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23-08-2014, 10:20 AM
An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:
Riot did not change S’pore’s view of Indian nationals: PM
SINGAPORE — Last December’s Little India riot has not changed how Indian nationals are looked upon by the Singapore Government and Singaporeans in general, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said yesterday.
“It hasn’t changed our view at all. There was an incident, there was a riot. It is unfortunate, we have investigated it. I think the causes have been established, the follow-up actions have to be taken … There are also legal consequences — the justice system has to follow up, rioters have to be brought to justice and punished. But I don’t think it has changed the situation,” he said.
“The workers are here for a purpose, we need them — they’re building houses for us, they are building trains for us, they are working all over, in banks, in so many companies. I think that we have to manage the non-indigenous population in a way that we can wear over the long term and, the Little India riot notwithstanding, we have to continue to do that,” he added.
“From what we can tell, the foreign workers who are here continue to be quite comfortable living and working here, and certainly, many more are wanting to come. That’s why we have to manage the numbers,” he said.
On the impact of technology, Mr Lee said new media has changed the way politics is conducted.
“For a start, I now have a Facebook account. Ten years ago, Facebook did not even exist. I would say that in a fundamental way, politics has not changed: It’s about power and it’s about how you do things for the people. It is always about power and it should always be how you do things for the people, but how that’s conducted has changed,” he said.
“Knowledge is not free, yes, it’s more readily available, but so is disinformation and so is misinformation, so is misunderstanding. And if you look at what has happened worldwide, the Internet has not caused a great convergence on universal truth. Far from it — it has led to divisions and all kinds of different ideas being able to take root and germinate, which is completely contradictory to one another, and groups which are completely anti-pathetic to each other.
“And we have to make sure that with the Internet, with social media, we don’t get seduced by, really, the delusion that we know everything, that what we know is the truth and we are the sole possessors and, therefore, we will fight it out to the end, because that way, you will fracture the society and be less able to form a consensus and move forward together.
“In Singapore, sometimes, you have a case where somebody says something outrageous. Tomorrow, everybody knows about it, and everybody expresses great outrage and we spend a long time calming ourselves down. Yes, it was an outrageous statement, but do we need to get worked up every time it happens?” he asked.
“It makes your margin of stability much narrower and you have to be able to navigate that and have bumps and spills along the way. It’s inevitable,” he added. Lee Yen Nee
http://www.todayonline.com/business/...n-nationals-pm (http://www.todayonline.com/business/riot-did-not-change-spores-view-indian-nationals-pm)
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://www.sammyboy.com/showthread.php?188511-Pinky-say-shitskins-so-farktard-the-riot-changed-nothing&goto=newpost).
Riot did not change S’pore’s view of Indian nationals: PM
SINGAPORE — Last December’s Little India riot has not changed how Indian nationals are looked upon by the Singapore Government and Singaporeans in general, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said yesterday.
“It hasn’t changed our view at all. There was an incident, there was a riot. It is unfortunate, we have investigated it. I think the causes have been established, the follow-up actions have to be taken … There are also legal consequences — the justice system has to follow up, rioters have to be brought to justice and punished. But I don’t think it has changed the situation,” he said.
“The workers are here for a purpose, we need them — they’re building houses for us, they are building trains for us, they are working all over, in banks, in so many companies. I think that we have to manage the non-indigenous population in a way that we can wear over the long term and, the Little India riot notwithstanding, we have to continue to do that,” he added.
“From what we can tell, the foreign workers who are here continue to be quite comfortable living and working here, and certainly, many more are wanting to come. That’s why we have to manage the numbers,” he said.
On the impact of technology, Mr Lee said new media has changed the way politics is conducted.
“For a start, I now have a Facebook account. Ten years ago, Facebook did not even exist. I would say that in a fundamental way, politics has not changed: It’s about power and it’s about how you do things for the people. It is always about power and it should always be how you do things for the people, but how that’s conducted has changed,” he said.
“Knowledge is not free, yes, it’s more readily available, but so is disinformation and so is misinformation, so is misunderstanding. And if you look at what has happened worldwide, the Internet has not caused a great convergence on universal truth. Far from it — it has led to divisions and all kinds of different ideas being able to take root and germinate, which is completely contradictory to one another, and groups which are completely anti-pathetic to each other.
“And we have to make sure that with the Internet, with social media, we don’t get seduced by, really, the delusion that we know everything, that what we know is the truth and we are the sole possessors and, therefore, we will fight it out to the end, because that way, you will fracture the society and be less able to form a consensus and move forward together.
“In Singapore, sometimes, you have a case where somebody says something outrageous. Tomorrow, everybody knows about it, and everybody expresses great outrage and we spend a long time calming ourselves down. Yes, it was an outrageous statement, but do we need to get worked up every time it happens?” he asked.
“It makes your margin of stability much narrower and you have to be able to navigate that and have bumps and spills along the way. It’s inevitable,” he added. Lee Yen Nee
http://www.todayonline.com/business/...n-nationals-pm (http://www.todayonline.com/business/riot-did-not-change-spores-view-indian-nationals-pm)
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://www.sammyboy.com/showthread.php?188511-Pinky-say-shitskins-so-farktard-the-riot-changed-nothing&goto=newpost).