Why the proposed bill regarding Little India is NOT okay
Tuesday, January 21, 2014 @ 12:28 PM PERMALINK
(Again, typed this on my phone whilst on the way to work. I'll run through it again tonight to correct errors and make points clearer)
I would also be lying if I said that I have never noticed that amongst all the major races living in Singapore, Indians are one of the most looked down upon.
Yes, I know that is quite a general statement to make. But just think about what you’ve heard or observed in public. Or even when you were a kid in school?
For some reason, many children go through kindergarten and primary school with the notion that Indians are smelly and that their dark skin and accents are something to ridicule. Yes, children don’t know what they are saying, they don’t realize the impact of their words but ask yourself, where does this come from?
Children don’t start life having fixed ideas about a particular group of people, they are groomed to do. And who grooms children? Adults. Who grooms Singaporean children? Singaporean adults – I trust you all know where I’m going with this..
Now, back to the main point of this entry – The temporary bill being passed by Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to increase police power in the Little India area. Link here
I know that the general sentiment about the first anti-alcohol measures that were enforced after the riot was "If you do the crime, you serve the time”. Many Singaporeans seemed to think that is was fair. Since a riot took place and it was somehow concluded that alcohol played a part, alcohol should be banned.
Now, I also know some people are going to say that in other countries, it’s usual that you can’t drink on the streets. That is true, but bear in mind that these laws were set for a specific area, where a specific group of people are known to hang out.
If it was a blanket law for the country, it would be different, but it isn’t.
Now, the MHA wants to pass a bill that provides police officers with the following powers:
· Being able to strip search a person for alcohol
· Officers holding the rank of a sergeant and above would be able to raid any place within Little India
without a warrant (if the officer reasonably suspects an offence has been, is being, or likely to be committed)
· The Commissioner or an authorised officer have the power to ban people from entering Little India for up to 30 days if their presence or actions are likely to threaten public order.
Here is the thing guys, not everyone in Little India rioted. Not all of them partook in the violence.
Agreeing to these insane rules or even supporting them sets the precedence that as long as it can be construed that a small percentage of a particular group of people can be proved to have done something wrong, that it is okay to typecast and penalize an entire group of people.
IT ISN’T.
Perhaps people don’t feel connected enough to realize how ridiculous this really is.
Let me try and explain it to you.
What if one day, statistics are released that 60% of drug related crimes are committed by males with dyed hair and due to this, the government decides that every male with dyed hair can be subjected to random strip searches for drugs. Would that be okay?
What if one day, the Government says that because they have found that 65% of all violent crime is committed by people with tattoos, anyone who has a tattoo can have their house raided without a warrant?
Does that sound okay to you?
No? Well then why do you think it is okay for them to do it to someone else?
Labels: What's got my goat, you have got to be kidding
|
