On Vivian Balakrishnan

Vivian Balakrishnan and the video that cannot be named

Last week, Vivian Balakrishnan sounded like a sphinx speaking in riddles and conundrums. Singaporeans are used to the fury of People Action Party attacks on opposition candidates during elections but this time round, the attacks have started even before Nomination Day. Adding to the unseasonal and surreal atmosphere this year is Vivian's mysteriously-worded attacks and half insinuations on Vincent Wijeysingha, a likely candidate for the Singapore Democratic Party.

As previous targets Francis Seow, Tang Liang Hong, Steve Chia, and James Gomez will know, the attacks and scandals begin and suddenly the entire news - and the entire elections - for the next few weeks will seem to revolve around their alleged shortcomings, the attacks from the PAP rising to a crescendo, "Please lah, withdraw!"

Dr Vivian's attacks on Wijeysingha, courtesy of Alex Au:

I am not sure what [the SDP] strategy is. I would like to know whether they have confirmed that they are contesting, I would like to know their line-up. I can’t help feeling that part of the reason for their reticence is they have elements of their agenda they are not prepared to disclose and subject to scrutiny. Eventually, they will have to come out of the closet.     (The Straits Times, 20 April 2011)

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan yesterday described the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) team running against him as ‘strange bedfellows’ who do not have a shared vision or ideology...In an interview with The Sunday Times, he said: ‘It has been brought to my attention – in fact it is the SDP which is suppressing a certain YouTube video, which raises some very awkward questions about the agenda and motivations of the SDP and its candidates.’    (The Sunday Times, 24 April 2011)

Why would an attack by a sitting minister on a very naughty opposition candidate be this cryptic? The PAP has never been shy from calling a spade a spade  witness its blunt denunciation of Steve Chia in 2003.

Vivian Balakrishnan, the dog whistler

It's taken the blogosphere half a week to figure out the game. Vivian Balakrishnan alludes to the open secret of Dr Vincent Wijeysingha's homosexuality. He alludes to a video taken at a public forum where Dr Wijeysingha discussed issues which were then popularly discussed like the age of consent and the decriminalisation of gay sex in Singapore.

Why would this discussion - in the video, Dr Wijeysingha clearly does not take a stand on either these two issues! - be so horrendously evil? And why would it then warrant such a roundabout, mincing reference?

Vivian Balakrishnan is not a sage, nor a sphinx, nor a fool. He is putting into practice dog whistle politics - carefully parsing his words to target a key demographic. Balakrishnan is not speaking to the press or to the general public that reads The Straits Times.

He is speaking to a key demographic who is not in on the secret but can decipher it with clues like - an agenda, strange bedfellows, closets. He speaks to a demographic that will be spring into action because there is an insinuation of a gay agenda secretly planned by a gay politician who Vivian Balakrishnan simultaneously accuses of fooling his party on his motivations and is also in cahoots with his party to suppress this video.

Consciously or otherwise, Vivian Balakrishnan furiously dog-whistles the demographic consisting of Thio Su Mien, her co-coup leaders at AWARE, Derek Hong, and other concerned conservative Christians. The "Gay agenda", the spectre of homosexual politicians pushing to overturn legislation - an obvious wedge issue for an obvious demographic, dog whistled expertly by a coy minister of very few direct words.

Vivan Balakrishnan, the enabler of religious identity politics

Consciously or otherwise, Vivian Balakrishnan invites Feminist Mentor and conservative Christians to wage another round of their cultural war in Singapore's general election this year. Consciously or otherwise, Balakrishnan will make 2011 the first time in Singapore's history where the conservative Christian vote has wedge issues in the elections brought to their attention.

Vivian Balakrishnan can right now say he meant nothing, that he meant something else which he will not follow up at the present moment but will reveal when the time is ripe, etc. The fact is the wheels have been set into motion and no one can close this Pandora's box.

If a gay man like Alex Au can hear the dog whistle (even though he misconstrues it to be an ad hominem attack), Conservative Christians can likewise hear Balakrishnan's dog whistle shrilly calling. At best, this will be the year in Singapore's history that conservative Christians gel as a voting bloc. At worst - if the PAP allows Balakrishnan to make Wijeysingha this election's key target -  this will be the year where a conservative Christian wedge issue becomes the key issue of a general election.

Vivian Balakrishnan - now, thou art Death, the Destroyer of Worlds

I was here when Thio Su Mien and her co-conspirators took over AWARE. I was here when Thio Su Mien and her co-conspirators had Singapore civil society under strain with their religious intolerance for secularism. I was here when it seemed we would no longer be at peace between peoples of different faiths, between believers and secularists.

I for one do not wish there to be a new cultural war between conservative Christians and everyone else. And yet if Vivian Balakrishnan continues his attacks, this will surely be an issue for conservative Christians. After all, who else would Balakrishnan count on to attack Dr Wijeysingha? His fellow cabinet colleagues, who tilted against the conservative Christian coup of a feminist organisation? Papalee, who thinks being gay is in the genes and can't be helped - and welcomes gay MPs? Goh Chok Tong, who went on record to say that gay civil servants are perfectly okay?

And should Balakrishnan succeed in making the sexual orientation of Dr Wijeysingha THE issue of this election, it is clear conservative Christians will rise up to the occasion - together with their leaders, who may feel obliged to weigh in especially when it comes to chusing politicians who may change the legislation. And should the conservative Christians rise up, will not their old foes in the AWARE saga - feminists, members of other religions, secular and agnostic Singaporeans rise up to counteract the perceived rise of religious politics in Singapore?

Perhaps Vivian Balakrishnan is pleased at the new cleavages he has wrought on Singapore society? Perhaps he is satisfied at the introduction of dog whistling to religious groups on wedge issues? Maybe he fancies himself a trailblazer but I see him as a sower of potential destruction in Singapore.

Will there be religious riots or even religious-secular riots in the future because of Vivian Balakrishnan's dog whistling? I'll make no bones about it - Vivian Balakrishnan's comments on Dr Wijeysingha constitute a threat to Singapore's long term stability as a secular, multireligious society.

I call on Vivian Balakrishnan to step down as a candidate in this election. You sir are not fit to be an elected representative of the people. Please lah, withdraw!

General Elections 2011: Retrocognition & recognition

2011 will be a watershed year for Singapore politics. For the first time in its post-independence history, the opposition manifesto consists of bread and butter issues, its issues resonating with the common man in the street: jobs, wages, cost of living, the property bubble. For the first time in Singapore's post-independence history, the PAP argues on ideological terms, stating a belief in the unproven, unproveable goodness of immaterial concepts and slogans: leadership renewal, foreign talent, securing the future.

The PAP manifesto and platform for this year will cut no ground with the electorate - as other airy-fairy concepts from campaigns of yesteryear have failed with the electorate. The Singaporean voter was never swayed by an appeal to intrinsic goods like "democracy", "checks and balances", so what makes the PAP clown show think the same voter can be swayed by an appeal to how having "leadership renewal" or bringing in foreign talent will make things automatically better for his lot?

The opposition manifesto and platform for this year has already been written for them, out of pure necessity. Hard statistics tell hard truths; Singapore's mandarins may expend millions on international PR campaigns on its 'success story' but this comes with increased scrutiny from statisticians around the world - whose recent reports put in hard numbers the hardship that the average Singaporean has had to endure for the past 15 years of a failed expansionary economic policy by the PAP.

The profile of the Singaporean voter points towards an interest in hard numbers and the tangibles. For the first time in Singapore's post-independence history, the PAP is the party of highfalutin ideas nobody has the time for, and the opposition is the party of bread and butter issues.

This election is the PAP's to lose.

ASEAN diplomacy, Singapore style!

Will East Timor be allowed to join ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian nations)?

Its application is sponsored by Indonesia, its former occupier. A few days ago, it appeared to be a done deal.

"We have visited all ASEAN countries and everyone has agreed politically that Timor can join," said Ramos-Horta.

That was then. Now, it seems the ASEAN members who have given East Timor's president assurances are backing away. The loudest dissenters, according to Barry Wan from The Straits Times, are a motley group consisting of Singapore, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, and Burma.

Their reasoning?

Singapore has been quite adamant that the prospective new member needs to prepare properly before it can join the bloc.

Cambodia, Laos, and Burma believe ASEAN cannot afford to accept a weak and poor nation as a member.

Vietnam believes accepting a weak nation will put ASEAN more firmly into the Chinese orbit.

In ASEAN, diplomacy is another name for international comedy.

Singapore's diplomats lobbied hard for the entry of the Indochinese nations into ASEAN in its last expansion, knowing full well that Cambodia, Laos, Burma, and Vietnam were not properly prepared to join the grouping.

Cambodia, Laos, and Burma certainly didn't object to their own membership applications despite being already preyed upon by the Chinese model of mercantile capitalism prior to them joining ASEAN.

As part of the new Indochinese membership of ASEAN, Vietnam's diplomats and politicians should already know that their neighbours (let's say Burma at the very least) report dutifully to Peking the proceedings of each ASEAN meeting they attend.

East Timor, as a Southeast Asian nation with oil reserves, will attract Chinese diplomacy, development, and political influence whether or not it joins ASEAN.

ASEAN diplomacy deconstructed

Being China's second banana in ASEAN, Singapore will not want to see ASEAN fall further under or more obviously into the Chinese orbit because it means having to compete with 10 other countries who also want to be China's second banana in the region.

Similarly, Cambodia, Laos, and Burma are aware that East Timor is an oil-producing upstart. As a new country that needs to build its infrastructure from scratch, East Timor is terra firma and fresh meat for investment and development funds. The three Indochinese nations do not want China to divert its ASEAN warchest (spent partially on building railroads to connect Peking to Indochina) to this new nation.

As Vietnam's diplomats and leaders are aware, being earmarked as a Chinese satellite doesn't mean co-option as a Chinese ally. Vietnam's China policy consists of resisting Chinese political influence in its ruling party and state organs, while accepting Chinese money. Their opposition to East Timor's membership is motivated by the fear that East Timor will better Vietnam on its own China policy.

Will East Timor be allowed to join ASEAN? Even its biggest detractors in ASEAN think it would do just fine in ASEAN!

From civil service to political service

If the leaders of the People's Action Party have been more than truthful, their star recruits for the next election will feature senior civil servants such as the former chief of the army and other permanent secretaries, directors, and assistant directors from various ministries.

Prepare for their bundling into strong Group Representative Constituencies, where their ascension from civil service to political service political mastery will be accomplished on the coattails of popular ministers and senior ministers of state.

Prepare for the attempts to convince that these senior civil servants have earned their right to take charge of public policy, that they have exhibited the skills to lead Singapore as the fourth generation of PAP's leaders.

If you have read my previous post, you'll understand that like Wall Street and its increasingly well-educated financiers and their complicated toxic instruments, the Singapore civil service produces increasingly well-educated bureaucrats who have honed to an art the skill of producing improbable KPIs.

In the Singapore civil service, success is measured through how creatively its bureaucrats can create creatively skewed KPIs. The more educated and scholarly the civil servant, the darker his arts of creating such toxic instruments. This trend will continue as long as Singapore's bureaucracy continues employing expensive, highly educated scholars for fast track promotions.

To allow the continued ascension into heaven parliament of Singapore's senior civil servants is to reward their innovation of inventing KPIs and statistics that have less and less correlation to the base reality. In time (if not now), the map will bear no relation to the territory, the statistics will bear no relation to what they measure, the representation of Singapore will bear no relation to anything existing in Singapore.

Senior civil servants are a dead-end product of Singapore's meritocratic system. Do not expect solutions or initiatives from them. I strongly urge the electors to strongly reject PAP GRC slates that include recent senior civil servants.

Wall Street Smarts

This was your comparative reading for the week:

Wall Street Smarts by Calvin Trillin
Smart Guys and Wall Street by Paul Krugman

As your readings for the week have been suspended for the duration of Singapore's Silly Season, this will be a presentation instead.

What makes a theory valid?

Calvin Trillin is a humorist, not an economist. The essay is a tall tale told by a fictitious man. Wall Street Smarts exists in the realm of fable, establishing timeless truths (or morals) from fabrications.

Why was there a financial crisis in 2008? Trillin tells a story instead, which Paul Krugman, winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics, endorses from his observation of graduate school and the financial service industry.

How do we measure the validity of a piece of qualitative research (or in this case, a qualitative essay)? Without recourse to charts and statistics, the idea expounded must be tested in terms of theoretical rigour, explanatory value (both in context and transferability), and credibility. The biggest test of whether a qualitative piece of reasoning is valid lies very much with its credibility - when deconstructed and restated in its barest axioms, would you be able to buy the explanation whether or not you agree with it?

Wall Street Smarts, restated

Why did the financial crisis of 2008 occur? One could point to the many economic explanations - overinvestment, market bubbles, toxic instruments. But why were overinvestment, market bubbles, and toxic instruments promoted? Why indeed were derivatives invented and then pushed the way they were?

Here, the economists have no answers because the question asks for an exogenous explanation for the crisis, which lies outside the boundaries of the economics discipline.

Trillin in effect proposes an explanation that turns the spotlight on the history of economics, the social anthropology of the finance industry, and the political economy of employment.

1. In the old days where finance was about selling actual industry, the financial services sector largely recruited from a hereditary class of bankers and financiers. Barriers to entry were not too high: a college education would have done it (plus either relatives or friends or classmates in the industry).

2. Owing to comparative lower prestige, the financial services sector did not attract the best, the brightest, the most ambitious, the most greedy.

3. The roots of the financial crises of the late 20th century and 2008 lie in the increase of prestige of the financial services sector, its attraction of the best and the brightest (etc.) graduates, and the increase in university tuition and student debt, and of course the balloon in executive pay in the financial sector compared to other sectors.

4. The last two factors create an industry fronted by innovative, ambitious, and greedy agents who were smart enough to invent complicated toxic instruments, fake products, massaged company accounts...

5. The financial crisis occurs because there is no longer any correlation between the healthy trade of toxic instruments and massaged numbers, and the health of the real economy.

Wall Street Smarts, Singapore civil service edition!

The next best test (other than the very subjective notion of 'credibility') is transferability. What other context, what other industry can we find a similar set of environmental factors?

We note that a post-independence strategy of the Singapore is its much-vaunted introduction of university graduates into its civil service. Gathering pace more in the late 1970s, the policy has morphed into the recruitment of scholars fast-tracked into senior posts and handpicked for politics by the ruling PAP.

Note the increasing salaries and bonuses for the civil service. Note the increasing salaries for MPs and ministers - which only began when the scholars started entering politics. Note the increasing reliance on complicated KPIs and statistics that no one can comprehend and therefore trust, note the trumpeting of dodgy rankings that somehow suggest Singapore is the best nation is this and that and the other. Note the anger from the ground about how far the trumpeted KPIs and rankings are divorced from the everyday reality and experience of normal Singaporeans.

Wall Street Smarts - not just a story that took place a long time ago in a country far, far away.

Tharman Shammugaratnam's crowning clown moment

Economic illiterate or discombobulator?

Finance minister Tharman Shammugaratnam (PAP-Jurong) continues to perform his clown routine in parliament as he defends Singapore's budget for 2010.

Possible in light of strong criticism from the blogosphere, the minister admitted that yes, the GST is a regressive tax. However, it seems that is his knowledge of basic economics ends here. Tweaking the rate of the consumption tax will benefit higher income groups and foreigners more, he claims. Yes. That's what Shammugaratnam said -- reducing the rate of the GST will benefit the rich more because the bulk of the GST is collected from them.

Which part of regressive tax does finance minister Tharman Shammugaratnam not understand? Why will he not admit or acknowledge what any introductory econs text states baldly - that a consumption tax makes the poor pay a higher proportion of their income than the rich and that reducing the rate of a regressive tax will make the poor pay a lesser proportion?

Either finance minister Tharman Shammugaratnam is an economic illiterate and should be removed from his post forthwith, or the minister a glib discombobulator who thinks that Singaporean citizens and residents are economic illiterates and should be removed from his post forthwith.

Why Tharman Shammugaratnam will rather clown about than tell you the truth

In 2003, the GST was introduced to gradually replace income taxes, the complicated system of duties and levies, and corporate taxes as the main revenue source for the Singapore government.

The advantages? The global rich will be more likely to make Singapore their home or at least vacation home. Singapore, I suspect, has one of the world's more lenient tax regimes for the rich. Corporate taxes in Singapore are now the lowest in Asia, next to Hong Kong. Having to deal with less duties and levies lessens the red tape that corporations and entrepreneurs have to deal with.

The downside? The progressive tax instruments that existed prior to 1993 have all been dismantled -- progressive income taxes, corporate taxes, and levies and duties to target the rich. Wealth is redistributed from the poor to the rich in Singapore's post-1993 tax system.

Tharman Shammugaratnam and the PAP will go down defending the GST in the short to medium run as a reform of the entire system will take time and planning. They will go down insisting that the regressive tax structure stay in place (and the poor receive strategic state handouts). They will if necessary play dumb on the regressive tax structure because it constitutes the main revenue source of the Singapore government.

They will attempt to tweak the system and preserve the GST for as long as they can, unless the electorate speaks loudly, unless citizens and residents complain loudly and often, unless bloggers continue to expose the PAP's faulty and discombobulating defense of an indefensible regressive tax.

A chief clown for the clown show?

Tharman Shammugaratnam is the finance minister of Singapore. Goh Chok Tong and Lee Hsien Loong were the finance ministers of Singapore before they became prime ministers themselves.

Tharman Shammugaratnam is unfit to be the finance minister of Singapore. He is either economically illiterate, or a glib discombobulator, or an insincere leader who cannot level with Singaporeans. Tharman Shammugaratnam is unfit to be the next prime minister of Singapore.

In the coming general election, I strongly urge the electors to strongly reject Tharman Shammugaratnam (PAP-Jurong) and deprive him of the opportunity to further damage the poor and the middle class.

GST, inequality and regressive taxes: A Model Answer

Joseph Henry Greene is part of the Citibank team headed by Johan van Oenen that made Goh Keng Swee and Singapore its first billions, betting the US dollar against the British pound. The team subsequently recommended that Dr Goh develop Singapore as a finance hub servicing the "Asian dollar market".

Here is Joseph Henry Greene on the subject of the GST just when the consumption tax was about to be set in place:

This sales tax which is coming on is regressive. Why the government would have a sales tax – which is regressive – at a time like this? It won’t hurt the people at the moment but if there should be any trouble in the future, it’s going to make the disparity between the very wealthy and the average working class of Singapore... It will cause a strain and it will exacerbate.

(Economic development of Singapore, Interview with Joseph Henry Greene. National Archives, Oral History Centre. 1994)

Here is a member of the economic literati telling you the GST is a regressive tax. Listen to him instead of the PAP clown show.

The PAP clown show continues! (GST edition)

This is not your reading for the week. We are suspending your readings for this week and indeed for many months to come. That is because we are in Silly Season. Very Silly Season

The headlines say it all:
PAP MPs question who WP is trying to help
Cutting GST to tackle inflation would benefit rich more than poor, they say

excerpts:

PAP MPs on Monday hit back at Workers' Party chief Low Thia Khiang's broad-ranging attack on the Government's Budget. At least seven MPs from the ruling party stood up to disagree, as they questioned his call for GST cuts...

Mr Christopher de Souza (PAP-Holland Bukit Timah) and Prof Koo Tsai Kee (PAP-Tanjong Pagar) said that trimming GST would be more beneficial to the rich than to the poor

Said Mr de Souza: "High income earners, we know, consume more and therefore pay more GST."

In 2008, finance minister Tharman Shammugaratnam (PAP-Jurong) said that in absolute terms, the bottom 60% of earners here pay less than 25% of the total GST collected each year.

We can only come to one of two conclusions. Singapore is run by

1. A bunch of economic illiterates who don't bother to pick up any econs textbook, which will tell them a consumption tax (i.e. the GST) is a regressive tax.

2. A bunch of glib discombobulators who know that the GST is a regressive tax but refuse to acknowledge it as such. Instead, they work on the assumption that the electorate is composed of economic illiterates.

Finance minister Tharman Shammugaratnam will distract you by talking about absolute terms. He hopes you won't realise that no matter what the bottom 60% pay for their GST, they're still paying proportionately more out of their total income than the top 40%.

Christopher de Souza will distract you by saying the rich spend more and therefore pay more total GST. He hopes you won't realise that the rich spend a lower proportion of their income on consumption - and have a higher proportion of their income in savings - than the poor.

Prof Koo Tsai Kee will distract you by saying that the tax pool gets redistributed disproportionately to the lower income earners in the form of GST credits. He hopes you won't realise that he just conceded the inherent regressiveness of the tax, and that it requires annual government handouts (aka GST credits) to redress the balance or appear to redress it.

The PAP continues to run a clown show.

Whether they are economic illiterates or glib discombobulators, I recommend that the following current MPs be dropped from the PAP slate for the coming elections, and that if reselected to run, the electorate vote against such clowns:

Mr Christopher de Souza (PAP-Holland Bukit Timah)
Prof Koo Tsai Kee (PAP-Tanjong Pagar)
Tharman Shammugaratnam (PAP-Jurong)

Stupidity and disingenuity must never be rewarded.

The system gets the results it wants

Your reading of the week: The Singapore Monitor interviews Ivy Goh Nair

Discussion questions:

1. What are the properties of a bureaucratic structure that simultaneously absolve individuals within the system from responsibility and accountability and hoist the same responsibility and accountability to other individuals?

2. Who has the function within the Singapore civil service to exercise oversight over this transactional system of shared/deferred/inferred responsibility and accountability?

3. How would this overseer function be expected to work - and how would it actually work out? Why would the two not coincide?

Underemployment in post-crisis economies

Your comparative readings for the week

Ex-NUS graduate: I'm a failed product of our meritocratic system
In Japan, young face roadblocks
The curse of the class of 2009

Discussion questions
1. What is a labour market?

2. As a perfect market, how would we theorise it to work? In a perfect, rational world how would the labour market deal with a recession situation? How would a "recession graduate" experience this?

3. Consider the real world examples. Why does it not work perfectly? Can there be cultural, social reasons why a local labour market will never work perfectly?

The good and the godless

Paul Tobin of the Humanist Society is outraged with The Straits Times Saturday feature on 27 November 2010, "God Wants You: Making faith cool".

With all due respect, Paul Tobin is barking up the wrong tree when he complains the feature expresses a "prejudice against those without any religious affiliation".

Pro-religious article or bad journalistic writing?

As a rule of thumb: never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence. As a further rule of thumb: Straits Times journalists - even if they're not Dr. "I don't need no stinking research" Andy Ho - are generally incompetent even when it comes to journalistic standards.

All you need to do is to read through the entire 16-page feature from last Saturday. One will then invariably make the following observations and conclusions:

1. The author has a 16-page, multiple article feature written on youth outreach by religious groups.

1a. This is not a 16-page feature on youth and violence, or solving youth problems through religion.

2. However, the editor sees more readers being interested to read the 16-page feature if the lead article suggests the outreach is tied to the rise in youth gang violence and the current moral panic.

2a. In other words, the lead article of the feature has been tweaked to be 'relevant' to 'current issues'. Hence the throwaway references to youth violence and gangs. Even Matthew Matthews, the pastor-sociologist interviewed here, says *nothing* about violence and gangs, but about religiosity as a youth phenomenon.

3. But anyway, that's why the lead article states early on that the youth outreach efforts have been going on for years to engage gang-prone youth - even though the reports in the next 14 pages mention nothing about reaching out youths and gangs - merely reaching out to youths in general.

4. My proof? How about: the list of interview questions Lee Siew Hwa sent to one of her correspondents in her feature article - which would have been the same set of questions she sent to everyone else.

But what about the line about "losing a generation to godlessness", or losing youths to "cynicism, violence and even fanaticism" in the absence of religion?

If this were Lee Siew Hwa's own words, then we have a case for her apparent bias against atheism and whatnot. A more likely explanation: journalists of The Straits Times - following certain bad practices in second-rate newspapers from the west - do not feel the need to indicate that a particular line or lines of thought are actually quotes or paraphrases from interviewees.

So think: which interviewee(s) would have made a remark about generations being lost to godlessness? Which interviewee(s) from which religious group(s) covered in the feature would have equated the absence of religion to an absence in morality?

[Hat-tip to AngryDoctor]

The ultimate national day video project

Your reading for the week at SINdie

Excerpts:

Before August ends, take a trip down with us through memory lane and look at a special set of videos. These videos have been around since 1985 and are influential in the way they have shaped our perception of ourselves, the places, the people and the systems around us.

MOE and sex ed: let the culture war begin!

Last week, Singapore's Ministry of Education released its new approved sex education vendors list after a revamp and audit of external vendors and their programmes. Word has it that liberals and secularists in Singapore are concerned with the new list - 5 out of 6 of the vendors are linked to Christian organisations.

Should this be a concern? The ministry wants you to stop asking this question because "external vendors affiliated to religious groups are reminded not to proselytise or make reference to their religions during activities".

For Singaporeans who have been keeping tabs over the years of the objectionable content of the programmes by these vendors (showing the infamous Silent Scream video which shows gory abortion pics but doesn't say that these were pics of procedures now banned and from miscarried foetuses rather than aborted foetuses, requiring students to sign chastity promises, teaching that masturbation is morally wrong)... Well, let's just say that these Singaporeans won't buy MOE's Jedi Mind Trick that easily.

So have the fundamentalist Christians won this culture war? Should we all be worried that our children are going to be mis-educated in schools?

Interest; or Means, Motives, and Opportunity

Let us construct a hypothetical social field of sex education, where the players can be situated and bounded by their interest(s) and subsequent positioning and position-taking in the struggles of this field - which like all other social fields, are centred on who is a "legitimate" member and taking a "orthodox" stand.

Who would be interested to offer sex education in the institutional context of schools?
Who would be interested to offer sex education as a comprehensive subject?
Who would be interested in defining sex education as a normative subject, as opposed to a scientific subject?

I put it to you that the paucity of non-Christian and even non-fundamentalist Christian CSE providers is due to the lack of interest of any other factions (from the wider society, from the wider conservative majority, from even the varied Christian community) to offer sex education.

Out of society at large, it is the fundamentalist Christians are interested in sex education as a political issue. It is the fundamentalist Christians are most interested to see sex education taught as a subject in schools.

Sex education in schools is a narrow interest of fundamentalist Christians - and it should be no surprise that they constitute the bulk of the supply and demand for sex education in schools - and that the orthodox or consensus principles of sex education from these vendors are going to be the ultraconservative, with a hard Christian core.

The tyranny of the minority

Wider society may be conservative, but not all conservatives make an issue out of sex education or insist on a moralistic approach to sex education - aside from a tiny faction of fundamentalist Christians.

As demand and supply for this form of sex education is mostly from this small but vocal minority, I am scandalised that MOE has decided to allow these vendors to offer sex education to ALL schools in Singapore, a free platform to push their narrow philosophies on sexuality, which go further right than most conservatives in Singapore.

These sexuality programmes pander to such a small minority of Singaporeans, I am surprised that MOE is allowing these providers to push their programmes under the protection of the ministry, and even to charge money from it. As even retired Rev Yap Kim Hao has mentioned in the Straits Times forums, these CSE programmes are unlikely to be effective or informative or practical.

Why is MOE allowing taxpayers money (i.e from non-Christian and secular Singaporeans) to fund these clearly Christian, clearly impractical, clearly anti-educational programmes?

Whose philosophy? Whose transparency?

"MOE's philosophy on sexuality education is that it does not encourage nor promote masturbation, abortion and oral and anal sex."

MOE's sex education philosophy is counter to its stated objectives of tackling problems related to teenage pregnancies, STDs, sexual activity in teens.

Hardcore, ultraconservative sex education programmes have had a track record of abject failure. When GW Bush pushed them as a condition for aid to third-world countries, we have not seen data to show any relief in sex-related problems in these regions.

Instead of asking vendors for transparency, the Ministry of Education should be asked to be transparent - what groups did it consult to reach its philosophy of sex education? What criteria did it even use to say that these vendors' programmes are credible, truthful, or even "work"? Which other groups had approached the Ministry of Education and were rejected? Can the public examine the curricula and teaching material of these sex education vendors?

Officially, we live in a secular society. Even the ministers say so!

A growing list of distinguished ministers, senior ministers and deputy prime ministers and prime ministers of Singapore have made speeches and remarks over the past year about the secular nature of Singapore, repeating assurances that Singapore will never ever see the kind of cultural wars fought in schools and classrooms all across the US.

The Klever Kids at the Ministry of Education just made all these assurances worth precious little. I would like to ask Ministers Wong Kan Seng, S Jayakumar, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, and Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong just how committed they are to keeping Singapore a secular society, and in particular, keeping classrooms in Singapore free from religious activists pushing their narrow ideas of sex education.

Nobel Prize winner on immigration

Your reading for the week

Paul Krugman, The Curious Politics of Immigration

Excerpts:

The [Republican] party likes inexpensive workers - and would really enjoy a huge guest-worker program that would both provide such workers and ensure that they can neither vote nor, in practice, unionize...

Open immigration can't coexist with a strong social safety net; if you’re going to assure health care and a decent income to everyone, you can't make that offer global.

There is only one party to vote for

Your reading for the week:

Shirley Tan, "To the Memory of Goh Hung Chuan, PBM, my grandfather"

My grandfather sits by a stone table in the courtyard. As an aunt walks out of the main house, my grandfather calls: "Come."

Dutifully, she heads towards her father. Without saying a word, she picks up a red China graph pencil and marks a cross in a box next to the PAP logo. Then, she leaves.
Grandfather wets his right index finger with his tongue and wipes away the red cross.
Another aunt prepares to go to work. "Come," grandfather calls out to her.
This is repeated with every grown up aunt and uncle every day during that holiday which I spent with my grandparents.

I did not understand why until I was of voting age.

Grandmother told me: "Your grandfather also made me practise every day, so that there would be no mistake when we went to the voting centre. I would always be in front of him in the queue to collect our voting slips and we would time ourselves entering and exiting our individual booths. I would always show your grandfather that I had voted for PAP, before dropping my voting slip into the box."

Grandfather wanted his whole family to vote for PAP. So he schooled everyone who could vote that there is only one party to vote: PAP.

Story continues here.

Plausible deniability; or, are you stupid enough to buy their excuse?

Being the first part in a series on the modus operandi and rhetorical strategies of Christians of a Fundamentalist Persuasion...

Barthes on Signs and wonders; or, How to mean more than what you say

... je suis chez le coiffeur, on me tend un numéro de Paris-Match. Sur la couverture, un jeune nègre vêtu d'un uniforme français fait le salut militaire, les yeux levés, fixés sans doute sur un pli du drapeau tricolore. Cela, c'est le sens de l'image. - Roland Barthes, Mythologies (1970, p.201)

The semiologist Roland Barthes is at his usual barber for his regular haircut. In his chair, Barthes is handed an issue of Paris-Match magazine while the barber attends to his task. On the cover that greets him, a photograph of a black soldier saluting the French tricolour. It is obvious, the myth and ideology, the PR line that this photo peddles. It is clear to any lay Frenchperson. But as a sociologist, Barthes proceeds methodically to explicate this intuitive, commonsensical reading of the photograph - and many others in the book:

The sign presented to us is that of a black soldier in a French army uniform saluting the flag. The wonder is its signification: French imperialism, French greatness, the idea that the French empire treats all its subjects equally, that there are no colonies but one all-embracing La Patrie. The image that forms the sign is carefully constructed and reconstituted as a beachhead so that it is co-opted into a secondary level of signification - one where myth and ideology is found. The denotation - what we see when we see the image - is that of a black person saluting the flag, but the connotation is that of French imperialism and greatness...

Semiotics: 101 ways to say what you mean and then deny you said it

The field of advertising may be seen as Practical Semiotics, where advertisers engineer innuendo and a surfeit of meaning to supplant the literal sign which is presented to their readers. And the joke goes that all advertising is about sex or selling the idea of attractiveness...

Take Zoe Tay's "I Swallow" ad, for example. In advertising, as it is with semiotics, there is always a fail-safe, a retreat position. Barthes calls this the alibi: "I wasn't being ideological, myth might innocently claim, I was somewhere else doing something innocent."

Accused of imperialism, the Paris-Match cover insists it is merely a photograph of a young man who happens to be black saluting a flag which happens to be a French flag. Accused of raunchiness, the beauty company insists it's just Zoe Tay saying "I swallow", nothing more. The halo of light about the head of George W Bush? An artifact of lighting in a photo, nothing more! The photographs of Obama in Kennedyesque poses? Just a mere coincidence...

When caught, the mythmaker says, "Remember, I didn't say it, I didn't imply it; you inferred it." The mythmaker denies, when caught red-handed, that objects and events always signify more than themselves; that they are always caught up in systems of representation and secondary meanings. The mythmaker appeals to our 'common sense' to take them for what they are, to say they only meant what they said and nothing more, to put on the outrage of someone who finds they are never taken for their word.

These denials are plausible enough inasmuch as they are take literally. Yet if understood within a methodical analysis of the conjunction of context, meanings and representations, signs and their significations are hardly ever unintended - and the denials lose all plausibility.

Plausible deniability; or, Fun with fundies

Singa Communications Limited, on 9 September 2009, unveiled its Singanews initiative at Kum Yan Methodist Church for an ATRIA "New Media Breakfast" event.

After the report was leaked online, the accusation floating around is that this news portal is a shill for Fundamentalist Christian (COOS) interests, despite claims by its directors that it is a secular organisation, that ostensibly, this has nothing to do with any Christian agenda.

Is this denial plausible? Have an entire faction of bloggers read too much into this un-launch?

Context is everything. Context is king. Context builds secondary-level meanings and significations above what is said.

The unveiling is not an official launch. It is not a soft launch either. This is a secret, closed door un-launch, given that this New Media Breakfast has gone unreported in the usual Christian blogs or even the Christian Post Singapore.

The New Media Breakfast is organised by ATRIA, which stands for "Apologetics through Rich Applications". Its modus operandi? "Evangelical apologetics focuses on presenting biblical realities evident in life is a reasoned explanation, and involves a researched defence of biblical truth. ATRIA widgets will invite an exploration of the foundations of faith that touch on areas as diverse as archaelogy, astronomy, biblical prophecy, spiritual experience and Christian lifestyle."

But maybe this image will give a fuller picture:


As a keynote speaker at an embargoed, explicitly Fundamentalist Christian conference organised by an organisation that nurtures fundamentalist apologetics, this news portal really wants to say we're reading too deeply - it's really secular.

In her keynote address, Thio seemed to have talked mostly about her experience with the media and the need for a more sympathetic media of their own and the need for Christians to speak out. You can read this as having nothing at all to do with the next keynote speaker's unveiling of a major secular news portal... but it will depend on how stupid you are.

All directors of Singanews, a secular portal, are Christians.
Matthew Yap (enough said?)
Basskaran Nair (identifies himself as a Christian and Christian philantropist)
Lee Chong Kai (Former All Saints Home CEO. Graduate of a "Rhema Bible Training Centre")
Victor Ho Kok Yin (director of Bright Arrows, 40% owned by COOS)

Singanews, a secular portal with a 100% Christian directorship, made the decision to have its unlaunch at a Christian media conference.

Singanews, a secular portal, chose to have its unlaunch at a church, to a group of Christians. As opposed to any other religious place of worship. As opposed to any other public area. As opposed to having a public launch.

You do the math.

Minilee NDRS decoded: 2009 edition!

By now, it should be apparent that every Prime Minister has a different style of doing the NDRS and their major policy speeches: Lee Kuan Yew relished the details, seeking to win hearts and minds through logic and superior reasoning; Goh Chok Tong is fond of putting the issues on the table as questions and dilemmas - leading to observations and comments that these questions either present false dilemmas or are attempts in leading the question to very controlled and guided ends; Lee Hsien Loong is noted for painting in very broad brush strokes, leaving his ministers to fill in the details weeks and months after the NDRS.

In all instances, basic comprehension of the NDRS and subsequent analysis can only come about when one understands this rule instead of throwing a hissy fit and denouncing the speech as "strangely empty" or worse.

Here then is Minilee's NDRS decoded!

The economy

1. The economy is not expected to return to pre-crisis levels of health - Minilee did not use the word "boom" to describe the eventual recovery from this economic crisis. What the PAP promises, it delivers - and Minilee has not promised a boom, merely a recovery.

2. In fact for the short term, Minilee's economic team cannot foresee exactly what will happen beyond Q3 of this year. The situation is so murky that they'll only review just before the end of this year to figure out their plan for next year.

In other words: We have no green shoots. We are in a transitional period.

3. Singapore will be building 2 "National Continuing Education and Training Campuses" in Paya Lebar and Jurong.

In other words: The shrinking of Singapore's white collar jobs and subsequently its middle class will continue, no thanks to the economic crisis. Perhaps Minilee's team expect a permanent and protracted change in the type of jobs available in the emergent post-crisis economy. We cannot otherwise justify 2 *permanent* institutions for retraining otherwise.

In other words:

Structural employment of the former white collar class to continue.

Current crisis expected to affect Singapore as a financial hub - most white collar jobs lost here are in this sector, many other currently existing white collar jobs
are dependent on the financial sector.

Look forward to continued downsizing of the middle class, structural unemployment necessitating a trip to one of the two retraining centres, and a future of structural underemployment.

Religious and racial harmony

Yugoslavia was a model of religious and racial harmony. But when their economy went bad - as with other pieces of Eden in the world and in history - the racial and religious harmony evaporated, no thanks to the diminished authority of the state (imagine if all Singapore's government could offer you was retraining in a blue-collar job, or suggest you sue your kids for maintenance to pay your medical bills?).

With trust in the government plummeting and no solutions forthcoming, it is no wonder that Yugoslavians sought their answers in religion, or that unscrupulous and power-hungry actors sought to stoke racial and religious tensions and present themselves as leaders.

We suggest that Minilee's team, having seen the economic growth forecast for Singapore in the next 10 to 30 years, are worried that conditions are beginning to look ripe for radical leaders to radicalise susceptible segments of Singapore society. It is this economic base that will empower and embolden a culture war.

Looking to the future

Spending half an hour on a now-and-then photo slideshow?

In other words: It may be difficult to tell if Singapore has improved between the last 5 years and now, especially for the poor; but it's really easy to tell the difference between the last 50 years and now.

Of all the forecast improvements in Minilee's "future segment" of his slideshow, which ones hint at an improvement for the lot of the bottom 1/3 of Singapore's population?

RDS: The remaining issues

Religious Diversity in Singapore is a collection of research papers originally presented in a series of workshops between 2004 and 2006 by the Institute of Policy Studies.

1. When is the line crossed? Cross-reading with recent comments on religious harmony

No restraining orders have been issued under the MRHA since it came into effect.

However, the Government came close to invoking it on a number of occasions to stop religious leaders from mixing politics with religion and putting down other faiths, Mr Wong Kan Seng, the Home Affairs Minister at the time, said in 2001.

The religious leaders stopped their activities after they were summoned and warned by the police and Internal Security Department officers, he said.

Had they persisted, the law would have been used against them.

- "Religious harmony: 20 years of keeping the peace", in The Straits Times, 24 July 2009.

Some argue that because no restraining order has been issued under the MRHA, it has been only a showpiece. Others say it worked mainly as a deterrent. What is your response?

Showpiece? Well, when I spoke in Parliament during the third reading of the Bill on Nov 9, 1990, I did foresee 'the best case scenario is that no occasion arises where we need to invoke this Bill'. I also said then that we will exhaust all other remedies, like advising, counselling, etc. So the best scenario has happened: We have not had to issue a restraining order under the Act.

That does not mean that we have no problems but rather that we have been quick to defuse the problems through active management, mediation and, where necessary, admonition, sometimes working with religious leaders.

So non-invoking of the MRHA does not mean that it is a white elephant or showpiece. It is part of our suite of tools to maintain law and order and communal harmony.

- "Jaya: Don't take harmony for granted", in The Straits Times, 24 July 2009

The Minister may make a restraining order against any priest, monk, pastor, imam, elder, office-bearer or any other person who is in a position of authority in any religious group or institution or any member thereof for the purposes specified in subsection (2) where the Minister is satisfied that that person has committed or is attempting to commit any of the following acts:
...
(d) exciting disaffection against the President or the Government while, or under the guise of, propagating or practising any religious belief.

- Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, Chapter 167A, Part III (8)

Singapore has to be a "fun" city attractive to its own and open to the world, so they argue, albeit with moderation but evolution as time and tide of society norms change. In order to be globally attractive and competitive, society has to loosen up and be in tune and in line with the progressives, the so call (sic) "mature", so they say. In the midst of all these, for God's faithful people, Paul's sentinel call should be voiced and heard clearly once again: "Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God, without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life..." (Phil 2.14-16; also 2 Time 4.1-4). But don't get Paul wrong! He is challenging us to build up extra robust capacity over the childish level of debate and controversy, and it could not be more timely and urgent.

- John Chew, "Shaping of Maturity", Disocesan Digest, September 2003.

The claim here is essentially that this generation has become "crooked and perverse" because the government initiated a "childish level of debate and controversy" in favour of the "progressives" but has excluded the views of the religious communities because of formal secularism. This jeremiad - one of several that were preached from pulpits and published in the press - can have the effect of summoning a level of conservativism that goes beyond what is normally held by well-meaning and "right-thinking" individuals...

- Kenneth Paul Tan, in "Relgious reasons in a secular public sphere", RDS.

2. Recross: When is the line crossed?

Compare the following:

I. Anglican Bishop (Saint Andrew's Cathdral) John Chew's statement on the government creating a crooked and perverse generation above

II. "It's not a crusade against the people but there’s a line that God has drawn for us, and we don’t want our nation crossing that line." - Derek Hong, Anglican Pastor, COOS

III. "How then should Christians, as faithful watchmen and committed citizens living in secular democracies, respond to a political agenda driven by a godless philosophy which has harmful social and spiritual consequences?"

"She examines how the spirit of the anti-Christ, the spirit of lawlessness, manifests in the philosophy, morality and politics that shape our laws, systems and mindsets." - The blurb to Thio Li Ann's new book, Mind the Gap

What similarities do these 3 sets of speeches and speech acts have in common? What are their common rhetorical and philosophical ground, if any? Why was only one of these speakers/actors be called to apologise and retract their statement?

3. The rise of religiosity

What does the increasing rise of religiosity mean for Singapore? Various RDS authors recite 'increasing religiosity' as a fact to be dealt with. Only one RDS author has cited an actual survey that wasn't a population census that showed "rising religiosity" in Singapore - and a Straits Times survey at that.

If Singapore's leadership had decided to incorporate various religious groups in selective consultative policy-making, the question needs to be asked:

Where in the survey of rising religiosity that the political leadership and RDS authors love to quote, does it say that increasingly religious Singaporeans want their religions and religious leaders to play a role in policy-making?

Where is the survey that shows Singaporeans expect and find this desirable?

Where is the survey that shows Singaporeans, increasingly religious, want public policy to be brought in line with their religions' or religious leaders' interpretation of a good society?

Discuss.

MOE principal to present at Christian lobby seminar

I draw your attention to the forthcoming GCF-RZIM Seminar on "Called To Engage - Being Salt and Light in the Public Square", scheduled on 8 and 10 August 2009 on the National Day weekend. Note that in the list of speakers is a Mrs Belinda Charles, who may be identified as the principal of Saint Andrew's Secondary School, a government-aided institution of learning under the purview of the Ministry of Education.

The purpose of this seminar, as described in its publicity, appears to provide a theological justification for faith-based discussion in the public of controversial social and political issues; identify a list of social and political issues to be targeted by Christian activists; and to compel Christians to engage in such behaviour in the public sphere as a religious obligation. Its goal, as stated in the PR materials, is so that "those in the positions of power will hear and respond favourably", i.e. to exert influence to align public policy with what this group considers as Christianity-approved ideals. In other words, this is a seminar conducted by the Christian lobby to provide the justification for its existence, its lobbying tactics, and its lobbying targets.

I note the recent statements on the need for religious harmony by SM Goh Chok Tong, SM Jayakumar, and Mr Wong Kan Seng. In particular, SM Goh's statement that religious sentiments should be kept private and the secular nature of our state and policy-making be respected. In light of this, I would like to seek the Ministry's clarification on the role of Mrs Belinda Charles in this controversial seminar, whose topic and timing is a direct challenge to our leaders' stance on religious harmony and the secular state.

I wonder whether the Ministry is aware of this seminar.

I wonder whether the Ministry approved Mrs Belinda Charles's participation and presentation at this religious seminar. I wonder whether the Ministry vetted the contents of Mrs Belinda Charles's presentation.

Does the stand of Mrs Belinda Charles at this conference represent the Ministry's official stand on religion and public policy?

I look forward to the Ministry's clarification on this matter. Concerned members of the public - and inquiring minds - want to know!

Inquiring minds: Ovidia Yu: "The list of speakers includes the principal of St Andrews Secondary School, a premier government-aided institution. Is this with MOE approval?"

Addendum: (7 Aug) As Ovidia Yu notes, Ravi Zacharias and his RZIM organisation is dedicated to training people around the world to "present Christianity as the only reasonable option by which people should live". I am shocked and surprised that such a religious activist was even allowed into Singapore by our Immigration Department for the purpose of preaching and teaching other people his exclusionary, exclusivist vision of religion - which clearly is inimical to Singapore's pluralistic, multireligious and secular society. I am shocked and surprised that such an organisation - dedicated to promoting an exclusionary, exclusivist view of religion - would be co-hosting any seminar in Singapore - and that the permit for this seminar was approved by the relevant authorities. I wonder whether the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Immigration Department would comment on why Ravi Zacharias was allowed here in Singapore, for this expressed purpose during our National Day weekend, and why this event was allowed to proceed. (9 Aug) We note that VCF-NUS has pulled out its notice of the GCF-RZIM seminar. The link now shows up blank. Also, the event has also been scrubbed from its events archive. If you wish to read the original text of the seminar notice, refer to Ovidia Yu's post, or look here or see here

Negotiating Christianity with other religions (RDS)

Religious Diversity in Singapore is a collection of research papers originally presented in a series of workshops between 2004 and 2006 by the Institute of Policy Studies.

Negotiating Christianity with other religions: The view of Christian clergymen in Singapore, by Mathew Mathews

Mathews's paper presents the results of a survey and a series of in-depth interviews conducted by the author. The year the survey and interviews were conducted are not stated in the paper, although Mathews mentions the surveys were sent out during the period of Father Joachim Kang's trial.

We will not present interesting quotes from Mathews's paper. While Mathews's paper was entertaining, we do not place much emphasis or authority on this than we would do for the other 2 papers from RDS featured here earlier, due to a list of very major flaws.

Representativeness of data

The survey was sent to a random list of Protestant clergymen on the NCCS church directory and the Roman Catholic parish priest listing on the Catholic Church website for Singapore.

1. Issue of denominations

While Mathews mentions some beliefs and statements made in the interviews as being related to Charismatic and evangelical branches, his sampling does not provide for representing various denominations - whereas he ought to know that beliefs and statements be allied across certain denominations. The data presented in the paper's tables only correlate attitudes of clegymen to either their Protestant or Roman Catholic allegiance.

While Mathews mentions that denomination was a variable in his study, it appears he presents no findings that would make denomination an issue. This is surprising given the fact that various quotes, reported attitudes in his paper are prevalent and strong in certain denominations of Protestantism while holding no cachet in other denominations. A representative sample would need to be constructed by taking into account the actual percentage of denominational strength...

There is nothing in the appendix on the raw data collected that would allow us to reconstruct other tables based on denominations, or to see if his sample had overrepresented certain far-right denominations in Singapore, such as the Anglicans and the Methodists.

2. Construction of interview population: major caveats

A total of 57 in-depth interviews were conducted. It is unclear to us what Mathews was striving for here: clergy from mainline Protestant denominations and Roman Catholic priests were "at times... furnished by their respective denominations, though some denominations allowed the random selection of clergymen." On the other hand, "a snowballing technique was used to speak to a variety of... independent church ministers".

There is just a few ways you can conduct interviews and then claim that these represent the average view of the population at large. You can conduct a random sample. You could select a randomised sample - oversampling for variables like denomination and so on. You cannot construct a sample out of three or more different ways and then still claim the sample to be representative.

You could even attempt, like Mathews did, to "obtain clergymen who represented different age cohorts and had differing theological positions", but this method like snowballing, does not lead to a representative sample, it only gives you a sample from which to construct various communities of similar viewpoints and beliefs.

This point is important, especially when Mathews seems to have a penchant for slipping up and talking about "the majority of responses" from his in-depth interviews.

This point is most important, especially when Mathews makes claims about the overwhelming theological conservativism of Protestant clergy. We need only remember that snowball sampling means this: you introduce yourself to 1 or 2 key interview subjects who introduce a few more to you after their interviews, who in turn introduce yet a few more to you. It is quite odd to see Mathews talk about representativeness in the same breath as snowballing.

This point is most ultimately important, especially for those who attempt to correlate the tables provided by Mathews, to study how the 'moderate'-looking bell curves in the tables can translate to the deluge of overwhelmingly far-right, ultra-conservative quotes from his army of unnamed pastors whom he claims to represent viewpoints of the rest of the interview correspondents.

In this case, we cannot even say that the survey responses will be representative of the population, while his reported interview responses definitely cannot not be regarded as representative of the population of Protestant and RC clergy at large.

3. What were the interviews about?

In the appendix to his paper, Mathews provides the questionnaire and the scoring and computation method for his survey portion of the study. There is no mention of what questions or what general interview topic strategy was used for the in-depth interview portion of his survey.

4. Sloppy labelling

Mathhews calls "theological orthodoxy" in his footnotes as "agreement to the inerrancy of the Bible, the authority of the Bible in all aspects of life, the veracity of the miracles in the Bible and the belief that the Pentateuch was written by Moses and not by a later author". Yet in his appendix, these same items are called "Conservative theological beliefs (also known as a fundamentalist Christian position)". We are not sure how fundamentalism has now become an orthodox theological stand, but for this not to have gone unchallenged and corrected by Mathews's correspondents, does show the type of biased sample population he ended up constructing.

Questions:

Where are clergy trained in Singapore that makes them, as Mathews claims (but I do not believe), creates an overwhelmingly conservative environment for Protestantism? From a production of culture point of view, environments do not spontaneously come into being: they are nurtured by institutions - say theological colleges; groups of censors - say the opinion leaders and drivers of various denominations; gatekeepers - qualified clergymen still need to be appointed to parishes by higher boards in mainline denominations...

Which denominations did the more conservative, exclusivist, far right clergy come from?

Out of his sample size of 57 in-depth interviewees - ignoring the quotes that were obviously cherrypicked for the paper - objectively and statistically speaking what were the proportion of positive statements against negative statements on inter-religious efforts?