An announcement

This isn't one of those things that I'm happy to have done; but
this isn't one of those things that I'm happier not to have done.

Theonlinecitizen replies

Choo Zheng Xi, currently a law undergrad at NUS and the co-editor of theonlinecitizen, has replied via MSN. He is the original author who broke Alfian's story, advised Alfian to send in his essay on Francis under a pseudonym, and also published Alfian's op-ed piece "Should homosexuals be allowed to teach" as an uncredited article.

The sum of it: Choo Zheng Xi has refused to answer any of the questions raised almost 2 weeks ago. I am reproducing his reply, stating his refusal to reply, word for word here, with no additions, subtractions or alterations:

[01:47] choo: hey sorri dont think ile be replying to your piece
[01:47] akikonomu: i didn't expect you to
[01:48] choo: ok
[01:53] akikonomu: you see, i don't expect you to have what it takes to explain away that breach of journalistic ethics
[01:53] choo: more like i dont think i need to actually
[01:54] akikonomu: nope. because you can't explain it anyway
[01:54] choo: well you wouldnt know would you =)
[01:55] choo: honestly it'd give the issue more publicity than a non issue deserves
[01:56] choo: none of the grand total of 3 ppl ive asked to look at your piece thinks it matters
[01:56] choo: they're probably the only ppl who read it
[01:56] choo: if i'd replied
[01:56] choo: i might have doubled your readership
[01:59] *** "choo" signed off at Wed Jul 11 01:59:14 2007.

I would like to thank Choo Zheng Xi for taking the time to explain that an explanation isn't needed, and to take the effort to impress upon me that this is a non-issue.

Alfian writes in

Mr Alfian Sa'at has emailed to clarify the questions raised in the earlier post, and I am reproducing his reply here word for word, with no additions, subtractions or alterations:

there is no big conspiracy. The story goes like this:

a) I file in the 'Francis' article for Trevvy.
b) Trevvy editors freak out; they think it's sensitive. They tell me they're not going to run it.
c) I consider passing it to Fridae (Which will piss off my eds, but I felt the story needed an airing. Francis needs to have people relating similar experiences with him, for people to step up and offer assistance, etc)
d) Someone from TOC is on MSN with me. I mention Trevvy spiking the story.
e) That someone suggests that I run it on TOC, but with a pseudonym. When I ask why a pseudonym, he says certain people in the blogosphere will just jump at it and accuse me of non-objective reportage.
f) At his insistence, I give him a pseudonym. 'Ramlah' is a silly drag name I have for myself; it's an inside joke among my friends.
g) Trevvy decides to run the article. But eds want to call it a 'parable' so as to cover their backsides.
h) Now Trevvy wants TOC to stop running it, claiming exclusivity.
i) It's messy. Ideally I would love to have the story on two different sites catering to two different readership profiles.

As to why I appear as various avatars for the articles (Alfian, Ramlah and one uncredited), much of it was based on editorial decisions rather than my own.

I wish to assure my readers and Alfian's friends that we have cleared the air between us, more than 3 days ago when he sent me this clarification. Notice that all outstanding questions posed to Alfian in the previous post have been cancelled. And I would like to note that 3 days since the poet and playwright explained the situation in his forthright and honest manner, we have heard not a peep from the editors of theonlinecitizen.

Here's what is really at stake: Suppose an article is reprinted several times over, with very minor differences, in multiple locations, but with different author names - or under no name at all - one might jump to the conclusion that either

a. there are different authors, and someone is clearly plagiarising from an original source, stealing someone else's intellectual work to pass off as their own, or

b. there is just one single author, who is running a sockpuppeting operation.

In the case of Alfian Sa'at, it appears that the editors of theonlinecitizen have clearly made a fool out of the poet and playwright - making him look either dishonest or conspiratorial, as either a plagiarist or a sock puppeteer.

Note that it is the editors of theonlinecitizen who have split Alfian's long article into 2 shorter ones - publishing the first under the pseudonym of Ramlah Abu Bakar, and the second as an anonymous article with no author attributed.

We are unclear why the editors of theonlinecitizen have chosen to do this. According to what Alfian has been told by the same editor, certain people in the blogosphere will just jump at it and accuse me of non-objective reportage.

I would understand this as an issue of a possible conflict of interest, i.e. "Some people would say Alfian's writing about Francis being rejected by MOE because Alfian himself was rejected by MOE". But here's the thing, and I hope the editors of theonlinecitizen pay attention: you do NOT deal with conflicts of interest by making the decision to withhold knowledge of the conflict of interest from your readers. An ethical journalistic source would actually *state* the conflict of interest, so that all readers can judge for themselves whether the article is fair and balanced, given the positioning of its author.

It's a simple, fundamental, publishing rule of thumb. Yet theonlinecitizen's editors have chosen to withhold information from its readers, to engage in deception (note the second article here is still uncredited, even after Alfian acknowledges authorship in his blog.

There is nothing wrong with conflicts of interest issues in writing, reporting, or opinion essays - that happens all the time. What is wrong is knowing that there's a conflict of interest, and then deciding to withhold that information from readers. The withholding of the fact is the real ethical issue - knowing who the person is, knowing his conflict of interest, and advising him to withhold his identity - so as to keep readers unaware of the conflict - that is not being open and honest.

It is to my regret that I find theonlinecitizen's silence on this issue most disturbing. That its editors had the arrogance to decide that its readers - and other blog aggregators who linked to those 2 articles - do not need to know the fact is most disturbing. That theonlinecitizen urges full disclosure on the part of the government and yet behaves as though they don't need to practice it themselves is most disturbing. And so it goes.

Compare and contrast. Discuss!

This is Alfian Sa'at on Trevvy.
This is Ramlah Abu Bakar on The Online Citizen.

Compare. Contrast.

Question for Alfian Sa'at: Are you the author of the Ramlah Abu Bakar article on theonlinecitizen?

Question for theonlinecitizen's editors: Were you aware that Ramlah Abu Bakar is Alfian Sa'at? If yes, when did you know? If you knew this, can you explain why you felt this fact had to be hidden from your readers?

Question for Alfian Sa'at: Why did you submit your article to theonlinecitizen under a different name?

Question for Alfian Sa'at: In your trevvy article, the title identifies Francis's story as a parable. I understand parable to mean "a fictitious narrative". Could you explain what are the factual elements in your report, and what has been fictionalised?

Question for theonlinecitizen's editors: Did the editors verify the details of Rmalah Abu Bakar's article and sources? Is RamlahAbu Bakar's article presented as a journalistic piece, or a parable? Enquiring minds want to know!


This is Alfian Sa'at highlighting an "interesting article"
This is theonlinecitizen's op-ed

Compare and contrast.

Questions for Alfian Sa'at: Are you the author of "Should homosexuals be allowed to teach" on theonlinecitizen?

If no, could you tell us why you've plagiarised and incorporated this article into a longer essay?

If yes, could you explain why you have chosen not to be identified as the author of this article?

Questions for theonlinecitizen: Could you clarify who is the author of this essay?

Could you explain why it appears without an author name this time, instead of a pseudonym? Enquiring minds want to know!

No place I'd rather be

Dick Lee points that some NDP songs are just crap, but my friend the Samurai Blogger points out that this year's NDP song by Kit Chan is really the pits. I'm of the opinion that anyone who watched the National Day broadcast must be working off some serious karma.

Today, though, for your pleasure (or not), we have a youtube clip of No Place I'd Rather Be, lyrics by Jimmy Ye.



Contrast this with The Duprees singing You Belong To Me.



The Samurai rightly points out the poverty of imagination behind the lyrics of our NDP - it is no more and no less than a second-rate, third-hand reworking of the lyrics of You Belong To Me. I believe, though, that the point isn't about the lack of originality of NDP songs, or their derivativeness. To arrive at an understanding of the true weakness of Kit Chan's NDP, we must adopt a very close examination of its text and that of its possible ancestor.

The lyrics of both songs share the same strategy: No matter where you go, your home will always be here. No matter how awed you are, or sold on the idea that you just might have a happier life elsewhere, your home is here. There's not other place you should be, because you belong here.

Now, for some reason, You Belong To Me is seen as a love song, while No Place I'd rather be is supposed to be a patriotic NDP song. But to me, the possessiveness and the "I don't care where you've been, you belong to me" thematic refrain of the first song puts it down as the anthem of a wife abuser rather than a lover, and from the other end, Kit Chan's No Place I'd Rather Be, comes across as the anthem of the abused wife, coming back for more.

The campaign to confer the martyrdom award to Alfian Saat

An incident, a talking point, a concerted campaign

Dear readers, we've known for almost a full month that Alfian Sa'at has been sacked from his relief teaching post at East View Secondary School. Word travels fast, especially since the playwright took it upon himself to tell his friends, fans, and acquaintances about it. We are not unsympathetic to Alfian's loss of the beginnings of a meaningful vocation, but since he has made it a public matter and since it appears that there is an ongoing campaign involving various bloggers to turn this into an issue to bash the MOE, the civil service, and maybe even the PAP with, it falls unto me to urge caution - and more importantly, common sense.

The talking points seem to go like this:

1. Draw issue to Alfian Sa'at, prize-winning, decorated playright having lost his job
2. Draw attention to MOE's refusal to provide an explanation for his sacking
3. Hint heavily at an unofficial campaign of persecution
a. He was sacked because he is a politically troublesome creature: a liberal, radical, and a critical Malay
b. He was sacked because he is an openly gay person who has written gay-themed plays
4. Ergo, Alfian Sa'at is a martyr for the cause - whichever cause it is. All hail his staggering genius and mourn his unjust persecution!
5. Storm the Bastille, lads!

My dear friend, the Blogger Samurai, has an important dictum that I wish whoever is participating in the campaign to award the martyrdom award to Alfian Sa'at could drill into their memory: Never attack in anger. I, too, have another dictum that I wish could have guided the leaders of this coordinated web campaign: Never sacrifice intellectual honesty for political ends.

Is there an unofficial campaign of persecution? No one knows, and by definition it can't be proven, which means it plays up to the very angry and radicalised hordes on the blogs right now. But the campaign does itself and the blogosphere an injustice when its proponents pointedly miss out the most obvious and probable cause of Alfian's sacking - one that could be backed with more tangible evidence than 3a or b.

The case against Alfian Sa'at

It is always a good practice to go back to the source material when unsure of the facts. In this case, it would be a good idea to pay a visit to the playwright's blog. This act alone could have saved the ongoing campaign from guaranteed embarrassment, and its participants from any fallout of credibility, really.

We note the following 2 entries on 24 April and 11 May.

Both are entries where Alfian Sa'at blogs about his teaching experience.

excerpt from the first entry:

The din from the classroom was overwhelming; a tidal wave of restless yelps, red-faced bully laughter, the wailing of the freshly-smacked...a boy at the back gripped the sides of his table and screamed, 'I hate History!' A girl at the side of the class stared at me as if she was putting a hex on me; how in the world did she leave her house in the morning with eyeliner on? A boy ran out of one of the classroom doors and re-entered through the other, as if he was an actor rushing to make an entrance from the opposite wing. A girl was putting some green dye in her mouth, probably Art Class leftovers, and spitting foul green liquid at her classmates. A rosette of lurid green sputum bubbled on her desk. She was like Linda Blair in the Exorcist, but ten times worse, because I couldn't wave a crucifix at her and make her hair evaporate.

Now, I wouldn't know, but that sounds like extremely bad form for a teacher to blog about his students in a demeaning manner. This isn't so bad until you realise that we know who the teacher is, where the school is, and we can thus identify the students...

But it's more than just that, of course. Alfian Sa'at is a master playwright, and we admire his narrative abilities that are shown off here. But not quite - why is Alfian Sa'at adopting this passive-agressive love-hate tone towards his students? Like some colonial anthropologist studying a native tribe, he exclaims how much they drive him up the wall, and in the next breath tearfully admits how charming they are, in their impish innocence. Like some arrogant, patronising colonial anthropologist:

It is an illusion to think that the classroom is a homogenous neighbourhood. There are overlapping ghettoes.

Impossible how a member of an oppressed ethnic minority ends up conferring the word ghetto on the students of a neighbourhood school. But there we have it - an exoticisation, a romanticisation of the neighbourhood school students. Who are of course tamed by the redeeming quality of Art:

I have to constantly strain my throat to get them to quieten down, but I realised that when I draw on the whiteboard they are rapt, respectful. And thus I would sketch the faces of Brahmins and Shudras, the four Ministers of the Melakan Sultanate, the Shang dynasty Emperor. I would draw four-clawed dragons, cavemen, even the faces of some of the students, who would blush at the attention. I have had so many requests for drawings: Stamford Raffles, a character called Lady Xin, exhumed from her tomb, from their textbook, and even a hamster.

Alfian Sa'at teaches racial harmony, of the exoticised mythical peoples category.

And if that weren't enough, the second entry takes the cake:

12:40 pm - red river
I'm a relief teacher.
WHY AM I MARKING THE EXAM SCRIPTS FOR 16 CLASSES????????

You see where I'm getting at, hopefully? Anyone would be fired for blogging about their work and workplace in such a manner.

And if that weren't enough, remember this is a blog where Alfian Sa'at posts updates on his gay plays, his coterie of hangers-on, his adventures in New York - meeting up with self-exiled dissidents and telling the MDA "Fuck you".

A clear inability to apply common sense, to keep professional and personal matters separate, to behave professionally.

The moral of the story: Never blog about work in a negative manner

References:
Beware if your blog is related to work
Microsoft fires worker over weblog
Looming pitfalls of work blogs
Blogging on the Job

12 June update: The Blogger Samurai has spoken on the issue. Listen to him.

גם זה יעבור

Gam zeh ya'avor: this too shall pass

Foucault's discourse theory places primacy on the zero point, the beginning point where a certain mode of discourse shaped from that time on how we see the world, describe it, and picture ourselves in it - such that we can scarcely think of any other way to see the world, describe it... that it appears as though from time immemorial we have always been seeing the world this way... naturally.

As an illustration, it is little known that "kiasuism" was coined in the late 1980s during a speech where a MINDEF general made fun of the go-getter characteristics of some soldiers in BMT. What is known is that since that zero point, that word grew to encompass and define everything that is Singaporean, that it is impossible to think of Singaporeans never being kiasu before - isn't it obvious they have always been in this state?

Hence, the Foucauldian project's obsession with zero points, with historical breaks that demonstrate that certain paradigms of thought, of social perception, weren't always so, and should never be taken as natural or commonsensical.

Gam zeh ya'avor: this too shall pass

Obsessed with beginnings, the Foucauldian project forgets that there are endings, that dominant modes eventually fall away; that, if certain social, political conditions, or a set of accidents could lead to a dominance in one form of discourse, that dominant discourse could very well pass away due to certain accidents - social or political. To gain a full understanding of political discourse, we must shift our focus from the zero point at its inception, and look to - and look forward to - the other zero point at its passing.

I'm going to build a list of political phrases that have fallen out of fashion in Singapore. These are well-turned phrases of closing off discourse, whose time have passed. It is important to remember, for those live in a city whose political nature seems unchanging, that seemingly unchallenge-able rhetoric have sell-by dates. After all, you can't use the same threats as people become more mature. Simply put, if the rhetoric is out of step with the populace, or too nonsensical, they will just make fun of it or even refuse point blank to accept such arguments - and hence such rhetoric is dropped from public discourse. From zero point to zero point, as it were.

The death of politicised phrases

Quitters vs Stayers
Died because: too many ministers had children who have settled permanently out of Singapore, including Goh Chok Tong's daughter.

Foreign talent
Died because: too many Singaporeans now realise it's just a disguise for foreign labour import substitution - even foreign labour and development specialists like Stephen Appold insist the foreign talent here "are not needed in the large number in which they are found".

Asian values
Died because: the Asian economic crisis of 1997 happened.

Unconstructive criticism
Died because: logically speaking I don't have to tell you to zip up your pants to point out that your fly is undone.

Boh Tua Boh Suay
Died because: no one agrees with George Yeo that criticising the leadership is tantamount to disrespecting the leaders. No one agrees with George Yeo that there is a natural hierarchy of order.

Helicopter vision
Died because: ministers in the Minilee cabinet were seen more as bumbling fools and incompetents making "honest mistakes" than infallible supermen.

OB Markers
Died because: fewer and fewer people believe that the government has the right to make up rules, stop discussions in their tracks arbitrarily, and issue red cards out of its ass.

And now, this too shall pass

This weekend, theonlinecitizen has released the full Attorney General's report (available in 4 parts) on its audit of over 12 ministries and statutory boards.

As the Blogger Samurai points out, the first lesson of political blogging is never attack in anger. Instead, we must use this unfortunate incident, this embarrassing report, to put to an end a particular dominant mode of thinking - that, for the sake of national competitiveness, ministries and statutory boards need not be subject to full transparency, oversight, and accountability to the public taxpayers. Instead of shrilling corruption and other accusations on the ministries, playing "Aha!" games with them, or like some political illiterates who conflate the ministries, the civil service, the government and the ruling party as a single entity, I suggest that the path of action for Singaporeans is clear, simple, and shrill-free.

It is time for us to reject, point blank, any future rhetoric designed to protect the operations of ministries and statutory boards from accountability and oversight. It is time for us to decisively and loudly remind our leaders that certain arguments just don't work anymore, and have lost their persuasive power. Softly but firmly insist "I don't buy your argument", and you shall see yet another political death, another political, politicised discourse fade into zero point.

Gam zeh ya'avor: this too shall pass

The vile and malevolent Ng Eng Hen

Khaw Boon Wan may be the stupidest man in the Singapore Cabinet, but his sheer destructive capability is dwarfed by the sheer mendacity and malevolence of his colleague Ng Eng Hen.

The illustrious Mr Ng is, after all, the labour minister who wanted to reclaim jobs for Singaporeans - in the marine, nursing, and cleaning industries. He is the same man who runs a ministry that won't let anyone know the real unemployment rate in Singapore. And yes, he's also the man who chairs the PAP's covert blogger operation.

However, Ng Eng Hen has just about outdone himself this time, in a rare application of massive stupidity in wrong-headed public policy that can only bring about the apocalypse - witness his "new initiatives to lure talented professionals".

Q: How on earth does he want to lure talented professionals (read "foreign talents")?
A: By luring them even before they are talented professionals!

The Work Holiday Pass scheme of Singapore is aimed at young students and graduates from overseas, according to the Channelnewsasia report. It is open to those aged 17 to 30. There will be 2000 places available a year. "A positive experience of living and working in Singapore under the Programme would encourage some of them to work here when they graduate, or at a later stage in their careers", says Ng Eng Hen.

There are, to put it mildly, some problems with this scheme. How on earth are we luring foreign professionals by extending visas to college students? Apparently, the phrase "talented professional" has become so debased that anyone could qualify, even before they enter the workforce, or gain the experience that sets them apart of elite professionals - i.e. the type of foreign talents that Singapore should really be going after.

Unlike the Work Holiday visas offered by the US, Canada, UK, or any other country, Singapore's WHP has virtually no conditions and restrictions on what sort of jobs the applicants can apply for, or how much they are allowed to earn. One non-obvious implication of this uniquely singaporean Work Holiday scheme is this: in effect, it introduces 2000 foreign undergrads into the short term labour market. Given that fresh local graduates in recent years tend to spend about a year working in contract or temp jobs - a sign of a shift in the labour market to contract work - it means that these 2000 young students will compete directly for the same jobs as local grads.

How should we put this into context? According to Singapore's Department of Statistics, in 2005 there were 3,500 graduates from local universities. So... picture dumping in 2,000 foreign students and fresh grads into the labour market right now. Is there any wonder that I consider Ng Eng Hen to be the most destructive and malevolent man in the Cabinet?

I've always wondered about how sincere our leaders are about their love for foreign talent - ooops, "talented foreign professionals" - and whether Singapore really needs so many of them. Stephen Appold has wondered the same thing, and actually bothered to find out. The final report is gruesome in its details, and even horrifying in its conclusions, written 2 years ago:

Arguably, university-educated migrants are not needed in Singapore at all. Less controversially, they are not needed in the large number in which they are found... Despite the high employment growth, an expanding surplus of university graduates has been chasing the available jobs with predictable effects: slower salary increases, the downward filtering of graduates into less-desirable jobs, the erosion of the relative income advantage of educated labour.

And the 2,000 visas for young students and graduates will just make it even worse. Ng Eng Hen aims to further depress wages and destroy local graduates!

Update (12 noon)

So the University of South Wales has shut down operations barely 3 months after its new buildings opened to students here. It's not economical, its dean says, to run the place given the drastically lower-than-projected student rate - and there's the matter of MOE and the Singapore government not allowing UNSW to reduce its operations and retool plans for a lower student intake. WTH. IMPEACH Ng Eng Hen! Impeach Ng Eng Hen now!

Of course, the moral of the story is still the same.

Despite the high employment growth, an expanding surplus of university graduates has been chasing the available jobs with predictable effects: slower salary increases, the downward filtering of graduates into less-desirable jobs, the erosion of the relative income advantage of educated labour.

It's a lesson that might actually explain the reason for UNSW's failure to attract students. Greater implications - if potential university applicants are aware of their drastically reduced rewards, the downward filtering into less-desirable jobs... then Singapore is just about finished as an education hub - no uni can attract a sustainable amount of local or even foreign grads. The domestic economy and labour market just simply don't have the space.

References: Appold, Stephen J. "The weakening position of university graduates in Singapore's labour market: Causes and consequences", in Population and Development Journal, 31, no. 1 (Mar 05): 85–112.

Woody Allen spoof

"At first, we didn't know exactly what this was, but we've developed a theory. We feel that when citizens of your society were guilty of a crime against the state, they were forced to watch this."

Mary Douglas is dead

I found out on Friday, but didn't get around blogging about this. At least we'll have the cold comfort of commemorating her and other anthropologists here.

The Guardian has a thoughtful obituary:

Dame Mary Douglas, who has died aged 86, was the most widely read British social anthropologist of her generation. If she had to be recalled for a single achievement, it would be as the anthropologist who took the techniques of a particularly vibrant period of research into non-western societies and applied them to her own, western milieu. Within her lifetime, this was so far accepted within British anthropology as to become almost lost to view. Posterity should restore most of the credit to her, and remember her as an innovative social theorist and for her contributions particularly to the anthropological analysis of cosmology, consumption and the analysis of risk perception.

In 1966, Douglas published her most celebrated work, Purity and Danger: an Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo. This book is best remembered for its stylish demonstration of the ways in which all schemes of classification produce anomalies: whether the pangolin for the Lele, or the God incarnate of Catholic theology. Some of this classificatory "matter out of place" - from humble house dust in her Highgate house to the abominations of Leviticus for the Hebrews - was polluting, but other breaches of routine classification had the capacity to renew the world symbolically.

The Times duly notes her passing:

Dame Mary Douglas was one of the outstanding British social anthropologists of the latter half of the 20th century. Her books, Purity and Danger (1966) and Natural Symbols (1970), were seminal for anthropologists and were widely appreciated in other disciplines.

Starting as an Africanist, she branched out to cover contemporary Western society, addressing such topics as risk analysis and environmentalism, and food and consumption. Old Testament religion was another interest, first in her famous discussion of the "abominations of Leviticus", in Purity and Danger, and latterly in studies of Numbers and Leviticus.

Daniel Miller remembers her as an intellectual giant on whose shoulders we stand:

Even when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge it seemed almost impossible not to devote at least one essay to the application of Purity and Danger to almost any genre of objects that one chose. When you told people you were hoping to become an anthropologist it was the most common point of recognition. 'Oh an anthropologist, you mean like Purity and Danger.'

For good reason; this was a book that simply changed the way people saw their world and made sense of every day distinctions that we observed but failed to understand. In my case the most important impact came with The World of Goods. Along with Bourdieu’s Distinction these were the two books that ensured that it was in some ways astonishingly anthropology, the discipline least associated with modern industrial society, that actually invented the modern study of consumption which was the path I took into material culture studies. Furthermore she established the essential grounds for those studies of consumption - the critique of economic assumptions as to why we desire goods and the critique of the consequences of those economic assumptions, for such fundamental issues as to what we mean by poverty.

Mary Douglas is still taught even now at undergraduate level. I haven't really made that Bourdieu connection before, but now I know why her essays never bored me. It is, in the end, a way of seeing the world and all its apparent arbitrariness as a bounded text that comes with its symbolic code: sense, purpose, and message to communicate.

And that's why I treat IS as a literary text - there's no other way.

The Great Firewall of Singapore, episode 2

Duly noted: Singnet users have problems displaying their blogs.

Explanation
Affected blogger users, all logging in from Singnet accounts, experience decreased functionality with blogger.

1. Missing Blogger bar on front page of all blogs


Singnet users get this page. Note the cropped Blogger 404 banner where the blogger bar should be.


Hello, blogger bar!

2. Logging into blogger, the Dashboard looks funny...


Singnet users get this page. Note the dashboard table just seems... broken.


Ah, this is the real deal! Note how uncluttered this dashboard appears.

3. Singnet users may no longer edit their templates.


Note that Singnet claims the entire page does not exist, leading users to think the problem lies with blogger.


Of course, that's just a bloody lie.

4. If you just want to blog... things still look funny.


I'm told that in actual fact, clicking on the buttons produce nothing. No bold text, italics, etc.


It seems that the wonky appearance of the create posts page just drives affected users cranky.

Solution

Under the internet settings for your browser of choice (Firefox/Mozilla/Seamonkey, IE6/7, Safari/Camino), switch from Direct connection to Internet to force a manual proxy of your choice, either the standard proxy.singnet.com.sg:8080 or anything on this page or that one.

Analysis

Transparent Singnet proxy has hiccuped once more. Strangely enough, instead of transparently sending to the user what the server is sending, the transparent proxy implementation of Singnet is doing some sort of interpretation AND rearrangement of what the server is sending, instead of being transparent.

This isn't the first time, though, that Singnet's transparent proxy has created problems for its users on blogger, livejournal, and other services.

Wankerdämmerung!

Not a good week for wankers, apparently. On one hand, the gang of wise old men are called out by Elia Diodati and twashers.

On the other... The Void Deck has pronounced Wankerdämmerung on the Brotherhood, while Mr Wang Says "Wankerdämmerung!" to the Brotherhood as they invade his blog.

Agagooga has looked into the eyes of the Brotherhood, and he says Wankerdämmerung to them.

It is now twilight for these wankers as more and more people decode their self-referential prose, their space opera stories, their posing as some kind of sg Illuminati.

As a satire of anonymous commentors, the Brotherhood illustrates the principles of strength in anonymity (no one knows who you are, that you're just the same person posting), strength in numbers (always intimidates people if you seem to be a huge movement), strength in incoherence (very easy to dismiss arguments if you have a dozen anonymouses posting non sequitur replies).

As a satire of local parliamentary debates and online discussions, the Brotherhood's "Great Hall Debates" and discussion style elsewhere illustrate the tendency for discussions to dissolve into brinksmanship, namecalling, thinly veiled threats, obfuscation, and fallacious and illogical arguments by the second reply.

As a satire of aggregators, the Intelligent Singapore illustrates the principle that for a political blogosphere that's as populous as the number of digits in two human hands, people should just use their own blogroll or rss feeds because it'll be the same blogs featured over and over again.

Sure, we kind of appreciate the satire that the Brotherhood is performing, a triple satire on the state of the blogosphere. But it's done in a style that very few people get the joke; that those who do get the joke won't find it in good taste; that the space for reasoned discourse is cut off each time the Brotherhood brings their discussions onto other blogs.

So, I also say Wankerdämmerung!

An academic debate

Duly noted: Ellia Diodati and twasher have set into motion what I call the Wankerdämmerung.

Elia calls out the current Singaporeangle as "trapped in its self-pleasing, obsessive groupthink over academic rigor as applied to things that really don’t deserve such standards", while twasher notes that a recent article on the Angle is marked by confused thinking, doubtful operationalisation, and ultimately empty academic rigour masking an irrelevant argument.

Also duly noted: the dignified, overpolite but "We are not amused" response on SA, the exaggeratedly polite Victorian era Botanist Society meeting manners masking a definitive stonewall to the problem pointed out by the barbarians outside the gate, an academic invocation of the right to end a discussion by saying I am not arguing on that context... (however you want to interpret and however you induced that context), by declaring "I am not going to indulge in arguing this further" as a unilateral end of discussion announcement.

I will not repeat my commentary on the gang of wise men (see footnote in cited article). Instead, I am content to refer to a previous post which was made more than half a year before the institution of the Angle groupblog.

Academic and critical writing

...from the National Library, Critical intellectuals on writing (Olsen G, Worsham L, eds; 2003). The anthology consists of interviews of leading scholars by the editors, on being intellectuals.

Wei notes their introduction attempts to delineate the difference between academic and intellectual writing:

"Simply stated, the distinction is this: academic work is inherently conservative inasmuch as it seeks, first to fulfill the relatively narrow and policed goals and interests of a given discipline or profession and second, to fulfill the increasingly corporatised mission of higher education; intellectual work, in contrast, is relentless critical, self-critical, and potentially revolutionary, for it aims to critique, change, and even destroy institutions, disciplines and professions that rationalise exploitation, inequality and injustice."

The pseudo-academic language (posts beginning with "I refer to X's article, which was a response to Y's article on...", "In this post, I shall attempt to argue that...", the use of the word treatise, the careless word-dropping - longue duree as applied to the life-span of intellectuals!), the exaggerated politeness masking a mutual agreement not to show up, call on, or embarrass the authors, not to critically examine and reflexively interrogate academic arguments, the rigorous analysis over issues of non-importance...

Now I see why Olsen and Worsham really believe it is possible for academics to work against their own duties as public intellectuals.

Post mortem for a political blogosphere

1. Technological essentialism

The argument comes back in vogue every few decades: new inventions will fundamentally change human behaviour, reconfigure power structures, show us new ways to think and see the world.

Fireworks. The moveable type. Ocean-sailing ships. The telegraph. These are inventions that changed the world the second time round. Or perhaps you could say they intensified patterns of behaviour that were already there, like how the steam engine merely made global colonialism easier.

2. Relative autonomy

The illusion that the internet, the political blogosphere, seems to operate under different rules, with a different culture and mindset, ties in neatly with the technological essentialism argument. Yet technological essentialism provides no explantatory value when the political blogosphere goes the way of Sammyboy, soc.culture.singapore, singabloodypore...

That the blogosphere could, for a while, be seen to operate under unique internal rules, can be explained by sole virtue of the miniscule population of political bloggers and commentors on their blogs, hence its relative autonomy with regards to institutional politics, the market.

What destroyed the blogosphere's power to create an idealised platform to comment and collaborate on measured criticisms of the larger polity, was simply the loss of its relative autonomy. The elections of 2006 provided the onslaught of commentors, who had their own ideas of discourse (one liners, mudslinging, ranting), and the attention of the institutional political players (both parties supplying their own anonymouses, setting up groupblogs, helping party members to set up their own blogs, creating and coordinating their own stables of bloggers).

3. Exit and silence

The exit of various bloggers is a deliberate resignation, not forced, and certainly not all that dire. The proxies of various political parties may now find conquering the blogosphere far easier, as is swamping readers with more pliant bloggers who can always be counted to rouse the troops. They will find, in time, that the blogosphere's credibility and respectability a halo created by the practices and discursive rigour and ethics of the ex-bloggers, and that this credibility and respectability will never be in their hands, ever, by the black ops virtue of their operations.

A fair warning: yes, some of us may be disillusioned or weary. There will be some of us, who are like the Magician.

We have read deeply into the rules that govern our blogging enterprise, the changing relations that govern us in the current situation created by the entrance of the anonymouses and the functionaries of the Whiteshirts and Redshirts. And we see one, and only one true exit, only one path of action that is morally and spiritually satisfying.

And then, we leave.

And yet, our magic (the halo of credibility!) was never in the microchips, the fibre optics, the blogging software that lie on the internet. Some of us may be silent. Others will simply do what we've always done, and start talking and convincing people around us, in this flesh-and-blood world, of our arguments, to invite them into our analytical projects. While you play your game of turning the blogosphere into your echo chamber.

The magic lies with the Magician's ability to understand and read the game, it is an inalienable part of the Magician. The magician remains the magician, even without the staff.

Questions for a new century

The history of communications (discourse, the exchange of ideas) is the history of the domination of relatively small groups over the means of literary, ideological, and literary production. Within the proto-state, only two caste-like classes of people had the legitimate access to public discourse and the interest to shape the content and nature of public discourse - the religious priesthood and its secular offshoot, the historians. Even during the age of the pamphleteers, of writers who could rouse hundreds of thousands to decapitate monarchs and overthrow governments, the story has remained the same: a vanguard leading the masses to revolution; the few, organising discourse, filtering the message and letting it loose on select crowds.

Even as technologies of communication and writing improved with the invention of the printing press, the newspaper and the nation-state, the message, now nationalised for the publics to embrace as their totality, has remained in the hands of the newspaper barons, opinion-makers, talking heads and pundits on television.

But you say, the internet has changed everything... Technically yes, perhaps, but it is important to note when and how this came about. The revolution did not come with newsgroups, forums, webpages or chat channels; the technology that you credit for the revolution did not give birth to it, but merely provided a space for people with similar interests to engage with each other. It is the blog and the social internet that has given the masses a medium to participate, influence and set the direction of public discourse itself. This is an age where everyone now has the voice to speak to all and the ear to listen to everyone else, where public discourse is discursively formed by the public itself. It is also an age where the public exercise of this power, the public participation in public discourse, creates a situation where discourse is made impossible.

To wit: Yes, we have the technological conditions, but what are the social conditions, the habits of mind necessary to create a conducive environment where people want to share points and develop ideas with each other? It's not a silly question - I have pointed out the deterioration in the climate of discussions and annonymous comments on local blogs some time ago, as have other bloggers more recently (some of whom I understand have become ex-bloggers).

So yes. We are at an odd juncture of local blogosphere history. In one ring, we witness a power grab of the blogosphere by the whiteshirts and their keyboard commandoes, with dual central command posts at the P65 and ypap blogs, supported by mysterious anonymous posters who pop up seemingly everywhere. In the other ring, we witness a power grab of the blogosphere by the redshirts and their keyboard commandoes, with dual central command posts at a non-partisan blog fueled by reader contributions (the open secret is the editor meets up with his regular contributors every fortnight to discuss articles and editorial direction) and an unofficial redshirt supporters blog fueled by apparently the same editors and public contributors from the first blog, and of course supported by mysterious anonymous posters who pop up seemingly everywhere. A pox on both their houses! Or as someone else has put it, black sheep or white sheep, you are still sheep. And in yet another ring, a gang of wise men pontificate politely over whether the state has any obligation to subsidise healthcare for the aged poor...^[1]

When you create an atmosphere of escalating incivility, turn polite discourse into a parody of itself by abdicating common sense and responsible analysis, offer commentary from an inauthentic "non-partisan" position, you poison the well of discourse. And through demonstration, prove that public participation in public discourse cannot be guaranteed by just technology alone.

And hence the slow evaporation of the political blogosphere, the gradual exit of bloggers, the sight of Gresham's Law running its course here - where the local blogosphere has been a venue for the exchange of ideas, bad blogging drives out good blogging. The warning signs have been here for at least a year, the alarms sounded at least half a year ago, and the rush to the exits beginning in earnest.

Don't call us when the dust settles, when you know which party has grabbed the blogosphere for what it's worth. Don't call us when you're done with the mass identical anonymous postings, the ratcheting of angry rhetoric and namecalling, the insincere and dishonest argumentation. Don't call us, because political bloggers aren't going to rebuild the credibility of this medium once you decide you need us once again.

To wit: Yes, we have the technological conditions, but what are the social conditions, the habits of mind necessary to create a conducive environment where people want to share points and develop ideas with each other? What will you gain if the only way to gain a foothold - and then some - in the blogosphere, will destroy its credibility outright, as well as its position as a safe haven for public discourse?

Footnotes

[1]

Surprisingly, the post questioning the public policy of state subsidised healthcare had no numbers - no breakdown of average healthcare costs for the aged, no breakdown of incomes. No shit, Sherlock! Isn't it obvious that healthcare has to be subsidised because most medical emergencies at that age cannot be afforded, even if the costs are shared by the family of the aged sick?! The farcial nature of the discussion was only added by the continuing commentary by the gang of wise commentors, who studiously ignored the big gaping flaw in front of their noses...

Talking pictures: General Motors robot ad

Going back through 2 years' worth of writing (have been adding tags to the old posts, a new feature of Blogger v2!), I've realised how this blog has shifted from cultural theory to critical theory and policy criticism. Sometimes, though, it's easier to comment on the world through allegory, to take things unseriously, or to make serious what is for entertainment. Today, instead of direct political or economic commentary, I present a new (old) way of doing things, of finding the truth through examining fiction, of tackling the base through the superstructure.

Talking pictures 1: General Motors



A robot at a General Motors car assembly plant drops a screw, a mistake that results in its firing. It subsequently sinks into a series of more humiliating and underemployed forms of manual labour, and ends up jumping off a bridge, depressed and suicidal. It is a cute ad, made to sell GM's commitment to quality control (its 100,000 mile warranty).

Its cuteness is its downfall, for the cuteness invests the metallic machine with human characteristics, to evoke the "awwwww, poor thing!" reaction from viewers. Yet the anthropomorphic strategy is a convenient fiction that masks the opposite truth: in the world outside the ad, human labour is mechanised (a calculative process) into nothing more than productive automatons. White collar or blue collar, labour is infinitely expendable, flexi-timed, subject to contractual hiring, minimal benefits, and no-cause firing.

In an age where corporate profits soar while labour wages remain stagnant, all labour undergo a series of automatising. We worry about hitting key performance indicators, whether we will receive a favourable review by our peers, whether the next mistake we make will be our last. In an age where our qualifications become obsolete a month upon graduation, we worry like the robot about getting underemployed. Will we be reduced to the call centre, the roadshow, or any odd job that has absolutely nothing to do with what we were trained for? And will we end up depressed and suicidal, jumping into the path of a train?

And then we remember Karel Čapek and his play RUR (Rossum's Universal Robots). This is the first recorded usage of the word, because the writer and his brother invented it themselves. But really, what they intended robot to mean is merely "work". And from the original Czech roots, robota=drudgery and robotnik=peasant, serf.

Hence, a robot: a person who works, or slaves. A person who toils away, who lives in order to work. By understanding the genealogy of the word, we now understand the true meaning of the General Motors ad: it simply describes - not the humorous and fictional plight of anthropomorphised machinery at a factory, but the real plight of dehumanised people at their workplaces.

Links: A full translation of the play

Minilee's keyboard kommandos

A few months after last year's General Elections, I had a private conversation with a few friends about the state of the local blogosphere. Despite its vaunted, almost mythical and most certainly mythologised role in provoking interest in politics and the elections, it was really in a vulnerable state. Without the election-fueled controversies, the blogosphere had no strong common focus. With comments on blog posts written increasingly by anonymouses interested in one-liners and non sequiturs, the blogosphere's power to serve as a clearing house for ideas and a broker for honest, sustained and serious discussion was diminished. (This would be partly why I stopped blogging for a time)

We concurred that it was high time for a power grab, with both major political parties establishing easy beachheads in the blogosphere. It's not that there's anything wrong with cabinet ministers and opposition members blogging, but we expected both parties to operate through proxies instead this time round. Perhaps they would set up a groupblog or an online magazine, then solicit members or guest contributors to nurture talents - without announcing in public about who is behind the blog/magazine. Actually it's an open secret amongst members of the Young Republic that a certain opposition party has done exactly that. Comparing it to the public efforts of the P65 blog, we thought the PAP had the cleaner hands...

Until now.

Li Xueying puts it this way in today's Straits Times:
PAP moves to counter criticism of party, Govt in cyberspace

The People's Action Party (PAP) is mounting a quiet counter-insurgency against its online critics. It has members going into Internet forums and blogs to rebut anti-establishment views and putting up postings anonymously.

Sources told The Straits Times the initiative is driven by two sub-committees of the PAP's "new media" committee chaired by Manpower Minister Ng Eng Hen. One sub-committee, co-headed by Minister of State (Education) Lui Tuck Yew and Hong Kah GRC MP Zaqu Mohamad, strategises the campaign. The other is led by Tanjong Pagar GRC MP Baey Yam Keng and Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC MP Josephine Teo. Called the "new media capabilities group", it executes the campaign.

Both were set up after last year's General Election. Aside from politicians, some 20 IT-savvy party activists are also involved

Insurgents

We're flabbergasted. Surely they don't mean to say that all bloggers are insurgents?

Insurgent, according to the Webster
1. Person who rebels against civil authority or established government
2. One who acts contrary to policies and decisions of their own political party.

Onelook has it even better:
3. a member of an irregular armed force that fights a stronger force by sabotage and harassment

But there's only one meaning of insurgent that is implied when you use "counter-insurgent", really. The member of an irregular armed force one... And how one takes action against insurgents (i.e. guerillas) is simple: you dispense with all rules of war and adopt a black ops manual. Adopting unconventional warfare is a must. Against the Vietcong, napalm their forests. Execute them. Against local bloggers, take on anonymous identities and destroy the blogosphere through disinformation and ghostwritten propaganda.

Black Ops

There is thus no less suitable phrase to describe the PAP counter-insurgency campaign. Party operatives posting anonymously in forums to advance the views of their party is every bit as covert and ethically questionable as a black op.

Elsewhere in the world, the revelation of party operatives infiltrating forums and blogs would be cause for the expulsion of several party leaders. One remembers the fury that was barely averted when Atrios disclosed his connection to the Democratic Party's campaign in 2005. One remembers the furore that resulted in the expulsion of one Jeff Gannon from the White House press room when it was revealed the journalist was hired by Republican Party operatives to ask easy questions for the administration. Closer to home, one remembers that a certain NKF trial alleges a whole slew of major ethical problems at the charity - including the practice of getting NKF staff to rebut anti-NKF views through ghostwritten letters in newspaper forum pages.

We wonder if Ng Eng Hen is so unaware of world affairs and the biggest trial to occur in Singapore that he happily authorises a campaign that essentially has PAP's party operatives masquerade as the ordinary blogging public, in order to propagate their party's views. Of course, that IS the intent of the counter-insurgency campaign, no?

One activist who is involved said that when posting comments on online forums and the feedback boxes of blogs, he does not identify himself as a PAP member.

We call upon Ng Eng Hen to come clean with this dishonest campaign; to identify all MPs, Ministers, and PAP party operatives involved. We want to know if they were paid by the State to masquerade as ordinary people to post anonymous comments on blogs during working hours. For their role in this fraudulent campaign, impeach Ng Eng Hen, Lui Tuck Yew, Zaqy Mohamad, Baey Yam Keng, and Josephine Teo! Impeach them now!

Minilee's war on GST

Back in early November, during our hiatus, Minilee announced the next GST hike. Given that the new financial year always begins in April, and that the government traditionally reveals some of its Budget plans in February, several thoughts went through my head, like:

"It's too premature to spring this on Singaporeans. Ideally you want to spring this as late as possible so people won't have time to internalise this policy, mull over it obsessively, and begin to think of all sorts of objections to it."

Tactically, this early announcement is a mistake, and we did witness several rebuttals, with the blogosphere exclaiming... "Why such high taxes if we don't even have social welfare schemes to fund?", and Today's forum contributors pointing out what a regressive tax the GST is, and how much MORE it'll hurt the lower classes that the GST increase was supposed to help.

We predicted the early announcement would lead to more questions, which would lead to more bad justifications and reasonings, and come 2007, Minilee would have to beat a hasty retreat from his plans. I mean, even Tommy Lee's IPS seminar last week had several academics pointing out - presumably through hard statistics - that Singapore's middle classes have had stagnant wages during the previous 5 years, and that its lower income groups had actually experienced declining real wages. Yet all these academics at a state-sponsored think tank couldn't stop Minilee from proclaiming his resolve to stay the course with the GST hike.

Now, this kind of thing is troubling since the emperor's advisors are supposed to find a way to tell their sovereign to change courses, however subtly they need to do it. Although the IPS seminar divulged almost nothing new that average Singaporeans already know, their public revelations were noteworthy because IPS isn't known for being rabidly critical...

Yet one could also insist that the IPS seminar did not result in Minilee overturning the GST hike, because that single issue was never explicitly linked, never explicitly rebutted through the findings the academics released last week... Were the speakers perhaps constrained by fear of what might happen if they made too direct a challenge to Minilee's GST policy? Were they too subtle? Or did they just put up a very token resistance, appearing radical by pointing out the obvious, but refusing to link it to the not so obvious?

What's really wrong about the GST
(with thanks to the various individuals who helped in the making of this minor manifesto last November - you know who you are)

1. The GST is a regressive tax. Increasing it to help the poor - what Minilee claimed is the purpose of the hike - is like amputating somone's foot in order to give him a bionic leg, without anaesthesia

Rather straightforward. Most people caught it within a week, leading to more clarifications by Minilee and more nebulous promises of a vastly increased Workfare

2. Increasing the GST and decreasing the corporate tax means the burden of social welfare is shifted from the rich and the corporations to the poor. A very clear signal, if you will, to businesses on their responsibilities as corporate citizens.

No one caught that either.

2a. The shift of the burden of social welfare to the poor is exacerbated by the stagnant wages of the middle class and the falling real wages of the poor. Again, a very clear signal that the state of Singapore is enacting its its very own tax cuts for the rich and the corporations.

No one caught that.

2b. A deeper political question is raised in all this: who should pay for government programs? The rich? Corporations that have benefitted from the "economic recovery" far more in terms of profit than Labour, whose private wages, salary income, and labour compensation has been at record lows in this particular recovery?

(Again, refer to this graphic)

When you are given a graph like that, and asked "Who is in the best position to pay for government programmes", who would you choose? When Minilee's answer to this question is a GST hike and corporate tax cut - what sort of signal does it send to employers?

No one caught that either.

3. Existing programmes like workfare don't really reach all the people it should, or help the people in ways they really need. They have been in some form of existence for the past 5 years, and still the wage gap increases. The whole "tax increases for more social programmes" sounds like an admission of government wastage, and should be painted as an admission of government wastage and inefficiency of its existing programmes. Why should the people pay even more money for more workfare, if workfare doesn't even function properly?

No one caught that. Maybe Minilee did, though. On 16 Nov (or 15 Nov), the headlines went: Pensions not the way to go

An old age pension system is not the way to go as it will impose a very heavy burden on the next generation, cautioned PM Lee. A better solution was or each person to save for his own future needs. Hence there is the CPF savings and the home ownership scheme, which gives one an asset whose value can be unlocked in one's later years.

Indeed, Minilee can be very charming if he wants to: He has this belief that despite Singaporeans living on $6.06 a day when they retire, the current CPF and home ownership systems are more than sufficient to see everyone through. Indeed, he's totally forgotten that the best solution is for each person to just sue the pants off their offspring, whose value can be unlocked for their own future needs. I mean, why bother with all those complicated pension schemes, welfare, and progressive taxes, when you can just ask the poor to rob their young, via the Maintenance of Parents Bill?

Are we trying hard enough to derail the GST hike? Are our academics at IPS doing hard enough to derail the GST hike?

Saddam Hussein is dead

Yet for all purposes, this momentous occasion cannot be commemorated with the appropriate satisfaction of justice being done, or that through his death, Iraq's many sectarian divides have been healed. In short, no justice, no truth, and no reconciliation came out of the meaningless exercise of state terror on the morning of 30 December 2006.

Make no mistake: his execution was barbaric and degrading - mass murderers are afforded far more dignity in their final moments than this. Why were his executioners wearing SKI MASKS?? And why were they chanting a Shia prayer when he was clearly a Sunni Muslim? Charles I, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were allowed to finish their final prayers before their heads rolled - Saddam's gallows were dropped when he was in mid-sentence of the Muslim final prayer, much like how Alexandra Fyodronvna was shot before she could complete the sign of the cross in the basement of Ipatiev House. You could say that no one deserves to die like this.

IraqSlogger points out the symbolic significance of why the execution was carried out on this very day - it seems to be a direct insult to the Sunnis by the Shia government. It's quite a valid point, but I fear that's missing the point - the circumstances of Saddam's death has many uncomfortable parallels to those of a major historical and religious figure.

1. He was executed on the eve of a most important religious holiday

Most people in the capital would have retired to their home villages for celebrations and religious observances. The closure of the capital and the slow confirmation of the news (civil servants of course on holiday) would have prevented mass protests and uprisings.

2. He was degraded by his guards prior to his execution

3. After his initial capture, the burning question was who should be charged with putting him on trial?

Various authorities were mooted - the US civilian court, a US army court martial, an International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague, or by an Iraqi court.

4. He was eventually handed over to the jurisdiction of a petty administrator installed by the occupying superpower

5. During his appearance at the trial, he bore the marks of being beaten in custody

Judging from the remarks on BBC's phone in programme last night, it also appears that most Shia muslims from Iraq were blase enough to effectively say "If you think this is unjust, so be it! Let the blood be on our hands!"

Now, if it turns out that Saddam's grave turns out to be empty in the coming days, we would have literally killed the Messiah AGAIN.

In more serious news, Juan Cole points out that Saddam Hussein received much assistance from the CIA and the US government from his beginnings as a CIA operative to even after Operation Desert Storm and the liberation of Kuwait.

Christmas telethon

Christmas is pretty much the only major Western (Judeo-Christian) holiday that Chinese people can identify with. No kidding - you'll have to travel miles to meet with your extended kin, spend an entire weekend consuming too much food, and as luck will have it, at your grandparents', there won't be much in the way of entertainment - unless your gramps are hardcore gamers .If you live in the kinless big city, it's an entire weekend of hosting or attending parties, hopefully with company you can live with.

Oh, who are we kidding... That's the reason why people end up sitting in front of the telly or secretly watching it from the corner of their eye as they make an effort to talk to someone else. Obviously in this corrupt and degenerate age we live in, there's nothing festive on telly. No. We have dreg like The Mask of Zorro, Jumanji, and the Powerpuff Girls Christmas special. And then you realise you took a few days of annual leave to rest at home as well.

It's time to stand up for your own Christmas entertainment. At parties, gatherings, or at home, insist on your own festive selection! It helps to bring along a few DVDs, of course. Here's my perfect Christmas selection, tastefully chosen to suit all stripes of Christmas celebrants.

For a Heartwarming Christmas

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)


Because you know that this is the most mushy, sentimental flick about how an angel makes one ordinary, do-gooding Joe's life better on Christmas, when he's at his lowest point. When I get slightly depressed, watching this helps.

Going My Way (1944)

Bing Crosby is a singing priest newly transferred to a depressed parish. Not only does he win over their hearts, he saves the impoverished church from closing down/getting sold, and makes everyone's life better. By singing, of course.

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Christmas Carols

Scrooge (1951)


The best film version of A Christmas Carol, IMO. Also manages to humanise the miser by giving him a touching backstory. Born poor, mother died in childbirth, was an honorable and hungry (in the sense of ambitious/hardworking) guy until he got mentored by a crooked capitalist who helped hone his business sense. Makes his interactions with Tiny Tim and the Cratchitts, and his transformation all the more touching later on.

The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)


Very faithful adaptation of the Dickens story, even more faithful to Dickens than the previous film. It just has Muppets instead of human characters in the rest of the cast, and Michael Caine as Scrooge. That's TWO reasons to watch this.

Blackadder's Christmas Carol (1988)


You don't expect me of all people to wallow in feel-good holiday movies, right? By the end of the 15th Christmas movie, you'd want to see something that skewers A Christmas Carol, just for the heck of it. Scrooge is a very nice man, an honest and philanthropic businessman whose company is just about to fall apart and die. Until a visit from some Ghosts of Christmas...

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Because it's about the birth of Jesus

Hail Mary (1985)


Jean-Luc Goddard made a very reverential transposition of the Nativity Story to a modern day setting. Most of the "controversy" raised by ignorant Christians are due to their own inability to realise how scandalous a virgin birth would have been viewed in 6 A.D., and how well Goddard evokes that sense of scandal in his movie.

The Gospel according to St Matthew (1964)


Pier Paolo Pasolini may have been a socialist, but this film - all dialogue from the Gospel, with nothing added or fabricated - was endorsed by the Vatican. Made with non-actors and real-life peasants, this looks like a very artistic documentary at times. Pasolini knows his Jesus well: he's the guy in old and dirty clothes siding with the poor, the trodden, the weak, and the criminals that are routinely condemned, ignored, or exploited by the rich, the morally superior, the hyper-religious leaders in church. Pastor Kong should watch this movie the next time he makes a stupid speech about God wanting people to be rich, hallelujah!

Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979)


Brian's not a messiah, he's just a very naughty boy! Who, for the entirety of his life, is mistaken for The Messiah...

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Cartoons

A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)
>

It's like the animated version of It's a Wonderful Life. Everything seems to be going wrong for Charlie Brown as he helps put up the school Christmas play. Charlie Brown's almost existential search for the meaning of Christmas is embarked while the entire Peanuts gang seem to be occupied with other stuff and ignoring him. But all goes well when Linus tells him the true meaning of Christmas in a speech that gets you all warm and mushy inside.

The Nightmare Before Christmas


Personally, my favourite Christmas cartoon ever. And now, in 3D!

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Just Christmas Movies

Perhaps the best part about doing your own Christmas programming is the offbeat choices you can make that will throw people off, yet impress them when they realise that these films ARE really set during Christmas, and perhaps do say something about how we celebrate it nowadays.

Brazil (1985)


Yes, it's a dystopian scifi comedy/satire. But it's also about Christmas. In fact, if you pay attention, there are lots of Christmas jokes in Brazil - every day seems to be Christmas in the movie, everyone seems to be giving the same gifts, and for the win, we have Capitalists for Christ marching on the streets...

Jingle all the Way (1996)


What Christmas without last minute shopping? Mugging people in stores? Fighting over the last item in the store? Jingle All the Way is a culturally important film that depicts all these. Watching Arnold as a wimp of a dad who endures all and then blows his top makes you realise that he paved the way for the Adam Sandler brand of comedy.

Die Hard (1988)


Your Christmas action movie! It's Bruce Willis foiling a plot involving a plane, lots of explosives, and Alan Rickman as a master terrorist!

Gremlins (1984)


Now I bet you didn't realise Gremlins was set during Christmas. Go shock the hell out of everyone with this factoid =D