separate from systemic racism, and are in fact deeply linked to them, but the connection often isn’t made as strongly as it could be.

    People switching to Chinese in conversations, friends telling racist jokes, etc are definitely significant and we should keep talking about these things and how they affect us, as well as how we can respond to them. We’ve all had these experiences and can feel solidarity around them.

    But I’m also interested in conversations that I don’t hear as much – about how Malay and Tamil people are overrepresented in prisons, whether they’re more likely to be profiled/picked up for certain crimes than Chinese people are, how Malay students are grossly underrepresented in universities, and what the barriers racial minorities face in accessing education, housing and jobs are.

    I’m interested in critiquing more closely, how our cultures and people are portrayed as backward, lazy, violent, uncivilised and parasitic in national narratives, and whether we can organise to push for anti-discrimination laws, for greater political representation and more in-depth analysis on how the media perpetuates harmful stereotypes about race.

    How many of the 1 in 10 families that live in poverty in Singapore are Malay or Tamil, and how much harder is it for racial minorities to experience intergenerational social mobility? The narrative continues to be that minorities need to work harder to catch up, and some minority groups are held up as “model minorities” and pitted against others. The recent study on Singaporeans’ receptivity to a president of a different race showed that both Indian and Malay respondents would prefer a Chinese candidate over each other. Is this what the success of a divide and rule approach looks like? Solidarity amongst racial minorities is low, and there’s plenty of racism to be explored there too.

    Social problems like unplanned teenage pregnancy, drug abuse and gang culture are ghettoised, stigmatised and pinned to the cultural deficit of minority communities rather than to structural discrimination, alienation and poverty. They’re also not given the same centrality in social policy as problems like gambling, that are more common in Chinese communities, are (as Alfian Sa’at’s play ‘GRC’ points out so well).

    Race needs to be a lens we apply to every social phenomenon we study, and we need more race disaggregated data about everything. The government, certain think tanks and the media are quick to look at race when it is to pin an issue as an “Indian problem” or “Malay problem”, but not to pinpoint racial discrimination.

    To take one example, there’s been a lot of discussion about bullying in Singapore schools – if studies on this also looked at whether racial minorities face more abuse/different types of abuse in school (I’m sure it’s true), anecdotes of interpersonal racism that appear in articles like this would have more context and meaning, and we would be able to offer deeper analysis and make stronger arguments for change. It doesn’t just stop at “my friends needs to be more sensitive” but allows us to demand that MOE, schools and educators take a proactive stance in addressing racial discrimination on a nationwide, school-wide or at least classroom-wide level.

    But maybe there is a different point to be made here too. While there is more interest in discussing race, while there are more voices addressing this now than before, are they diverse enough? Many of these voices, including mine, are middle-class voices. And I believe there are more important voices to listen to, when it comes to racism. The same way that middle-class feminism can silence working class women’s struggles, race consciousness that is not informed by class struggle can be a hazard. I am excited to explore possibilities for organising, for collective action, and to not allow individualised identity politics (or the “cult of individualism”) to become self-limiting or deteriorate into navel gazing.

     

    Source: www.theonlinecitizen.com