Locksmiths and real estate agents sticking ads all over the place

Posted on May 12, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘ Illegal ads a sticking point for HDB residents’, 12 May 2013, article by Lim Yan Yang and Lim Yi Han, Sunday Times

Now that Singapore’s “Sticker Lady” has been sentenced in court for mischief, some Housing Board residents are wondering if they will see the end of a sticky problem they have been living with for years. They say locksmiths, real estate agents and providers of all sorts of services paste small advertisements and labels all over the place, and seem to get away with it.

Tampines resident Francis Cheng contacted The Sunday Times and said he has put up with ads and calling cards that have been stuck to his meter box, doorbell, gate and on the railings along the common corridor. “It’s a nuisance. I peel it off and a few days later they paste it back,” said the 40-year-old business manager. Competing businessmen sometimes leave layers of overlapping stickers that are just unsightly, he added.

…The police website refers the public with such “non-police matters” to relevant agencies such as town councils and the LTA….Technically, the law has penalties for unauthorised advertisements, under the Vandalism Act and the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act.

But lawyers said the courts are unlikely to act against businesses that do not adhere to the rules unless home owners pursue the matters themselves by lodging a magistrate’s complaint. “Some might argue that it’s a slippery slope: if you don’t arrest them, they will paste more stickers,” said criminal lawyer Amolat Singh. “But the courts operate under the de minimis principle, which means the law does not concern itself with trivialities.”

He said the law must strike a balance between the fact that advertisements promote a commercial service – unlike in the Sticker Lady case – and that most people do not view them as mischief or vandalism.

Most of the locksmiths, plumbers and air-conditioning repairmen The Sunday Times called declined to talk about their ads but one argued that his sticker has helped many people. The 40-year-old locksmith, who declined to be named, said: “Those who complain are those who haven’t had their door spoilt or forgotten their keys.”

Your grandfather meter box is it

I have to admit I once benefited from a vandal’s calling card stuck on a letter box. My door was jammed and I had no one to call. It was, for my intents and purposes, an emergency and I remain grateful enough to close one eye to rival locksmiths tearing each others’ stickers or sticking their ads on top of each other outside my house as long as it’s not on my gate. Property flyers on the other hand, are a downright nuisance, the only consolation being sometimes they come with eye candy amidst the eyesore, on which I’d waste a couple of seconds of my life ogling before tossing it away for recycling.

Need a house NOW

So we have one group of people running foul of Vandalism laws, another being annoying Litterbugs, with neither getting arrested for their deeds, while a graffiti artist with better aesthetic taste when it comes to stickers gets charged for mischief and has to serve 240 hours of community service. If Samantha Lo had inserted an additional line in her Press Until Shiok stickers advertising swimming lessons and a fake number, maybe the law would consider her actions ‘trivial’ as well.

I can’t say, however, that MOST people don’t mind such rampant defacement. Maybe some folks like myself do benefit from sticky ads, whether it’s breaking into their own house urgently or selling their homes at cushy prices. But I’m certain there are many who find it more disruptive and polluting than Sam Lo’s street work, so I question the lawyer’s assumption unless he had run a nationwide survey to ask Singaporeans what they think of sticker ads. There’s also a suggestion of exemption from penalty if your sticker is about a ‘commercial service’ rather than ‘art’. Which means there’s a chance you may be an illegal landlord, uncertified driving instructor or maybe even a prostitute sticking ads willy-nilly and not get caught. What if you’re spreading the gospel through stickers, like what happened in 1977 with a ‘I found it’ campaign? (‘It’ meaning ‘a life in Jesus Christ’). Would the authorities have hauled in a church leader for ‘mischief’ or use some fancy legal Latin term to convince us that he did no wrong?

It also begs the question of what exactly the law considers a ‘triviality’ which it doesn’t concern itself with. One man’s triviality is another’s outrage. If Sticker Lady had simply pasted ONE offending sticker in town, maybe less than 2 cm in radius, would it be ‘trivial’ enough to adhere to the ‘de minimis’ principle? One HDB owner’s complaint may be trivial, but if EVERY level on EVERY block of HDB flats reports a case of sticker vandalism, surely it becomes a PROBLEM, one that I forsee our authorities and courts will no doubt be STUCK on.

About these ads

Filed under: 1970s, 2013, Advertisements, Environment, HDB, Justice system/Lawsuits, Public works, Religion | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Cradle of Filth banned from St James Powerhouse

Posted on April 28, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘No venue for Cradle of Filth’s gig’, 28 April 2013, article by Tan Yee Kun, TNP

THEY were set to play on Friday night in Singapore for the first time. But three days before UK extreme metal band Cradle of Filth’s ticketed gig at Powerhouse at St James Power Station, the owners of the venue decided to pull out, leaving fans in the lurch and the organiser scrambling for an alternative stage

Tickets were priced at $100, with an early bird rate of $80 and $120 at the door.

Mr Dennis Foo, chief executive of St James Holdings, told The New Paper yesterday that he was alerted to the band’s background by one of his “associates”.

He said: “We decided not to allow the concert (to be held at) our venue after we were sounded out, and after we checked their website. Their content (contains) heavy (anti-religious) elements and vulgarities.

“St James, as a responsible operator, cannot allow these types of performances on our premises, especially when our entertainment licences are at stake.”

The lead singer of CoF Dani Filth comes from the ‘heart of the English countryside‘ and helms a band that sings about ‘vampires and werewolves’, except that extreme death metal isn’t the kind of stuff you’d hear on a Twilight soundtrack. ‘Dark’ and ‘morbid’ lyrics betraying a scholarly grasp of medieval occult and Crow-inspired make-up aside, the folks at Cradle of Filth turn out to be pretty normal people in real life who actually smile and don’t look like they’re about to impale you with a pitchfork or grow giant fiery bat wings and drag you down to Hell, as the Inokii Facebook page reveals. They have, however, caused quite a stir with a T-shirt featuring a nun in a ‘compromising position’ and features extreme Jesus blasphemy. Sounds not that far off from Lady Gaga antics.

Still, Dennis Foo and the St James honchos should have done their research before committing to a venue for the band. Just as someone didn’t like Adam Lambert’s gay lifestyle, one of Dennis Foo’s buddies thought that Powerhouse was no place for raging dark metal full of blood, questionable ‘lords’ and overall damnation. I have no idea what Foo’s or his associate’s religious inclinations are, though ironically in 2001 the man was responsible for the DEVIL’s Bar at Orchard Parade Hotel, a themed waterhole for a football club that calls itself ‘The Red Devils’. He also put up a white paper on his own to lobby for the casinos. A black metal addict may very well damage his hearing from his music or be a sucker for the Antichrist, but a gambling addict does far more destruction to himself and everyone else around him. I’m not sure which of the two is the greater ‘evil’ here.

Surely, the band title itself should alert you that they’re not here to do Bon Jovi or Nickelback cover versions. Although most people attuned to milder forms of elevator music would freak out at the guttural incantations of extreme metal, it’s worth noting that the genre has a rabid following here, one website listing the number of metal bands at a stunning 197! We’ve also had our share of ‘underground’ metal festivals such as 2011′s CARNAGE fest, which features names like Cardiac Necropsy and Remains. Cradle of Filth sounds tame in fact (Every bundle of joy leaves behind a cradle of filth) compared to the nightmarish likes of Devourment, Dying Fetus, Blood Anatomies, or ANALDICKTION. The latter is a local band by the way, and it has a song called ‘CB destroyer’. Mommy…

Any literate person WOULD know if a band is black metal or not simply by looking at its name. It’s either has death imagery, virulent disease, or scary Latin words straight out of the Necronomicon in it.  In fact, you can think up one yourself in a jiffy, like Lethal Injection, Rigor Mortis or something pants-pissingly terrifying like Final Examination, Internal Security or One Direction (STRAIGHT TO HELL). If, however, you don’t know anything about the macabre or John Milton you’re no better off than a D-grade horror movie, an ageing professional wrestling tag team (Legion of Doom, Demolition), or a bad Kiss tribute band.

Last year, another metal band ‘Inquisition’ was banned from performing at the True Metal Invasion fest for reasons unclear. I checked out some of the lyrics and found Satan-summoning and song titles like ‘Ominous Doctrines of the Perpetual Mystical Macrocosm’. That’s what you get when you combine a love for the occult and quantum physics. The song ‘Crepuscular Battle Hymn’ has the lyrics: Crushed from the blow of my hammer strike/ Thrones made of gold crumble from the blast. Which sounds like freakin’ Thor’s anthem, for God’s sake. Hardly the kind of stuff to possess horny boys so that they can molest little girls. Ban this but allow ‘Motherfather’ Gentleman’ on radio? May the scythe of my Leviathan lord lay a thousand curses on your rotten soul.

Filed under: 2013, Concerts, Local music/bands, Violence | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Lee Wei Ling is an atheist sent by God

Posted on March 31, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘ An atheist sent by God’, 31 March 2013, article by Lee Wei Ling, Think, Sunday Times

I have a patient, R, who has been under my care since 2006. In 2008, she ran into a serious non- medical problem. She worked for someone who ran tuition centres, and her duties included taking children from one tuition centre to another and calling the pupils’ parents.

She was paid only $750 a month, but had to spend her own money to ferry the children by taxi, and she was not reimbursed for the telephone calls made on her own cellphone. She was naive, and her boss exploited her. Strapped for cash, she took money from the fees paid by the parents to pay off loan sharks. She had intended to repay the tuition centre from her future earnings, but before she could do so, her boss found out.

He threatened to report her to the police if she did not reimburse him immediately. Although her parents repaid the money on her behalf, the boss lodged a police report anyway and she was charged.

I asked a senior psychiatrist to see her. After examining her, he agreed that she was in no medical condition to serve out a prison term.

The law firm I approached agreed to help her pro bono. Their representation and the medical reports helped reduce her sentence from a jail term to a fine.

…In this cynical world, there are still people who want to do what is right, even if doing so will not profit them personally, as my psychiatrist friend and the lawyers who defended R pro bono show. This gives me hope that we can develop into a compassionate society no matter what our religion, or whether or not we believe in God.

R praised her saviour as a ‘person sent by God’, which the latter thought was ironic since she did not believe in His existence. If Lee Wei Ling weren’t the daughter of LKY, this would have been a perfect ‘Letters to Heaven’ bedtime story for Christian kids. Although intended as a Easter-themed celebration of the human spirit and compassion without faith intervening, Lee Wei Ling’s account of how she got a patient off the hook is not so much Good Samaritan as it shows the benefit of having powerful connections, or how having a mental illness and good lawyers can help you escape prison time. Pro bono also happens to be a fancy legal term for ‘free of charge’. It is usually administered for ‘the public good’, legal assistance for an ‘indigent stranger’ without expectation of reward. I would imagine it given to say elderly, disadvantaged workers seeking compensation for unfair dismissal at work, or to bloggers getting threatened for commenting on famous politicians’ celebrity daughters.

Dr Lee would deny that her position and influence had anything to do with R having an advantage over anyone else caught in the same situation. Regardless of R’s mental state or financial difficulties, the fact is she STOLE from her company, a crime that warrants a jail term. Lee carefully sidesteps the details; if R was indeed ruled out of a prison sentence on the basis of illness, was there any rehabilitation program mandated in addition to the fine? What illness do you need to suffer from to be spared a jail term? How did this article get past the Sunday Times editor?

Lee concluded with a cloyingly hopeful reminder that there is still some humanity left in us after all, that altruism is alive whether or not you believe in God.  Yet, I’m not sure if it’s fair to say that saving R was the RIGHT thing to do; many people who have committed similar crimes out of desperation have landed in jail because they couldn’t afford expensive lawyers or psychiatrists to declare themselves medically unfit. Nor are they fortunate enough to have ‘atheists sent by God’ among their company. There is also too little information and too much sob-story from Lee’s perspective on R to say if she was truly deserving of the loving, unbiased touch of God. I also question if Lee’s doctor and lawyer friends did it out of genuine compassion, were returning a favour to ‘promote access to justice’, or acted simply because of who she was.

Maybe she should have written a story about volunteering in a tsunami-hit Third World country where the people believe in animal spirits instead of Jesus Christ, and then conclude that belief in a Man-God in a flowing robe and a halo over his head is not a prerequisite for miracles. Incidentally her father would call such disasters ‘Acts of God’, though he has been described as a man ‘agnostic’ in his approach to life.

Filed under: 2013, Justice system/Lawsuits, Politicians, Religion | Tagged: , , , | 7 Comments »

Satanic soldier having sex with 11 year old cousin

Posted on March 12, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Soldier jailed for sex with two minors; told one minor that he was a Satanist’, 12 March 2013, article by Elena Chong, ST.

A 21-year-old army regular was jailed for 20 months on Tuesday for having sex with two minors. Neither the accused nor the two girls, then aged 15 and 11, can be named as there is a gag order. A district court heard that he was initially given a 12-month conditional warning for having sex with his girlfriend, aged 15, at his home in November 2008. He was then 17. The girl, now 19, became pregnant and underwent an abortion.

He breached the condition of the warning to remain crime-free for the next 12 months by committing similar offences. This time, he preyed on his 11-year-old cousin. Claiming that he was a “Satanist”, he told her in October 2009 that since she was the first person to touch him, she must have sex with him or else “Satan” would “come after her”.

The girl became disturbed and later on, began to believe him as she started seeing “figures” in her bedroom. She was often scolded by her mother and she attributed the incidents of “bad luck” to the fact that she did not have sex with the accused.

Satanism is one way to use alleged powers of the occult to frighten gullible girls into sex, but the Horned One and the blood rituals committed in his honour have gone out of fashion in recent decades, which makes the victim’s fear of the Prince of Darkness rather surprising. Telling a kid horrific stories about Satan these days is as good as wriggling your fingers in a creepy fashion and summoning the Boogeyman. Parents no longer use scare tactics to send children to bed or ‘be good..or else’, when sometimes the threat of imaginary monsters may be more effective than a stern wagging finger and ‘rationalising’ with a brat who refuses to let go of your iPad.

There seems to be a trend of boys taking liberties with evil deities to deceive innocent girls. A certain ‘John’ fell into a trance in order to make girls succumb as he channeled Yan Luo Wang, the Chinese God of Hell back in 2011. Just earlier this month, Simon Wong Choy Chuan pretended to be possessed by ghosts whilst chanting and speaking in a different voice, calling himself ‘Gasura’, which sounds more like Godzilla’s bumbling arch nemesis than an embodiment of pure evil. For his theatrics he got 5 girls to submit to him, his hisses, fits and sputters probably more convincing than any of the professional actors on Channel 5′s Incredible Tales. But even blessed angels and saints aren’t spared from lecherous pretenders. You have fake monks ripping you off your ‘donations’ and priests touching boys where they shouldn’t be touching. If drawing inspiration from the pits of hell doesn’t work, there’s always the other side of the ‘supernatural’ to turn to.

The ‘medium con’ was first brought into public awareness by the shocking trial of serial rapist-killer Adrian Lim, who was an ‘ardent believer of the goddess Kali’. In 1983, he related to the courts how he SOMERSAULTED and rolled to the front of an altar, mimicking the ‘voice of an old man’. But it’s not just playing a vessel for spirit possession that makes people piss their pants. Conversely, you may trick someone into sex by convincing her that she herself is the one who needs a special brand of ‘exorcism’, taking ‘sexual healing’ to gruesome extremes. Lying alone is useless without a little persuasion, authority, plenty of charisma, and perhaps some gravity defying acrobatics for authenticity. You also have to choose your avatar wisely. It would be embarrassing to channel Hades, mythic Ruler of the Underworld and get a blank stare instead of reluctant undressing.

As customary as it is to symphatise with any victim of such a ruse, you’d have to wonder what good a little common sense and skepticism could do to save a child, or even an ADULT for that matter, from trouble. We teach our kids how to solve complex Maths problems but fail in our duty to protect them from malicious superstition or predators. Even if you’re the sort to be fooled by eyeball rolling and scary gibberish, at least ask yourself what our army is doing letting these wild, incestuous Satanists serve the country, what with their blood rite nonsense and heavy metal music and all. Let’s see what the Dark Lord has in store in return for this follower desecrating a nubile and blood relative like a good Satanist should. A hot tub in hell would be well deserved.

Filed under: 1980s, 2013, Army, Justice system/Lawsuits, Kids, Religion, Sex, Superstitions, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Adam Lambert concert promoting gay lifestyle at StarPAC

Posted on March 2, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Church feels the heat over gay singer’s gig’, 2 March 2013, article by Tessa Wong, ST

THE National Council of Churches of Singapore (NCCS) is looking into a complaint about a church-owned venue hosting an upcoming concert by openly gay singer Adam Lambert. Lambert is due to perform next Friday at The Star Performing Arts Centre, a commercial entity fully owned by Rock Productions, the business arm of New Creation Church.

New Creation is a member of the NCCS, which represents about 200 churches in Singapore. NCCS general secretary Lim K. Tham said the council had received a complaint from a Christian that “the gay lifestyle may be promoted at the concert, and that the concert venue is owned by a church,” he said.

“The NCCS has conveyed this concern to New Creation so that it can make a response.”

The Media Development Authority (MDA) said it has also received feedback from some members of the public “expressing concern” about the concert. It declined to reveal what their concerns were. Even though it is not the first time that Lambert has performed here, the NCCS said it did not receive complaints about his previous gigs. The MDA declined to say whether it received any complaints about him previously.

He performed at Resorts World Sentosa in 2010 and sang at the Formula One Grand Prix at the Padang in 2011. (He ‘came out’ in 2009)

…This is not the first time that Christians have raised concerns about a pop concert in recent months. The MDA previously met with the NCCS and LoveSingapore, a network of 100 churches, about Lady Gaga’s concert in May last year. It is understood that they had raised concerns over how she may have insulted Christians and promoted homosexuality at her concert.

The Star PERFORMING ARTS centre at Buona Vista sounds like a venue for an evening of ballet and other classy types of refined entertainment, like an uglier Esplanade of the West. Yet it showcases a diverse range of celebrities from golden oldies to K-pop, saccharine David Foster to Bollywood, sleepy Norah Jones jazz to the flamboyant razzle-dazzle of American Idol runner-up Adam Lambert. Earlier this year, the church-owned theatre wowed male audiences with  an all-girl group from Japan known as the Ebisu Muscats. Unbeknownst to many, the Muscats are in fact a spin-off novelty act consisting of nude models and PORNSTARS.  The NCCS said nothing then. Oh I forgot, those guys don’t watch porn. They were also seemingly fine with singing pastor Sun Ho’s China Wine video.

NCC insists that its Star stage operates independently from the workings of the Church, like a secular debauched fantasy realm of its own, though the theatre is just an escalator away from a Christian book and music shop. Lambert’s music is not known to promote any agenda for ‘free love’ or cast a cursory eye on religion unlike Lady Gaga’s overt references to biblical characters (Black Jesus, anyone?). Last year, 300 Protestant South Koreans gathered for group prayer cum protest against Gaga’s Born this Way Ball. I wonder if anyone has already booked Hong Lim Park for a similar vigil to save humanity from Adam Lambert. A commenter from the NCC Facebook page refers to Lambert’s gig as an ‘appearance of evil’ (1 Thessalonians 5:22). The actual quote from the Bible is ‘Abstain from all appearance of evil’, or ‘If you see a gay dude with eyeliner, run far, far away’.

You can pray and Air guitar at the same time, it seems

As the singer proudly proclaims, he’s just here ‘for your entertainment’, though that entertainment may include him kissing his band guitarist amid the gothic ‘glitter and leather’ extravaganza. Up yours S377A!

The people complaining to NCCS and Malaysia’s hardline opposition party PAS have something in common then, both terrified of a gay epidemic, with the latter forbidding Lambert from even showing fans his nipples. In response to allegations of promoting homosexuality in Malaysia, he said:

Does my show ‘promote the gay lifestyle’? It promotes living ANY lifestyle that includes the freedom to seek love and intimacy

Lambert’s ‘We Are Glamily‘ tour was also recently cancelled in Manila due to ‘unforseen circumstances’. This is the same country where Christian and Muslim brotherhoods unite to banish demonic singers. Interestingly, the ‘Glamily’ title was left out for the Singapore promo. Sistic calls it ‘Adam Lambert Live in Singapore’. Imagine how outraged the church elders must feel if it had been left intact. Some gay singer coming here to break up the family unit! Dear Lord!

I wonder what the wholesome folks at NCCS think of Elton John (who has a male spouse, surrogate child and an orchid named after him) performing Candle in the Wind for charity here. Elton John is the last person Singaporean teens would look up to on sexuality matters of course, nevermind that he implores you to ‘Feel the Love Tonight’ on a Disney cartoon. Lambert is gay AND cool, which in the conservative Christian’s mind is an equation that adds up to ’666′.

A question every openly gay singer will have to ask when seeking to meet their fans in this part of the world is: Whaddaya want from me? Whaddaya want indeed. All together now…

Yeah, it’s plain to see (plain to see)
that baby you’re beautiful
And it’s nothing wrong with you
(nothing wrong with you)
It’s me, I’m a freak (yeah)
but thanks for lovin’ me
Cause you’re doing it perfectly

Filed under: Gay stuff, Concerts, Art, Religion, 2013 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments »

Repealing 377A a looming threat to the family unit

Posted on January 19, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Pastor’s plea to retain S377A sparks online furore’, 18 Jan 2013, article in Today online.

A plea by a church pastor — made during morning service last Sunday — to Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong against the repeal of Section 377A of the Penal Code, which criminalises sex between men, has drawn strong reactions from the online community. Mr Goh happened to pass by the Faith Community Baptist Church (FCBC) during his regular walkabout in his Marine Parade constituency and was invited by the church leaders to meet the congregation.

While Mr Goh was on the stage in the church’s auditorium, FCBC senior pastor Lawrence Khong read from a prepared statement. Among other things, he called the effort to repeal Section 377A “a looming threat” to the family unit, which he defined as “a man as father, a woman as mother, and children”.

“We see a looming threat to this basic building block by homosexual activists seeking to repeal Section 377A of the Penal Code,” said Mr Khong, who also urged the Government to “provide moral leadership in preserving this basic building block and foundation of our society”. In response, Mr Goh made a general remark that people are free to stand by their beliefs: “You stand by your belief, and you’ll be fine.”

There are many other educated voices out there in a better position than myself to argue for the repeal of 377A, but what concerns me here is whether someone of Khong’s calibre should be endorsed by Goh Chok Tong to ‘stand by’ such divisive beliefs and if taking this moral high ground would be detrimental not just to the livelihood of gays of the faith, but gays of society in general. In his statement, Khong talks of the repeal ‘attacking religious freedom’ and changing the way sex is taught in schools. If a religious leader expresses an irrational fear of a certain group of individuals and crudely labels it a destructive force, is it all ‘fine’ and dandy? Two gays having consensual sex in private doesn’t hurt anyone. One influential man telling every Christian or Catholic that homosexuality is a form of spiritual defilement is not someone simply expressing a ‘belief’. In some civilised societies, such condemning of an alternative lifestyle choice is considered a hate crime. Here, the ex Prime Minister of Singapore gives you an encouraging pat on the shoulder for ranting about the impending ‘gaypocalypse’. If I ‘believe’ the PAP is running the nation to the ground, will I get the same assurance?

I’m not sure that we, for the benefit for fellow humans with feelings, should tolerate such attitudes disguised as old biblical axiom. What Khong is implying is that homosexuality needs to be ‘controlled’ before it becomes a ‘norm’ and wrecks everything we hold dear. If you replace ‘homosexual’ with groups like the elderly, the sick, the handicapped, the mentally impaired, atheists, rapists, liars, gamblers, cheaters etc you have someone essentially advocating mass sterilisation of ‘undesirables’ from the pulpit. On the other hand, if one speaks up against the Church while ‘standing firm’ to a belief that monotheistic faiths are the viral scourge of humanity, you’ll be FINED rather than ‘fine’, if not jailed for sedition and ‘disrupting religious harmony’. Meanwhile, men of the cloth spew discriminatory hokum and get away with it because they have scripture to back them up, the same scripture that justifies genocide of the ‘deviants’. If a pastor is allowed to take a sweeping crack at homosexuality, so should I be able to exercise my ‘right’ to critique his sermons as being arcane, merciless and downright nonsensical. Jesus, just look what one of your heterosexual clergy have done to a 15 year old follower this past month. And you want to talk about 377A when you can’t even control your guys from the ‘proper’ family units.

The argument for the preservation of the ‘family unit’ and its role in nation building is as stale as unwashed foreskin. In 2009, Senior Pastor Derek Hong from the Anglican Church of our Savior said:

Accepting homosexual practices and endorsing any education programme that teaches our children that such practices are neutral or normal would lead to the erosion of the sound family values on which Singapore society has been built.

The infamous Rony Tan from Lighthouse Evangelism compared homosexuality to a plague of barrenness, that if left alone, ‘half the world’ would become homosexual, like the spread of some zombie pandemic. John Chew, head of the Anglican Church, told the ST in 2006 that:

 …‘It may be a cultured way of depicting a certain lifestyle, but two generations later, it will be an accepted lifestyle…If Elton John can do it, imagine the impact on his fans…It is just too dangerous, we have no fallback…It’s not like in the West, where these things take time to trickle down.”

Yang Tuck Loong, pastor of Cornerstone Community Church and LoveSingapore member, had this to say in his ‘Firing the First Salvo’ statement (Church network to speak up for S377A, 22 Jan 2013, ST), a terrifying metaphor which is hard to differentiate from a call to arms by the Knights Templar.

We must not be oblivious to our responsibilities as an army to push back the powers of darkness

PM Lee seems to think we are still at heart a ‘conservative’ society, and are not ready for change. Look at the sex scandals in your own cabinet : A heterosexual Speaker of Parliament running wild. Right under your nose.

So from the right-wing religious point of view, homosexuality is ‘contagious’ and is ‘unacceptable’ based on what appears to be it breaching a sacred union, though any link between this perfect union of penis and vagina and the success and happiness of a kingdom or nation has yet to be reliably shown. It doesn’t say if a polygamous marriage has run afoul of the Bible’s teachings (in fact it was probably rampant at the time the Bible was written). It also says nothing about the millions of men and women who made a difference to society as orphans or products of single parents and broken families, nor does it acknowledge that perfect families are as likely to produce a saint or President as a Hitler or serial killer.

Lawrence Khong and like-minded leaders need to be put in their place before such remarks are taken as a war-cry against the ‘fallen’ and a stamp of government approval for something akin to militant eugenics. The Archbishop was once told to stay the hell out of politics for commenting on the ISA, so shouldn’t a pastor be censured for interfering in our legislation as well? Likewise, politicians should know better and stay clear of mixing policy with religious affairs. Did Khong pull a Houdini here as he does on a regular basis as a trained MAGICIAN? Maybe that explains the hocus-pocus reasoning coming out of his mouth.

He should make himself disappear

Filed under: 2013, Gay stuff, Politicians, Religion | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

MDA banning Elangovan’s Stoma

Posted on January 9, 2013 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Media Development Authority bans Elangovan’s play Stoma’, 9 Jan 2013, article by Huang Lijie, ST

Singapore playwright Elangovan’s first play after a three-year hiatus will not be staged. The play, Stoma, which tells the story of a Catholic priest defrocked over sex abuse charges, was denied a performance licence yesterday.

It was originally slated to run at The Substation in Armenian Street from Jan 17 to 19. In a letter to Mr Elangovan, artistic director of theatre company Agni Kootthu (Theatre Of Fire), the Media Development Authority said a licence was not issued because the play contains “sexually explicit, blasphemous and offensive references and language which would be denigrating to the Catholic and the wider Christian community“.

This is the third time that a play by Elangovan has been denied licence to be staged here, after Talaq (2000), a play about a Muslim-Indian woman’s experiences of marital violence, and Smegma (2006), which comprises 10 mini plays that explore the control and exploitation of disadvantaged groups of people.

Elangovan’s earlier banned work Smegma sounds like a biography of a punk metal band or a sex-heavy meditation on puberty secretions, but it’s actually drama composed of 10 vignettes, including:

  • Three men in a prison cell making fun of  the Singapore flag
  • Kindergarten children calling their MP a PIG
  • Singaporeans sexual escapades with underaged girls (How prescient, this Elangovan)

But it was the Arts Consultative Panel’s fear that it would ‘create unhappiness and disaffection amongst Muslims’ that pulled the plug on Smegma. Interestingly, Smegma was initially granted a licence under a RA(18) rating, but got banned less than 30 HOURS before it was scheduled to play. 6 years later you would see MDA pulling the same last-minute stunt on a film that allegedly mocks Indians called Sex. Violence. Family Values. This followed a consultation with a similar panel of ‘experts’ AFTER MDA had made the more forthcoming decision of granting M18 instead.

The synopsis for Smegma contains the following line: “When the comfort zone is shattered, ugliness rears its head like SMELLY SMEGMA”, and so it is with MDA coming down hard on Stoma for its priest-sex associations, like a libido-killing, shameful splotch of spermy grime on a male porn stud’s scene-stealing manhood. What is the difference between Stoma and another similarly-themed production Doubt (performed here in 2006) anyway? Does Jesus Christ cameo in it totting a shotgun? Or perhaps it features sexy nuns showing more leg than habit?

The controversial Talaq (Divorce), which earned the playwright and even its lead actress Nargis Banu DEATH threats, was based on true stories of Indian-Muslim women getting battered and raped by their husbands.  The theatre company clashed with the National Arts Council (NAC) for inviting two deeply religious Muslim men from the South Indian Jamiathual Ulama (SIJU) on their panel, one of whom, Haji Marican, reportedly objecting to the play not so much that it depicts Muslim husbands as violent rapists, but that involuntary sex  should NOT be considered rape in the first place:

In Islamic law, a husband cannot rape his wife as long as the marriage continues. He need not ask permission from his wife for sexual relations each time he wants to have it. Even if she is angry or not in the mood, he has the right to it. In any event, a husband can have sex with his wife without her consent and that will not be rape

I’m no scholar on religious matters, but I wonder if these guys were intimidating the NAC into making an unfavourable decision not with choice religious words, but with wooden clubs that could beat off the most rabid sabre-toothed tiger. Elangovan’s wife (S Thenmoli) and president of his theatre group also got arrested for trespassing after holding a private rehearsal of Talaq in 2000. Maybe if I had threatened to nail Stephenie Meyer shut in a coffin and bury her alive, and MDA intervened accordingly, disgruntled boyfriends and husbands in Singapore would have been spared the torture of sitting through 5 soppy, draggy vampire movies which also promulgate bestial-pedophilia love between wolfmen and little girls. And all that got was a PG rating!

If there’s anything that should be banned, it’s this promo rap video below which MDA produced in 2007; for giving the arts-loving public the false impression that they’re cutting-edge and cool. I rather scrape dried smegma off a rapist’s corpse with my fingernails than listen to this. They just don’t stop, y’all.

Postscript: Barely a week after this ban, a sex scandal involving a pastor from an unnamed church and an underaged girl surfaced. Oh the irony. Elangovan’s fiction is eerily close to the inconvenient truth. Looks like the year of the Scandal is stretching past the Chinese New Year.

Filed under: 2000s, 2013, Art, Bureaucrats, Censors, Religion, Sex, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Esme the guide dog not allowed in Forever 21

Posted on November 30, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Store says sorry over guide dog incident’, 30 Nov 2012, article by Melissa Lin, ST

A FACEBOOK post from a blind woman with a guide dog who recounted her treatment by staff at a Forever 21 clothing outlet went viral yesterday, prompting the American retailer to apologise. Ms Cassandra Chiu, 33, who contracted Stargardt disease when she was eight and lost her vision over time, was at the fashion chain’s Orchard Exchange outlet yesterday afternoon with her six-year-old daughter Kady, a maid and her labrador Esme.

Ms Chiu, a psychotherapist, is the second Singaporean trained to use a guide dog to help her move around.

…After picking up a pair of white pants, she headed to a changing room to try them on. But she was stopped by a female staff member, who told her that no dogs were allowed in the store, Ms Chiu told The Straits Times. She started explaining that Esme was her guide dog, and not her pet, but the staff member walked away before she could finish speaking. “I ended up talking to thin air,” Ms Chiu said.

…Finally, another staff member intervened to say that guide dogs are allowed in the store. Ms Chiu told her to “ask the staff to stop harassing me” and left the store with her purchase of pants.

…The Singapore management of Forever 21 apologised on the post, and said they would like to meet her to apologise in person. “I don’t think that’s necessary,” Ms Chiu said. “The problem is that we need to have a more inclusive society. If they want to do something, they should put a guide dog decal in their store so there won’t be questions about whether guide dogs are allowed inside.”

The president of the Guide Dogs Association of the Blind, Dr Francis Seow-Choen, said people should be more open to guide dogs and be aware of what they are. “They’re not pets. People can be reassured that the guide dogs we bring in have been certified and trained.” Meanwhile, Forever 21 has released a statement saying it has issued an apology to Ms Chiu on its own Facebook page and that of Esme The Guide Dog.

Forever 21 not seeing eye to eye with Seeing eye dog

Esme the dog has her (?) own Facebook page, and it’s more entertaining than BABIES who status update about lactation time. One post recounts how Esme shocked someone while inside the toilet, something I’m not quite used to myself, though I’d rather have a dog staring at me pee than a little girl accompanied by her father. What’s surprising is that Cassandra is only the SECOND blind Singaporean with a guide dog. There could be many reasons why our government has taken so long to implement dogs to help the blind, but some of the most obvious ones are hardly ever mentioned in the article above.

In 1988, it was reported that guide dogs for the blind were barred by various government agencies, of note the Ministry of Health (hospitals and clinics), SBS (buses) with SUPPORT from the predecessor of MICA and, tellingly, the Muslim Religious Council. One can only conclude that the authorities (and certain cultures) deemed a blind man’s helper as a scary, filthy animal, even though a mutt could do more for 1 blind person in its short years of life than a rich, miserly man ever would. The first ever guide dog owner Kua Cheng Hock had to send his pal Stacey back to Australia because of public disapproval. Dogs would have been an economical alternative to enhancing our amenities with disabled-friendly infrastructure, yet we baulk at the thought for the sake of the beliefs or irrational fears of certain individuals. They have been trained not to lick, bite, bark or shit about unnecessarily, which is more than you say of some human beings. I’m not sure if they’ve been trained not to SALIVATE though.

It wasn’t until 2005, when we only had ONE guide dog (Kendra) in the entire country, that SMRT Transit decided to allow them on public transport provided that they were accompanied by station masters and dressed in a harness, just in case there were people who were ‘afraid of dogs’ or ‘culturally sensitive’. Restaurants, with blessings from NEA, followed suit in the same year. Esme in fact posted pics of herself and owner in IKEA, on a bus, in a church, in NTUC, Food Junction and surprisingly, in a cab. This dog has been to more places than the most pampered Pomeranian puppy in Singapore.

Wimp

Wimp

So what do Muslims do when they’re blind and walking canes are not an option? Get a miniature horse, of course. But probably not feasible in Singapore as the poor creatures are likely to be harrassed by kids (and some adults) wanting to ride them like My Little Ponies. Britain passed a groundbreaking fatwa in 2008 allowing a blind teen to walk into a MOSQUE with his guide dog. We’re unlikely to become THAT inclusive, though such acceptance of a taboo animal on holy ground so that one can pray is something to mull over.

Esme’s owner did well to let Forever 21 off with a Facebook post. In other countries, the blind would lodge complaints for discrimination if Muslim cabbies ever refuse to take them. Our PM Lee himself is a fan of ‘inclusiveness’ as well, and unless something is done to address our attitudes and foster compassion towards the blind and their four-legged companions regardless of our religious inclinations, his speeches and tweets would be, well — wait for it — all bark and no bite.

Filed under: 2012, Pesky animals, Religion, Shopping malls | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Not enough sheep for future Korban rituals

Posted on October 27, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Sheep for ritual: Be prepared for alternative arrangements, says PM’, 27 Oct 2012, article by Dylan Loh, Today online.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has said that Singapore should prepare for the possibility that Australia may, like New Zealand, ban live animal exports completely, as Australian animal welfare groups are pressing strongly for this. Writing on his Facebook page yesterday, he said both he and Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs Yaacob Ibrahim were initially worried that the Korban ritual in Singapore might be affected by Australia’s stringent new regulations on live sheep exports.

Fortunately, 16 mosques passed the Australian audits and were able to import 2,500 sheep, which arrived on Thursday morning and were sent to the mosques for yesterday’s Hari Raya Haji ritual.  Those involved in the ritual have been trained to treat livestock in line with international animal welfare standards. There are another two days of audit to get approval for the sheep slaughter practices for next year’s Korban.

Mr Lee, who recently met Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard in Canberra, had thanked her for her government’s help on the matter, and she told him that her government wants to continue exporting live animals. While both countries are working out a long-term solution on the supply of sheep for the ritual, Mr Lee also noted yesterday that Singapore should be prepared for alternative arrangements in future.

I’m going to come right out and say that though I’ve never witnessed a Korban ritual, the thought of an animal being held down while fully conscious, having its throat sliced across and head yanked from its trachea, blood splattering all over the place in honour of a higher power bothers me, to put it mildly. Supporters of this squeamish rite may argue that’s the ‘traditional’ way of getting meat on our plates anyway, and accuse anyone crying foul over its cruelty and ‘barbarism’ as being a hypocrite. According to a snap poll on Huffington Post, these were the results of people asked if they thought Korban was ‘inhumane’ and ‘antiquated’.

It’s understandable that the Australian government is reluctant to sell us their sheep, having to face formidable pressure from animal rights activist groups like ‘Stop Live Exports.org’. The truth is we’ll never know what it’s like to squeeze with other animals on a long flight, paraded in front of worshippers, dragged and strung into a corner against your wishes and wrestled to the ground whilst totally aware of the bloody end to come. We only see the grim, sometimes resigned, faces of animals in Korban images, we don’t hear their gruesome cries of agony (If you’re REALLY interested, just Youtube ‘korban’). I rooted for the little guy who escaped from the clutches of mosque folk in a previous Korban in 2010. It got killed anyway. I couldn’t view an episode of Lamb Chops Play Along without turning away.

Yet, we still have some devotees accusing Yaacob of being a ‘useless Minister of Muslim Affairs’ for not being able to secure enough sacrificial animals or being ‘fleeced’ by Godless Western powers. People are instinctively hopping mad at sheep-curbing regulations without asking WHY these regulations exist. I’m not sure if MUIS would tender for CAMELS if goats, sheep and cattle are all struck by mad (insert animal here) disease.

Maybe korban culture is something we’re just AFRAID of questioning or opening for debate, given how potentially sensitive and emotionally charged it could be. There MUST be sheep as there must be blood. No two ways about it. The local animal rights groups are conspicuous by their silence, not even commenting on the Australian resistance to sheep exports. You could treat sheep with first-class hospitality like Kai Kai and Jia Jia, make sure they’re free of disease and not subject to cramped conditions, that is UNTIL you begin to sharpen the blade and prepare the beast for the kill. It’s like cannibals fanning you with palm leaves, feeding you grapes and massaging your thighs before suddenly hanging you upside down and cracking your head open with a bone axe.

The need to ‘respect’ others’ beliefs forces upon us the dilemma of an ethical double standard in the way we rally against ill-treatment of other animals. We race against time to save wild boars, prevent dolphins from being exploited as RWS playthings, put a bounty on cat killers, consider culling pesky crows cruel, and even managed to get SHARK’S FIN banned at wedding dinners and NTUC. Yet we remain uncomfortably silent about thousands of sheep made to travel thousands of miles in packed containers to be sent to a horrifying, ritualistic demise all over the world. If a symbolic deed obligates us to ‘respect’ it because generations of believers swear by it, does that make it immune from scrutiny or criticism?

Let’s look at Vesak Day for example. Recently NPARKs issued an advisory against releasing caged animals into the wild, which many devotees would also consider a significant ‘ritual’ in Buddhism. The President of the Buddhist Fellowship even encouraged believers to ‘reduce meat intake’ all year round rather than release animals which wouldn’t survive outside. I’m not aware of anybody bashing NPARKs for their intervention, and calling them ‘USELESS’ for curtailing a religious practice. I suppose some Buddhists will still release their pet tortoises into the sea, though I’d imagine these doomed animals would have a couple of things Korban lambs would ‘die’ for 1)A fighting chance and 2)A taste of freedom.

We don’t stone adulterers to death, burn widows at the stake, disembowel animals to tell the future from their intestines, or get to eat shark’s fin soup at a friend’s wedding anymore, though these were once widely viewed as ‘tradition’, so maybe we shouldn’t be so ‘sheepish’ about taking a fresh perspective of Korban rituals too.

Filed under: 2010, 2012, Animal abuse, Festivals, Politicians, Religion, Violence | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Amy Cheong blaming divorce on cheap Malay weddings

Posted on October 8, 2012 by gdy2shoez

From ‘Police report filed against Amy Cheong over offensive Facebook post’, 8 Oct 2012, article in Sg yahoo news.

Singapore police are investigating the former NTUC staff who was fired on Monday morning for her profanity-laced post insulting traditional Malay void deck weddings. A police report was filed against Amy Cheong, assistant director, membership department at labour movement NTUC, by a member of the public, Lionel Jerome de Souza on Monday morning.

De Souza is the secretary of Hougang’s Inter-Racial and Confidence Circle (IRCC), which comes under the purview of the Ministry of Community Development Youth and Sports. In his report, he urged the police to take a serious view of Cheong’s comments which “inevitably hurt the feelings of the Malays”.

In her post on Sunday evening, Cheong had put up a public status on her personal Facebook timeline, complaining about a Malay wedding that was being held at a void deck near her home. Among other things, she related Malay weddings to high divorce rates, and asked how society could “allow people to get married for 50 bucks”, peppering her post with vulgarities.

In a separate post, she also allegedly wrote, “Void deck weddings should be banned. If you can’t afford a proper wedding then you shouldn’t be getting married. Full stop.”

Unless calling a Malay an ‘asshole’ is considered a racial slur, I think this is more a case of carelessness and faulty logic than racism. There are, of course, people who don’t spend a cent outside the registration fee for marriage, and still live happily ever after. If Amy Cheong had complained about the noise rather than associating divorce rates with ‘cheap weddings’, maybe she would have just been let off with a stern warning without getting the sack. For someone who already lost her job, a police report seems like overkill, but for someone in senior management, Cheong should have known better, especially after so many incidents of Facebookers getting in trouble posting ‘silly’ remarks about Muslims, not to mention a certain filmmaker being dealt with death warrants for making a shoddy Internet film where the Prophet was played by an actor looking like Jesus. In such a charged climate of ‘anti-Islamic’ sentiment and its subsequent retaliation, it wasn’t so much a malicious, hateful remark, as it was a really bad idea. Of course our Facebook-savvy PM was quick to dish out the damage control by urging everyone not to let this incident ‘undermine our racial and religious harmony’. But maybe this is more a case of custom intolerance than a hate crime that nearly everyone is making this out to be. If I post on Facebook about ‘damned ding-dong-chiang lion-dancing’ during Chinese New Year, I would get the same treatment from the Chinese community too. Or would I?

Just last year, people were flamed for racial abuse after complaining about McDonald’s playing religious prayers during the fasting month, putting links to images of pigs Photoshopped on the Kabba, or calling kids on kindergarten buses little ‘terrorists’. But let’s see if high ‘divorce rates’ among the Malays is indeed a factual statement, and whether it’s in any way related to ‘$50 weddings’. According to a 2006 commentary by a Malay man, there are 3 typical reasons to explain the high divorce rates among Malays. One, the tendency of women to ‘fall in love’ too easily. Two, the cultural expectations of ‘short courting periods’ and thirdly, general ‘money problems’. In the same year statistics showed that divorcing Muslims stayed in a marriage shorter than non-Muslims (an average of 7.8 vs 10 years), and the most common reason for divorce was ‘personality difference’, followed closely by ‘infidelity’. Just this year, ‘infidelity or extra-marital affair’ took top spot as reason for divorce in Muslim marriages.  There would also be the pressure of ‘remarrying’ within two years as the community supposedly frowns upon single parents. Which suggests that money issues aside, there’s also a hint of  ‘fools rush in’ syndrome. So it’s not just about the ‘affordability’ of weddings that encourages failed marriages (This may well be a myth, you can be charged $1K to $6K just for PLANNING and DECOR alone). One may have to consider whether the union was failed in the first place.

Every once in a while we get annoyed by atrocious singing, throbbing drums, motorcycles chugging and horning, yelling and general littering amid the merrymaking, but I would make the same complaints against Chinese funerals even as a Chinese, just not making a fcuking ass of myself ranting on Facebook about it. I wonder how Amy Cheong would react if someone went:

How many f**king days do Chinese funerals in void deck go on for?F*ck!!!Pay for a real funeral you asshole!How can society allow dead people to lie in a dirty void deck? KNS!

I also stumbled upon a Twitter account of ‘Amy Cheong’ apologising to countless people. I doubt this is the real Amy Cheong, considering that her Twitter icon is that of Ted, the vulgarity spewing bear.

Filed under: 2011, 2012, Bloggers, HDB, Money, Racism, Religion, Weddings | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments »

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