To Cut or Not to Cut?

A chicken and egg debate ensues whenever anyone brings up the topic of censorship in Singapore. What comes first? Freedom of choice, or rules to maintain social order?

The prevailing sentiment among traditionalists has been that we have been living in a good, clean, and safe haven for a number of years. So let's leave it at that. No need to rock the boat. No need to slaughter any sacred cows. Better to leave the ant's nest alone than to step on it.

Censorship, they say, helps to keep people's minds pure. Less violence, sex, and anything extremely thought provoking - whether politically or socially - is better so that the man on the street can focus his energies on studying, working, and existing.

It is there to protect young minds. The less they see, the less they hear, the less they will know. Less is best, they say.

Singaporean parents are already so stressed with managing their work, their finances, their children's education (plus tuition, enrichment, music, and the works), and not to mention their maid (now a necessity in dual- income families). So isn't it a blessing when mum and dad do not have to discuss about the birds and bees with little junior? Or why his dark-skinned friends like to hang out together and not include him in their games.

Personally, I feel that censorship is a paradox in today's context. With the onset of the World Wide Web or the Internet in 1994, the creators had unleashed the most powerful weapon on this earth. Even more powerful than the nuclear bomb.-- the freedom of information. And the freedom of a fuss-free, easy and economic access to this form of information, as well as the channel of communication by which people can now disseminate their thoughts.

So what censorship can we speak of?

It is not just a matter of opening the windows and making sure the flies do not get in. Sure, we can install wire meshes, layers of protection, or even get a super duper electric barrier to zap the flies if they dare to venture in. But we must live with filtered air as opposed to fresh air, and we have to make sure that we do not electrocute ourselves from time to time.

Censorship is a double-edged sword.

On one hand, it makes sure that all "unhealthy" content is removed from the mainstream. Again the definition of what falls into this category is very subjective.

On the other hand, because of such massive cleaning up, often what is left for people to digest hardly stirs the soul. It is devoid of independent thought and creativity. Such filtered material leaves little room for innovation.

And more often than not, a process takes place because of the censored environment we live in. Self-censorship.

People are so fearful of being out of line, not conforming to common opinion or idealogy, that they censor their own thoughts even before they register them in their brain waves. Those who might be less hard on themselves do a self-censorship procedure before their thoughts turn into words or actions.

How do we progress as a society then?

Even if our people have resigned themselves to fate, and accepted this as part of life in Singapore, I do not see the foreign "talents" being as accommodating. Forget about turning Singapore into the London or New York or Paris of the East.

No amount of loosening up (bungee-jumping, bar-top dancing or gay civil servants) will make that much of an impact as compared to a broader relaxation of censorship standards in Singapore. Nor will the numerous categories that our censorship committee comes up with (nc15, m18, r21). It's all just lip service.

When the sons of our soil are of legal age to bear arms and die for our country, but deemed not mature to handle the sight of breasts, I am puzzled.

When our own local "talent" has to give up his artistic rights and his real-life depiction of hard issues that Singaporean teenagers face just to satisfy the safety net of local movie censors, I am puzzled.

When license plates bearing the SEX prefix are given a pass, just because they might convey certain connotations and 'offend' certain individuals, I am puzzled.

What do we want to create for our future?

If we wish for our boys to turn into men; if we wish to show our people that their creativity can be shared within and not just outside of our country; if we also wish to lighten up and be labelled as a FUN place to be, then let us snip less, and let's see more SEX on the road.