Death Penalty In Singapore

There seems to be campaigns inside and outside Singapore aiming to get us to remove the death penalty from our system. Reasons were given on why Singapore should drop this “barbaric” way of punishment and join the rest of the “civilized” countries that had removed death penalty. In this article, I will analyze those reasons based on sound engineering principles.

Many countries had removed death penalty.
An engineer will consider the above sentence to be incomplete. Since many countries had removed death penalty from their justice system, how have they benefited from such move? Do they enjoy lower crime rate? Do they have a higher standard of living? Do they enjoy higher economic growth? The bottom line is how will the removal of death penalty benefit us as the people who do not murder or carry drugs?

None of the advocates of anti-death penalty is able to provide us with any answer other than some empty slogans. The situations in those countries without death penalty show us that there is no benefit for the people in removing death penalty. The only difference I can think of is the increase in the cost of imprisonment. Think. When you lock up those murderers and drug traffickers in jail, you have to pay for their lodging, food and medical care. Who will pay for these? Tax-payers.

In this regard, I am glad the Singapore Government has enough common sense in not apeing others without thinking on the implication.

Statistic shows that death penalty does not deter crime.
The idea behind this statement is criminals like murderers and drug traffickers commit their crimes without thinking of the consequences. So whether the death penalty exists, they will still commit their crimes. The engineer’s respond is, so what? At least we can be sure that with death penalty, those convicted criminals will not be able to repeat their crimes.

Another important question is, will the removal of death penalty deter crimes? Will the drug traffickers stop bringing drugs to Singapore if we remove our death penalty? Common sense tells us that being nice to the criminals will not cause them to commit lesser crimes.

Therefore, the only valid reason for removing the death penalty is the guarantee that it will reduce crimes and make our streets safer. Until that can happen, the engineering way is to keep the death penalty.

Life sentence is just as effective as death penalty and more humane.
Some people say that keeping the drug traffickers in prison for life will also prevent them from repeating their crimes. Sounds good but the problem is, prisons are very expensive. When you keep people in prisons, you have to pay for their lodging, food and medical care. Not only that, you need to employ an army of prison guards to take care of the inmates. These things cost a lot of money. Who should pay for them?

Will those human rights organizations raise funds to help us to finance our prisons so that our tax money can be channel for better use? The answer is clear. Those people are only good in empty talk. They can talk a lot on morality, but when it comes to real issue like paying for the cost of their plans, they become very quiet as though we are obliged to pay for them.

As a tax-payer myself, let me share my personal views. I pay taxes because I have no choice. The law says I must pay my tax or face the penalty. I also cannot dictate the government on how to spend my tax money. However, I can understand that the lesser prisons we have, more of the government’s money can be channeled into healthcare, education, economic stimulus programs and other things that benefit the people.

The removal of death penalty means more of the tax-payers’ money will have to be channeled into providing free lodging, food and medical care for the drug traffickers and murderers. Why should I (and other law-abiding citizens) be forced to bear the cost of sustaining these criminals? I have no desire to pay for those scums. Being forced to pay for the welfare of criminals is not humane to me. This is the real injustice.

There is no U-turn in death penalty.
The basic idea is if the person is wrongly convicted and found to be innocent, it might be too late. After the person is hanged, you cannot unhang him and bring him back to life. This is a real problem.

From the engineering perspective, the issue is in the system of conviction and not the death penalty. There should be sufficient fail-safe mechanism in the justice system to ensure that only the truly guilty person be hanged. Of course, some people may say that since nothing is perfect, there can still be innocent people being hanged.

In response to such view, my answer is welcome to the real world. In the real world innocent people die every day. Let me give you an example. Many innocent people have died in road accidents. We can always improve on the road safety but there will still be innocent people dying in road accidents. Should we close down all our roads to stop innocent people from dying?

The answer is clear. We know that no matter how much we improve on our road safety, there is bound to be innocent people dying there. Yet, we still want to keep our roads because they bring us greater benefits. We are willing to accept the fact that some innocent people may die. This is the price we are willing to pay.

The same applies for the death penalty. There may or may not be innocent people being wrongly convicted but the benefits from it is far greater. If you have never been to Singapore, I invite you to pay us a visit to look at our streets by yourself. Compared to may countries, our streets are safe and drug free. Will we continue to be the same if we remove the death penalty? I am not willing to take the chance.

Death penalty is too harsh for mere drug trafficking.
Let me be personal here. I have a four-year old son. My desire is for him is to grow up in a healthy, safe and drug-free environment. If I ever catch any drug dealer trying to get my son hook to drugs, I am willing to volunteer to push the lever for the scum to be hanged. If there are 100 drug dealers, I am willing to do it 100 times. (Of course this is subjected to the authority’s approval.)

I am sure all responsible parents will share my sentiment. Nothing is too harsh when it comes to protecting your own family from being destroyed by drugs.

There are reports out there that says Singapore has the highest per capita hanging in the world. In my view that statement is irrelevant. If one person brings in drugs, we hang one. If 10 come in with drugs, we hang 10. If a million come in with drugs, we hang a million. We have the right to defend our families from being harmed by drugs.

This is war. We have made it clear that we do not tolerate drugs in our country. Anyone who still brings in drugs to harm us is effective in declaring war on us. We have the right to respond in kind. There is no nice way of killing people. Hanging is the most cost effective and humane way available. This is our weapon against the drug traffickers.

Forgiveness.
Some people say that we should learn to forgive those criminals and not to resort to eye for an eye type revenge. I agree. I forgive all the drug traffickers who are convicted in Singapore. However, that does not mean we must forfeit our rights to defend ourselves. We have promised to hang those who bring in drugs above a certain limit. If they fulfill their roles in bringing drugs to qualify for the death penalty, it is the authority’s responsibility to give the drug traffickers the reward they deserve – ropes around their necks.

Hanging drug traffickers is not eye for an eye type revenge. If we want to have an eye for an eye type revenge, we should tie up the drug trafficker and stuff him with all the drugs he carry. We do not do that. Instead we show the convicted drug traffickers mercy by giving them a quick death.

My stand is, I forgive all the drug traffickers who bring in drugs to harm my family. At the same time, I hope all the convicted drug traffickers will also forgive the people of Singapore of doing what we can to defend ourselves from their drugs.

Conclusion.
The above is not exactly exhaustive but I hope I have made my position clear. No matter what people may say about our death penalty, we Singaporeans consider it as the weapon of self-defense. Unless we can find better weapons, this weapon is here to stay. For those who still dare to defy us, we challenge you to come to Singapore with your drugs. We are ready with our ropes.

Engineering Solution To The Sub Prime Crisis

In this article, I shall present the engineering solution to the sub-prime crisis in America, which is having a negative effect throughout the world. I shall begin by describing the origin of the problem. Then I shall proceed with the analysis of its nature. Based on its nature, I will present the solution with all the necessary explanations on variations of scenarios. Let us begin.

Origin of the problem.
The problem begins when banks and other lending institutions in USA lent money to people who would not have qualified for loans to buy properties, thus the term “sub-prime”. They did that in order to charge higher interest. Higher interest means higher profit, which will inevitable lead to higher income to the CEO. As for the sub-prime borrowers, they got to own their houses for the first time. So, everybody was happy.

How about the risks? It must not have been obvious in the beginning. The loans are backed by properties. If the borrowers fail to pay the installments, the banks can seize their properties and recoup their money. Property prices were quite stable at that time. Not only that, the sub-prime loans had increased demands for properties. As a result, property prices had increased. So, the risk of borrowers failing to pay their installments plus property prices dropping appeared to be a remote possibility.

How did this affect the whole world? When the banks run out of cash to lend, they securitized their sub-prime loans to sell them to investors worldwide for a few percentage of the loan amount in commission. In return, they got new injections of cash, which enabled them to lend more.

The problem came when the seemingly impossible scenario happened. Borrowers cannot pay their installments and property prices fall. This has become a global problem as many institutional and retail investors have invested into these sub-prime loans. The rest is history. Companies had gone bankrupt and many Americans are facing the prospect of being evicted from their homes. Welcome to the biggest recession in history.

Nature of the problem.
Despite the huge impact on the whole world and millions of lives affected by it, I am going give you an analysis that may seem out of place. In my opinion, the problem is entirely virtual and not physical.

Let me explain further. If a house is burnt to ashes, there are physical losses. The furniture, food and clothes in the house had been reduced to ashes. Their value is gone forever. This is a real physical loss. However, in the sub-prime crisis there is no real physical loss. Many houses are worth lesser than what they used to but the physical houses are still there. Not a single brick is lost. This is what I mean by saying that the sub-prime crisis is entirely virtual and not physical.

My solution is derived by this fact.

Solution to sub-prime crisis.
Based on the true nature of this crisis, I shall now present my engineering solution as follow:

Allow the banks to repossess the houses. Do not prevent nor delay them. Let nature runs its course.

In case somebody accuses me of being insensitive, not compassionate and not knowing what I am saying, let me explain the rationale. What will happen when the bank repossess your house and evict you? It has to sell it for whatever price it can get to get back their money. Will the banks be successful in getting back their money?

Consider this. The United States of America is facing an oversupply of houses right now. If there is a massive repossessing of houses and auctions of these houses, there will be a huge increase in the supply of houses. The result will be a drastic drop in property prices. Those who had been evicted from their houses can buy back their houses at a fraction of the present price. The problem would have been solved.

Of course, I do not pretend to know about the law. Does the law allow those who are evicted to buy back their own houses? Can the banks repeat the repossessions if the evictees buy back their houses?

In this case, let us assume the worst case scenario. Let us assume that those who are evicted cannot buy any houses. In this scenario, two seemingly contradictory events have happened in the same space and time. On one side we have a lot of empty houses and on the other we have a lot of people with no houses.

What will happen then? Foreigners like myself will come to the rescue. I will buy those houses at dirt cheap prices and rent them back to the Americans at dirt cheap rents. If I buy a house at US$100, I do not mind renting it at US$1 per month. My condition will be the tenants are to take full responsibility in all the maintenance. In one year I will have US$12. This is equivalent of an annual yield of 12%. So even if the property prices never rise, I am still making good profits. I am sure a lot of foreigners will share my sentiments.

As a result, those who had been evicted from their houses can continue to live in their original houses with low rents. They may have lost ownership of their houses but at least they do not have to sleep at the streets. The problem is solved.

How about the investors and lenders?
My response is, be a sport. You took the risk for the sake of higher returns. The risks turn against you. You lost the bet. When you invest in bonds or any loan instrument, you are basically placing a bet that the underlying borrowers can afford to pay you back the principle amount plus interest. If they fail, you lost your bet.

Let this be a lesson learned in investing and trusting in the so-called financial expert. Pick yourself up and move on.

Conclusion.
In conclusion, the solution is very simple. This is what engineering is all about, simplicity. However the bottom line is, it works.

Christian Militants Strike Again

I used to think that the AWARE Saga ended well. It was a classic good verses evil and the good has won. However, it seems that this movie has a sequel. The militants are striking back. Right now, there are several self-proclaimed “conservative majority” folks started the following:

1. Create an online petition with fictitious signatures to demand the AWARE president to apologize for the CSE contents that are supposed to promote homosexuality. (This amounts to admitting that AWARE has been promoting homosexual lifestyles as accused by the crusaders)
2. Post slanders on a Nominated Member of Parliament for his role in helping the old guards against the crusaders.

I consider myself as a part of the conservative majority and I have never endorsed the above evil acts. Nor, can I imagine any Buddhists, Hindus, Taoists, Muslims or even atheists sinking to the level of doing the above evil acts. I don’t think I need to convince anyone in Singapore that those self-proclaimed “conservative majority” are purely Christians.

This is sad thing for me to say this because I am a Christian myself. Now I understand how a Muslim feels each time there is a news report of terrorism committed by some other Muslims out there. We Christians are a minority group in Singapore and those militants are the minority among Christians. In other words, those self-proclaimed “conservative majority” are a minority of a minority.

Let me give you a clearer illustration. The Christian population accounts for about 15% of Singapore. Assuming that those militants make up about 10% of the total Christians in Singapore, they only make up about 1.5% of the total population. How can 1.5% of the total population call themselves the majority? How can they get so many signatures in their online petition? It is very obvious that they have lied and cheated. Their motive is to create the false impression that they represent the majority of us but I don’t think most of us can be so easily fooled.

This is another proof of their cowardice and their lack of morality, not to mention stupidity. I am sure that of us, the true conservative majority can see through their schemes.

The next question is how real are they? Before the coup in AWARE, these militants only exist in cyberspace. In other words, they are just some computer virus. However the coup in AWARE tells us that they are beginning to extend their holy crusades to the real world. In the coup, we have seen how they can sink to the level of ganging up with church members to take over a secular organization and how they use a pastor to drum up support for them in the pulpit. They may have failed in one crusade but there is no guarantee that they will launch more crusades in other forms. One thing for sure, they will always call themselves the “conservative majority” as though we can be so easily fooled.

How should we Christians with integrity respond to these crusaders?

First, we need to be completely honest and truthful. There is no use in sticking our heads in the sand. Those self-proclaimed “conservative majority” are purely Christians. They go to church. They believe in the part of the Bible that says homosexuality is sin. (Unfortunately they have ignored other sins like lying and slandering.) So, they are motivated to commit their sins in the name of “serving the Lord in preventing our nation from crossing the line of endorsing homosexuals”. Thus, they will stop at nothing to witch-hunt anyone and any organization that shows the slightest form of kindness and sympathy to the homosexuals. In short, they commit many sins in the name of fighting one sin.

Secondly, we need to make it clear to the public that we do not endorse their acts just as most Muslims do not endorse terrorism. Yes, the Bible does say homosexuality is sin and we believe in what the Bible says. However, we do not do witch-hunting. We do not condemn people and organizations that show kindness and sympathy to the homosexuals. We will never gang up with church members to take over any secular organization. We will never launch any crusade on anyone who says homosexuality is neutral. We have the basic intelligence to know that the act of calling homosexuality as neutral is not promoting it. We also have the basic intelligence to know that having the support of homosexuals does not mean there must be a “Gay Agenda” as proposed by an intelligent lawyer.

In conclusion, it is vital for us the true Christians in Singapore to make it clear we are against those evil acts of militancy.

Christian Militancy In AWARE Saga

One of the positive outcome from the recent AWARE saga is the exposure of Christian militancy in Singapore. The idea of Christian militants in Singapore is no longer a hypothesis. It has shown its ugly head in the takeover of AWARE. It is up to us now, the real conservative majority to decide on the action we are going to take to protect our nation from their domination.

When I use the term “militants”, I am referring to a group of people who will resort to any means to achieve their objectives. In this case, the “Christian militants” are those who think that they are the only true Christians and they have the right to demand the entire nation to obey their rules. They will resort to any means and sink to any level to achieve their aims. Like the Crusaders in the past, they will not allow morality to stand in their way.

Some people may wonder whether I am over reacting on the whole issue. Maybe those are just a bunch of over enthusiastic and harmless fanatics. In this article, I am going to present my proofs. Please consider the following:

Taking laws into their own hands.
The Ministry of Education in Singapore has recently suspended AWARE’s Comprehensive Sexual Education (CSE) program from schools after it has found some inappropriate words in the instructor’s handbook. This is the respond to parents’ complaints on the issue.

This event tells us that the government system is working fine here in Singapore. If the parents think the schools are teaching wrong things to their children, they can lodge their complaints and the ministry will look into them. If the contents are really bad, the ministry will take action like suspending or even banning the program. There is absolutely no need to stage any coup.

If those “concerned parents” are really concerned about the CSE program, why did they not lodge their complains in the first place? Why did they start the coup first and then complain later? How much common sense does it take for them to realize that complaining to the government is the right move to address their concerns? Why would they participate in the coup to resolve a problem that can easily be solve through a simple complain?

Is it because it is more glorious to have a crusade than a complaint? This episode tells us that their real motive goes beyond the program itself.

The crusaders accused AWARE of promoting homosexual lifestyle. Technically homosexual lifestyle is illegal in Singapore. This means promoting it must also be illegal. So, if those crusaders have proofs that the organization is doing it, why can’t they make a police report or take legal action? After all, they have a page 73 lawyer on their side.

So, why can’t the members of the particular church take the necessary legal action for the ministry staff and police to do their job. It is because they don’t trust the ministry staff and police? Or, are they operating in militant mindsets? They want to take their own actions? They want to fight their own war? They want their own crusade?

Lack of personal morality.
Since they had completed their coup, the new exco explained to the public that their agenda was to bring the organization to its original focus as their predecessors had strayed from it. This sounds very innocent. The old guards may disagree but it is only a matter of opinion.

When the media pointed out that there was a surge in members and most of the new exco members worship in the same church which suggests an organized coup, they insisted that there wasn’t any. So, it must be a statistical anomaly. Out of all the women in Singapore, most of the elected exco members must come from the same church. This alone can arouse some suspicion.

Unfortunately for them, they did something really stupid to break their cover. They elected an advisor to their team and this advisor called herself the feminist mentor. She openly declared that she was the one who planned the entire takeover to stop AWARE from promoting homosexual lifestyle. This is a slap on the faces of the elected exco. This is the equivalent of the Feminist Mentor publicly called the newly elected exco liars and they did not deny it. So, there was a planned coup after all and the reason is about homosexual, nothing to do with losing focus.

The above events had clearly shown that these women had openly lied and they cannot be trusted.

Not only that, their church too became involved. Initially, both the team and their church had publicly denied the link between them. This is still possible because church members can organize their own activities without approval from their church leaders. However, a pastor had openly asked the female church members to support the team. He later apologized but the damage had been done. The link was shown. So, the statement that denies any link between the church and the new exco is proven to be false. The new exco and the church leadership had lied.

I have put up the above events to show that those participants of the coup have no regard to personal morality. They can talk a lot on how immoral homosexuals are but they themselves do not have much morality at all.

If we are to put the above two factors together, we can see that these people have no regard to both the law and personal morality for the sake of their anti-homosexual agenda. So far, they have been very peaceful which I am grateful for. However, what if somebody else who have the same level of morality resorting to violence? After all, I am trying to save the entire generation of citizen from being turned into homosexuals by those godless liberals. What is wrong in killing a few people? It is all for the greater good.

The mask of conservative majority.
One of the reasons given by the crusader to justify their anti-homosexual attitude is it is against the values of the conservative majority. I don’t think I need to convince you that this “conservative majority” is only a cover. They are against homosexuality because the Bible says it is a sin. It has nothing to do with the values of the conservative majority. The “conservative majority” is a ploy to mislead to the public into thinking that these crusaders have the support from the majority of the population. The dumb part here is the crusaders really believe in their own lies.

The truth is the conservative majority are not comfortable with homosexuals. However, they don’t go witch-hunting for them. They don’t take over organizations that are friendly to the homosexuals. So, the attempt to present themselves as the representatives of the conservative majority is a futile attempt to cover up their real agenda. This is another proof of their deceitfulness.

Fight for our Christian rights.
There are blogs out there calling for Christians to fight for our Christians rights as we can no longer depend on the conservative government to protect us. Since when has there been such a thing called the “Christian rights” in Singapore? It seems that there are some misguided Christians who see the AWARE saga as the fight between Christians and the rest of humanity. The act of voting out and booing our Sisters-In-Christ is an act of war on Christians. All Christians must unite to fight against our enemies (meaning every one else).

It seems to them that Christians have the right to impose our values to the entire humanity. We Christian view homosexuality as a sin. Anyone who is friendly toward the homosexuals is violating our Christian rights. So, don’t blame us for declaring a holy crusade on you.

Conclusion.
Christian militancy is real in Singapore. I am not referring only to the participants of the coup alone. I suspect there is a larger community out there who shared the same agenda and had the same level of morality. How low can they sink to? I don’t know and I hope it is not too low.

Homosexuality And AWARE

I am inspired to write on the issue on homosexuality because it has been often being abused for one’s selfish agenda. Recently, we have a situation where a woman found that the sexual education programs conducted by woman NGO (AWARE) do not use negative words to describe homosexuality. She decided that no negative words on homosexuality means promoting homosexuality. Then she started telling her church friends that their children will grow up being homosexuals if they attend the schools’ sexual education programs.

How does this sound to you? In my mind, this sounds like the words of some senile old man or woman. The reasoning is totally outrageous. The bigger joke is the church friends really believe in her words. Thus, they mounted a holy crusade to infiltrate and take over a secular NGO. As a result, they have become the disgrace to all the Christians in Singapore. This woman has become the most hated person in Singapore and the church that has openly supported her crusade shares her fame.

I thank God that their crusade has thoroughly failed. I am also glad that many Christians had chosen to speak up to condemn their evil deeds. Hopefully, the actions of these Christians are enough to convince the public that we do not condone what these crusaders have done. Just as not all Muslims are terrorists, no all Christians come from that church.

In this article, I am going to present a clear view on how Christians should think on the homosexual issue. Please note that the views are not exhaustive as I am not really a homosexual expert. I am only an engineer who believes in a loving God. My loving God will never endorse any crusade, especially the recent one.

Here we go.

Homosexuals are human beings.
They are entitled to all the rights and respects as human beings. Their homosexual behaviors do not make them less humans. Homosexuals can be hurt when people hurl insults or throw stones at them. The principle of doing to others what you want others to do to you is still applicable even if the other side consists of homosexuals.

I am sure those religious churches, like the one involved in the crusade will say that this is what they believe in but their actions say the opposite. Actions speak louder than words. Their anti-gay crusade has revealed to us that these people are no different from the Talibans. No matter what views we have on homosexuality, the fact is the crusaders have proven themselves to be a greater evil.

The issue of sin.
The crusaders will say that the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. They are correct but that is not the whole message. The Bible has listed many types of sin, not just homosexuality alone. I am not going to list them out. I am just picking out one of them –lying. Telling lies is also a sin but this does not stop the crusaders from lying to their teeth from the day they completed their coup to the final press conference after they were defeated.

Even at the final press conference, the crusaders denied that they had planned the takeover despite the overwhelming evidence showing that the coup was really planned.

Does the sin of lying less sinful than the sin of homosexuality? Is it right to commit one sin in the name of stopping another? Are the crusaders morally superior to the homosexuals? This is the time for the crusaders to do some soul searching.

Promotion of homosexual lifestyles.
In my first article on AWARE, I have automatically assumed that the accusations that the old guards have been promoting homosexual lifestyles are correct. I apologize for this mistake. After gathering more evidence and deeper thoughts I am convinced now that such accusations are nothing but lies. This is another lie from the crusaders. It seems that these crusaders can sink to any level for the sake of their crusade.

Let me give you one reason why there had never been any promotion of homosexual lifestyles. The reason is homosexuals are not evangelistic. I have never come across any marketing campaign telling me to try out homosexual lifestyles because it is fun. So, if the homosexuals themselves do not evangelize their lifestyles, why would anyone else want to promote them?

Logic dictates that there was never any promotion of homosexual lifestyles in the first place.

Neutral words on homosexual lifestyles does not mean promoting it.
The above sounds like common sense but it is the starting point for the whole crusade. In the minds of those crusaders, if you don’t use negative words on homosexual lifestyles when you conduct your lessons, you are promoting homosexual lifestyles to the students. Your students will grow up to be homosexuals.

If they are right, they should ban dictionaries as well because all dictionaries that I know of use neutral words to describe homosexuals. Will your children become homosexuals after reading the dictionary?

Was Jesus pro-gay?
When he was on earth, Jesus made friends with the social out-cast and marginalised people like tax collectors and prostitutes. This sounds like what AWARE is doing. So, if AWARE is pro-gay because it does not reject them, then Jesus must be pro-prostitutes. Jesus never set any conditions for his prostitutes friends to change in order to qualify to be his friends. He allowed them to change at their own pace. I believe he will surely treat the homosexuals the same way.

What would happen if a gay wanted to follow Jesus at that time? I believe Jesus would have treated him the same way he treated the tax collectors and prostitutes. Does this make him pro-gay? If that is so, all Christians should also be pro-gay.

Can homosexuals change?
Based on what I know about them, homosexuals are physically indistinguishable from others. Homosexuality is a mental and not physical state. We have come across situations where people with terminal diseases got healed because they chose to think positive. We have also come across people who rise from rags to riches after changing their mindset. So, what is the big deal for homosexuals changing to heterosexuals by changing their thought patterns?

However, they have the sole right to decide whether they want to change and we have no right to persecute them if they choose to remain as who they are. Just as we do not force people to believe in Jesus, we should never force the homosexuals to change their lifestyles.

Conclusion.
These are all I can think of. Hope you like it.

AWARE 2: The Aftermath

I have a busy week. I do not really wish to write about AWARE again but since I have started it, I believe I should close it or it will be left hanging. Let us recap from the previous article.

We learn that there is a feminist mentor who had organized like-minded women from her church to launch a holy crusade to take over AWARE because they had a higher calling to remove its programs that promote homosexual lifestyles in schools. What a noble calling!

However, the ousted leaders of AWARE (also known as old guards) denied openly that they had been promoting homosexual lifestyles in schools. Not only that, even the Ministry of Education of Singapore has openly stated that they had never been any program that promote homosexual lifestyles in schools.

So, we have some integrity problem here. Somebody has been blatantly and shamelessly lied to the public. Who is the liar? We can easily narrow the liars down to two sides.

 Had the feminist mentor and her fellow crusaders lied in accusing the old guards of promoting homosexual lifestyles in schools?

 Or, had the old guards together with the government of Singapore lied to cover up their activities in promoting homosexual lifestyles in schools?

Who can we trust? Who are the shameless liars here? Telling you the answer will be an insult to your intelligence.

This gives me a problem. Suppose a non-Christian guy asks me whether Christians are supposed to have integrity like not lying opening to the public, I will not know what to say. I wish I can say “Yes, Christians are supposed to have integrity.” However, if he is to refer to this incident, I will be very embarrassed. This is a problem I don’t know how to solve.

Of course, the feminist mentor and her fellow crusaders will not be bothered with my insignificant problem. They have their crusade to fight in. In all crusades, the ends always justify the means. As long as victory can be achieved, who cares about things like morality and integrity? It is the crusade that matters.

Let us move on to the final showdown on 2 May 2009 where both sides battled to take control over the organization. Let me give you my predictions based on two different scenarios.

Scenario 1: The old guards win.
This should not be a surprise because they have the support of all the non Christians and Christians who believe in integrity, tolerance and mutual respect. The day 2 May will always be remembered as the day all Singaporean women stand together and declare in one voice that they reject all forms of religious intolerance and lies. The old guards will have their position back. AWARE will be stronger than ever.

As for the crusaders, they will have to crawl back into their church in shame. After a while, no one will remember them anymore.

Scenario 2: The new guards win.
This scenario is still possible because the crusaders are more organized. They have an entire church behind them. So, if all the female church members obey their pastor’s battle cry to support the crusaders out of church loyalty regardless of the truth, the crusaders will secure their control over this organization.

As a result, AWARE will be shunned by all the non-Christian women. It will only be an organization by Christians for Christians. It will lose its integrity as an honorable and secular organization.

Meanwhile, the old guards will be urged by their supporters to set up a new AWARE. This new AWARE will take up all the functions started by the previous one. It will be seen by the public as the real AWARE. It will emerge stronger and more influential than the old one.

As for the crusader who “won”, they will be remembered by all Singaporeans as religious extremist who will sink to any level to promote their religion. Ironically, they will suffer more humiliation if they win.

Conclusion
Whatever the results of the showdown, the winners and the losers are clear. It is only a matter on how much humiliation the crusaders will take for being committed to their crusade.

AWARE

Currently, this word must be the hottest topic in Singapore. For the sake of those who are not in Singapore, let me give you some background information. AWARE is basically a woman NGO whose primary purpose is to promote gender equality. Like most Singaporeans, I have never bothered about it until the recent quarrel. The quarrel has aroused the interest of the nation the situation has become uglier by the day. How does this happen and what makes it so interesting to so many of us? I shall provide the story and some analysis of it.

It begun when the existing leaders were voted out of office and replaced by a new group. There was a sudden increase in membership just before the election and this give rise to the speculation that these new members joined just for the sake of taking over the organization. The media used the term “old guard” and “new guard” to describe the two opposing teams. The old guards cried foul and accused the new guards of promoting their religious and anti-gay agenda. It so happens that the new elected members are all Christians and are from the same church.

The battle line is drawn. On one side, we have the old guards who are seen as liberal and tolerant, while on the other side we have the new guards who are seen as conservative, anti-gay and having a secret religious agenda. Sounds like the classic good verses evil story. The cyberspace is full of conspiracy theories and most of them are not very friendly to the new guards. It is really getting very ugly out there.

There are even revelations that the new elected leaders received death threats. They had suffered fears for their families and their own safety. So, the question here is, do these Christian ladies suffer for the sake of righteousness or do they suffer out of plain stupidity? Here is my analysis.

Composition of the new leaders.
The new president and all the new exco members are Christians. Many even come from the same church. How will the public see this? It certainly looks like a clash between two minority groups. (Christians are a minority group in Singapore.) On one side there is a liberal and tolerant group. On the other side, there is a Christian group who may have a “Christian agenda”. Who is right and who is wrong? It does not take much intelligence to understand that the general public will prefer a liberal group than a specific religious group to serve them. The new group can say that they do not have any religious agenda but who is going to trust them? In the eyes of the public, the new group can never wash themselves clean from stigmas like “religious agenda”, “Christian agenda” or “anti-gay agenda”.

I believe most Singaporeans do not like the way the old leadership promotes homosexual lifestyles but I also suspect that they hate the idea of “Christian agenda” even more. So, the homosexual issue has become the equivalent of lesser evil, thanks to the effort of these Christian ladies.

What should the new leadership do instead? They should get the participation and support from women from all the major religious groups. It is only when the new guards have an executive council that consists of women from various religions, they can boldly proclaim that they represent the majority of Singapore women. The old guards will have a weaker ground to fight back.

The new guards wanted to stage a coup to take over the organization but they did not want to cross the religious boundary to make their coup a success. Instead they chose an easy way of recruiting only from their same church and faith. On this issue alone, I am sure that no matter how the meetings turn out, the new leadership will only be seen as villains. In extension, the public may view all Christians the same way.

The objective of the coup.
Based on the news I have read, it seems that the real objective on why those Christian ladies went through so much troubles is to stop AWARE’s program in promoting homosexual lifestyles in schools. They must be planing take over the organization and then cancel all these programs. Does this solve the problem?

If this organization can go to the schools to promote their homosexual agenda, so can any other. What if there are other organizations out there going to the schools to do the same thing? Will these ladies infiltrate these organizations and take over them? They will be very busy.

The real solution lies in the schools. The problem would not have existed if the schools do not participate in those activities. They should approach the authorities instead. It does not have to be a direct ban of those homosexual activities. We can just ask the government to prevent the schools from sending their students to those homosexual programs without the parents’ consent. Will this be more effective, simple and less strenuous than the current coup?

Contradictory statements from the new leaders.
When the new president was interviewed by Channel News Asia, she made the following statements:
1. The objective of the takeover is to bring AWARE back to its original focus, which is women welfare.
2. There was no secret pact among then elected leaders to take over the leadership because they did not know each other before.

However, yesterday’s news revealed that there is a mastermind who planned the entire takeover. She called herself the feminist mentor. The mentor revealed that the real reason for her action is to stop AWARE from promoting homosexual lifestyles. While the first statement of the president is not entirely wrong, she is not being clear about the homosexual issue. This gives the impression that she is hiding something.

The mentor had also revealed that she was the one who planned this. So, the takeover is pre-planned despite the earlier denial. The exco members may not have known each other before but they know the mentor. The mentor was the one who get them all together. So, the facts show that the event is orchestrated despite the president statement.

Conclusion.
Based on the above three reasons, I conclude that this takeover is a failure. I wish the public will not lump all Christians with these women in the coup.