For the sake of your children, Singaporeans have to choose. Either protest or emigrate. Inaction is no option.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The time has come for a decision that matters your children. Is it in the interests of your children to be educated in Singapore? If not, stay and fight for change, or leave Singapore. The Lees have destroyed the education system. In Singapore children are being turned into robots.

In every other respect, Singapore is declining. The economy is failing; the brain drain continues unabated; lawyers are becoming an endangered species; the judiciary is completely discredited; there is no rule of law.

If you find the status quo unacceptable and wish to see change, join the protestors now, demand for democratic change, or else, pack up and emigrate with your money, your family and your children.

The Singapore ship is on a collision course with an iceberg. Either right the course now, or abandon ship. Staying on deck and doing nothing is suicide.

Singapore education is an overly regimented system where children are subject to a multitude of pointless unnecessary rules, even infants being forced to obey them under pain of punishment; a system which destroys any possibility of their developing an independent spirit and spontaneity; where obedience to rules is a way of life and considered the highest virtue.

From an early age, they are driven like robots, to merely do as they are told; to embrace authority, where any attempt to question it is immediately considered bad manners.

Homework, lots and lots of it, has to be handed in on time and any deviation from schedule it is punished severely. Children being overwhelmed with school work suppresses the natural tendency in them for play and frolic, an important part of childhood development. As a result they lose all spontaneity, they lose their curiosity, and they lose their childhood and from an early age are transformed almost into adults, with schedules, time tables and appointment diaries.

The education system in Singapore destroys their childhood, which in turn affects their performance and analytical and thinking abilities in their adulthood.

Secondary school and college students are deliberately brainwashed into believing that any opposition to Lee Kuan Yew and his son, the Prime Minister, is a bad thing and if someone were to indulge in such activity, although legal under the law, is warned that his future in Singapore is ruined, due to government reprisals and persecution.

This indoctrination and brainwashing of young men is aggravated by national service where they are yet again told to obey military orders and respect authority unconditionally. They are programmed into thinking that their rulers can never be wrong and if left to the rulers, they will be provided with food work housing everything. This in turn dampens any entrepreneurial spirit, where reliance on the government becomes a way of life.

As a result of this indoctrination and brainwashing over several years, you are left with young adults going into the work force unable to think analytically or independently.

Particularly noticeable is the universal lack of interest in anything else other than their job. No knowledge of political systems. No knowledge of the constitution. Or their rights. Or about the rest of the world. It seems to me, all they are concerned is to go to work, do what they are told, and try to make as much money as they can. What they fail to realize is, they can make much more money if they knew a bit more about things other than just work.

For instance they do not realize they have rights as citizens, that the government is beholden to them and not the other way round. They don’t seem to understand any of this.

I met 5 young Singaporeans by chance at Chinatown Restaurant along Sacramento Street, in San Francisco on Friday last. To my question, they said they knew of Dr. Chee Soon Juan but had never met him. Questioned on their thoughts of the government, they gave the standard answers; that the PAP have more experience in government whereas the opposition did not; that they were waiting for Lee Kuan Yew to die for greater freedom and the usual other mouthwash. They were much more interested in telling me about their work in the American company in Singapore and how much money they were making. Nothing else interested them.

Needless to say, they had never heard of John Stuart Mill and his “Liberty” and no doubt they will never hear of it their entire life!

Not interested in the lack of human rights in Singapore. Not interested whether Lee Kuan Yew paid himself $3.7 a year or double that! I got the distinct impression, that they did not have strong views about anything, just programmed to follow the leader. No doubt, despite their book learning, they were just wasted lives. Very sad indeed.

They would not have turned out that way had they an education in USA, UK Australia New Zealand or Europe. In western schools discipline is balanced with humanity and compassion. Completely opposed to the Singapore’s regimented system, western schools give foremost importance to the fact that each child is an individual. Each is different. Each has his strengths and weaknesses. The weaknesses are not necessarily bad as with time, they can turn into strengths. And allowing the child to develop independent thinking and respecting it even if it is not necessarily what the mainstream might expect.

These children grow up into very robust individuals. Individuals who will stand on their own anytime anywhere with no fear to question authority if that is what is necessary.

In Singapore on the other hand, children have no views at all. Right and wrong becomes irrelevant. Obedience means everything. For instance, no Singapore student has questioned why they are not allowed to hold student protest in campus! The rule says no, and that is enough for them!

After the regular dosage of indoctrination and brainwashing over the years, these children lack the ability to compete with children from the west in the global marketplace. For jobs requiring compliance to a set of orders, they will do well. But if it is to think of new ideas and new ways to stay ahead, they will fail.

Singaporeans parents who submit their children to years of this regimen in their schools are almost committing a crime upon them. You are destroying their minds. In the end, after the Singapore administration has finished with them, you are left with a spiritless soulless spineless follower, not a leader with an independent mind.

A western educated child, who because of certain personal convictions, and questions authority, takes responsibility for his decisions. And from those decisions, right or wrong, the child stumbles along his life’s passage, sometimes correct, sometimes wrong; but in the end that child is an independent child able to stand alone with confidence.

The prime example, of a Singaporean regimented education is the Prime Minster himself. All he can do is to mimic and obey Lee Kuan Yew, his father; almost as if he will be lost without him.

And what is even more ignoble of this government is the fact that they do this because it helps them remain in power; since an unquestioning obedient population is easier to control than a questioning one; and that is why as parents you are duty bound not to permit this upon your children.

Since you know that the Parliamentary system no longer works to protect your interests, for change to happen, you have no choice but to publicly protest. Of course, such action may result in government reprisals but what choice do you have?

Otherwise emigrate with your family and children. Emigration has the additional advantage for you to withdraw your CPF by relinquishing your citizenship. For the sake of your children, you have to decide one way or the other.
Requiring your child to go through the Singapore education system is deliberately making them into second rate adults. With no curiosity, and no independence of thought.

Rather a strong word to use, but I will use it anyway. A zombie.

Gopalan Nair
39737 Paseo Padre Parkway, Suite A1
Fremont, CA 94538, USA
Tel: 510 657 6107
Fax: 510 657 6914
Email: nair.gopalan@yahoo.com
Blog: http://singaporedissident.blogspot.com/

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