Cancer
i see the ah bengs on the bus sometimes. i see the way the behave, their profound insecurities hidden behind the facade of false bravado, their general aimlessness, their cowardice that drives them to band together like packs of hyenas.
i wonder whether i will be able, when i start teaching, to educate people like them. currently, i don't think i can. i don't think i have the patience, the tenacity, the courage and the strength to handle students like them. what then? will i give up on them?
but if i do, and if everyone else does, then what?
these students will grow up to become a cancer of society, leaching life away, slowly but surely starving the vital organs of state, impeding the proper functioning of our nation.
so on at least 3 levels, we have to help these students break the viscious cycle of poverty.
a society where the poor gets poorer and rich gets richer breeds deep discontent. as early as Lao Tzu, we know that when there is great disparity in terms of social status and wealth within a nation, it is going to breed envy, jealousy, resentment. crime, dissent, discontent will fester.
a society where the proportion of chronic poor increases spends much on welfare, crime fighting and any other blackholes. the segment of population that is productive decreases and the proportion of population that is chronically poor is not only not productive, but becomes a burden.
everyone deserves to live life with dignity, to be able to pursue happiness, to be able to choose the sort of life that he wants. in order to do this, he must be adequately equipped with the financial wealth as to afford him those choices. so from the humanistic point of view students need to be educated too.
so, from the humanistic, economic and social point of view, we see that it is imperative to educate those ah beng ah lian students, even though these are the students who are the most difficult to educate, even though these are the students who most do not want to be educated.
does our nation have enough teachers with the tenacity and ability to educate these students? is the education system conducive for the education of these students?
questions to ponder about.
posted by rench00 at 10:43 PM
4 Comments:
Oh nice. Calling people cancer. Wonder what they did. There's no such thing as welfare for them to bludge on, champion.
12:59 AM
get your facts straight. there at least 17 different financial assistance schemes under the ComCare Fund. though they might not be called welfare, though we try not to think of them as welfare schemes, these schemes ARE welfare schemes. what else can you call giving people money that they do not have to work for? and then there are all the schemes under the CCC. all welfare just not termed as such.
where does all the money come from? the taxes that i pay, so effectively leaching off the resources available to the nation. that's what they do. and some of them go on to commit crime, disrupting the proper functioning of society. which is what essentially cancer does: cells/elements of the body that undergoes some aberrant mutation and hence gain unlimited proliferative capacity and thus deprives the other cells the nutrients needed for growth, disrupting the proper functioning of that organism, eventually killing it.
but it is our fault that they become cancerous. some aberrant mutation of the genes of society causes them to become cancerous.
4:43 PM
I hope you would go read more and reflect more before you actually start teaching.
If you are that concern about people 'leeching' off national resources, maybe teaching isn't for you. Try applying to be a PAP cadre.
And oh, I wouldn't be so conceited to go around diagnosing human beings as a diesease of the society.
About the welfare part, Singapore government have never acknowledge publicly the existence of a normal welfare system, they prefer to term it 'assistance' or some other forms.
You are not the only one paying taxes, but it also goes into paying for public goods like NS pay, and minister pay. Who knows, the tax collected from the COEs may actually be funding those assistance scheme.
COMCARE is a government run scheme, interesting. You have a problem with needy old people, try hollering it into their face, you have a problem with kids who can't afford to go to school? Try chiding them gently to find some part time work delivering newspapers. You have a problem with peole who struggle to catch up in the 'world class' education system in Singapore and thereby may have to drop out, and can't find work in the restructuring economy? Try telling them to brush up on their card dealing skills, maybe they can get a shot at the casinos,, and maybe tell them to lose their dyed hair in the meanwhile.
Do you know that the symptom of flu such as fever are actually caused by the actions of the white blood cells against the viruses and bacterias? Ah, now you have given me a great insight as to how Singapore is being run now, thanks.
8:03 PM
on the contrary, the government does classify the whole class of Comcare and some other schemes as social welfare programmes. but of course, you would know that if you had done your research.
and yes. i'd rather pay NSF's, ministers, than support people who cannot do so themselves. ROI for the former higher than the latter.
the PAP is powerless to change the minds of people. teachers, on the other hand, can.
the PAP is powerless to prepare the students to lead a productive life (and hence not leech off society). teachers, on the other hand, can (and indeed must). and not just in terms of qualifications but the more important aspects of character and emotional development.
whatever insights you have gained are gained through your own interpretations of what i have said, which are not necessarily be what i actually meant.
i don't think you know enough about pedagogy to tell me what i should be doing or not doing before i teach. nor do you know enough about the issues within education, nor have thought much about it yourself. so before you make such a statement, do THINK and REFLECT about it more yourself.
finally, so back to your first point of what they did to deserve being called cancer, instead of being productive, these people leech of resources, threatening society. just as cancer does to a human body. the analogy is clear as day. it does not have to be degrading or denigrating in anyway until you think of it as such. it is just the frank and honest truth. people who cannot support themselves and require welfare and assistance from the government are leeches, are cancers. couching it in any other way is but dressing the brutal truth in useless false morality that prevents the solution of the problem which is to prevent more from becoming such cancers and to remove the cancerous growth by enabling these people to become self-reliant.
3:16 AM
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