Wednesday, December 24, 2003
so re-minisce is working on christmas eve. and christmas day.
festive cheer comes in many different flavours.
anyhow, a very merry christmas to one and all.
i've been having a running battle with someone on xiaxue's blog.
xiaxue did her usual predictable, boring, egocentric-mememe thing about why she doesn't have to give up her seat to ANYONE on trains.
(quote : Oh yeah, you have a stupid baby with you. Well, guess what? No one on the MRT asked you to give birth to it. If you think it will be a burden to you while you take the MRT, don't give birth. And if it was an accident, you can jolly well leave the baby at home.)
Naturally a large proportion of her readers loved it (which speaks volumes about the readers she is attracting methinks).
She then concludes with this little gem :
"So am I still a bimbo? Or do I just have big boobs? (what boobs? lol)"
Well, since you asked, I think it is hard to grow out of being a bimbo, and from the available evidence, you certainly don't have big boobs.
There, I'm glad I got that off my chest.
the comments she earned from her sycophantic readers (what IS it about sycophants and Singapore? Aside from both being asse... I mean both starting with esses) were even more underwhelming, eg :
"my god i hate such women. fucked up to the max!!! i hate giving up my seat, i hate kids whu run abt in the train when u're trying to sleep, i hate mothers whu dun give a flying fuck when their kids are makin a hell lotta noise. do us a favor, use ur brazen-ness to shut their traps up.
passerby"
anyhow, my comment, which ran as follows :
"i guess the one thing you've showed us all, xiaxue, is that we're a long, long way from becoming a gracious society. most of your readers can't see further than the boundaries of themselves. they perceive the world from their unique standpoints, and no further. they none of them owe anybody a seat, and everyone else should stand because they are too tired, too weary, too indifferent.
and to compound matters, the potential objects of their affection, pregnant women, or tired mothers are too often just as selfish and self-centred, both of which are at odds with graciousness. its difficult to put on someone else's shoes and walk around in them (Atticus Finch, to kill a mockingbird). its harder still when you've grown up being taught that that's a bad, undesirable thing.
re-minisce."
earned this response :
"DUn you hate it when some ppl act hero and start saying things like our society needs to be more gracious, to those ppl I got only one thing to say, screw you. That being said, wondering why I said that? Well simple, who the heck are you (or anyone for that matter) to tel;l off the whole society that they shld be gracious.
My mama always tells me, look at yourself before condemming others, maybe that is why I condem others so easily :P
NaiveGuy"
to which I replied :
"yeah naive. nice one, good on you.
and no, I'm not saying society needs to be more gracious. I'm saying we're not a gracious society. I'm not so much condemning people as speaking in quiet resignation.
xiaxue, you already know the ansewr to your unphrased challenge.
giving up a seat isn't about risk/benefit analyses. there is no swollen ankle vs swollen tummy debate.
it's about coming from the heart. giving up a seat because society demands it is not graciousness, it's herd mentality. if you understand not the motivations for your actions, then your actions are cheapened and meaningless. I would rather singaporeans continue to hog their seats than give it up because the government imposes fines on people who don't, or something.
Few of you will understand what I am trying to say, and many will just become defensive because you will persist in misconstruing what I write. Many of you will tar me as a goody-two-shoes sanctimoniously dispensing feel-good advice about how we should polish our little haloes every day. have it your way. It doesn't mean a great deal to me.
But give it a moment's thought. what would it be like to be in that other person's shoes?
the woman who slagged xiaxue off didn't do it - how would she have felt if the roles had been reversed and xiaxue had snidely pointed out how young people nowadays... etc.
But how would you feel, with your perpetual backache from carrying that extra load around, standing in amongst a trainload of people oblivious to your presence, and indifferent to your discomfort, blithely avoiding your gaze for fear of being compelled to give their seats up to someone other than themselves, and hence by definition less worthy.
and how would you feel being told that it's your fault, you shouldn't have got pregnant in the first place?
answer is most of you won't give it a moment's thought. you'll just read those questions as accusations, and say screw you, preacher boy.
which is fine by me. if you can't understand the message, then it isn't for you."
Can you see it coming?
"BTW, you think your comments in this lil corner of cyberspace will mean jack shit to the rest of singapore? I doubt so, so now the question would be, a) wad are you trying to say, b) wad are you trying to prove?
I dun give squat if I was on a train with no seat. Singapore is not that big that standing means hell, even if your less abled body, also no one knows if your ledd abled body like its tatooed on your forehead, no anyone gives a damn. Thats Sillypore for you, so give it a rest.
NaiveGuy"
Somedays, I contemplate my red passport, and have to wonder : Quitter, or Stayer?
festive cheer comes in many different flavours.
anyhow, a very merry christmas to one and all.
i've been having a running battle with someone on xiaxue's blog.
xiaxue did her usual predictable, boring, egocentric-mememe thing about why she doesn't have to give up her seat to ANYONE on trains.
(quote : Oh yeah, you have a stupid baby with you. Well, guess what? No one on the MRT asked you to give birth to it. If you think it will be a burden to you while you take the MRT, don't give birth. And if it was an accident, you can jolly well leave the baby at home.)
Naturally a large proportion of her readers loved it (which speaks volumes about the readers she is attracting methinks).
She then concludes with this little gem :
"So am I still a bimbo? Or do I just have big boobs? (what boobs? lol)"
Well, since you asked, I think it is hard to grow out of being a bimbo, and from the available evidence, you certainly don't have big boobs.
There, I'm glad I got that off my chest.
the comments she earned from her sycophantic readers (what IS it about sycophants and Singapore? Aside from both being asse... I mean both starting with esses) were even more underwhelming, eg :
"my god i hate such women. fucked up to the max!!! i hate giving up my seat, i hate kids whu run abt in the train when u're trying to sleep, i hate mothers whu dun give a flying fuck when their kids are makin a hell lotta noise. do us a favor, use ur brazen-ness to shut their traps up.
passerby"
anyhow, my comment, which ran as follows :
"i guess the one thing you've showed us all, xiaxue, is that we're a long, long way from becoming a gracious society. most of your readers can't see further than the boundaries of themselves. they perceive the world from their unique standpoints, and no further. they none of them owe anybody a seat, and everyone else should stand because they are too tired, too weary, too indifferent.
and to compound matters, the potential objects of their affection, pregnant women, or tired mothers are too often just as selfish and self-centred, both of which are at odds with graciousness. its difficult to put on someone else's shoes and walk around in them (Atticus Finch, to kill a mockingbird). its harder still when you've grown up being taught that that's a bad, undesirable thing.
re-minisce."
earned this response :
"DUn you hate it when some ppl act hero and start saying things like our society needs to be more gracious, to those ppl I got only one thing to say, screw you. That being said, wondering why I said that? Well simple, who the heck are you (or anyone for that matter) to tel;l off the whole society that they shld be gracious.
My mama always tells me, look at yourself before condemming others, maybe that is why I condem others so easily :P
NaiveGuy"
to which I replied :
"yeah naive. nice one, good on you.
and no, I'm not saying society needs to be more gracious. I'm saying we're not a gracious society. I'm not so much condemning people as speaking in quiet resignation.
xiaxue, you already know the ansewr to your unphrased challenge.
giving up a seat isn't about risk/benefit analyses. there is no swollen ankle vs swollen tummy debate.
it's about coming from the heart. giving up a seat because society demands it is not graciousness, it's herd mentality. if you understand not the motivations for your actions, then your actions are cheapened and meaningless. I would rather singaporeans continue to hog their seats than give it up because the government imposes fines on people who don't, or something.
Few of you will understand what I am trying to say, and many will just become defensive because you will persist in misconstruing what I write. Many of you will tar me as a goody-two-shoes sanctimoniously dispensing feel-good advice about how we should polish our little haloes every day. have it your way. It doesn't mean a great deal to me.
But give it a moment's thought. what would it be like to be in that other person's shoes?
the woman who slagged xiaxue off didn't do it - how would she have felt if the roles had been reversed and xiaxue had snidely pointed out how young people nowadays... etc.
But how would you feel, with your perpetual backache from carrying that extra load around, standing in amongst a trainload of people oblivious to your presence, and indifferent to your discomfort, blithely avoiding your gaze for fear of being compelled to give their seats up to someone other than themselves, and hence by definition less worthy.
and how would you feel being told that it's your fault, you shouldn't have got pregnant in the first place?
answer is most of you won't give it a moment's thought. you'll just read those questions as accusations, and say screw you, preacher boy.
which is fine by me. if you can't understand the message, then it isn't for you."
Can you see it coming?
"BTW, you think your comments in this lil corner of cyberspace will mean jack shit to the rest of singapore? I doubt so, so now the question would be, a) wad are you trying to say, b) wad are you trying to prove?
I dun give squat if I was on a train with no seat. Singapore is not that big that standing means hell, even if your less abled body, also no one knows if your ledd abled body like its tatooed on your forehead, no anyone gives a damn. Thats Sillypore for you, so give it a rest.
NaiveGuy"
Somedays, I contemplate my red passport, and have to wonder : Quitter, or Stayer?
