Wind In My Hair wrote:
hey calm down. people here are not faulting you for your race, but because of the things you say. you will find that racial slurs and prejudices are generally not very welcome here, but genuine issues and observations will be civilly discussed.
Although no one directly faulted me for my "race", what they said did have such an undertone.
as far as prejudices not being welcome in singapore... from talkingcock.com (considering how singapore lacks freedom of speech/expression, this tells you a lot about the singaporeans' racist attitudes)...
BANGLA (Contributed by Andrew Yong)
Racist abbreviation of "Bangladashi."
http://www.talkingcock.com/html/lexec.p ... a=B&page=1
I'm pretty certain all of you heard this slur before, used in a derogatory manner, more than once during your stay in Singapore; so you know it's not a figment of my imagination.
k1w1 wrote:
Just wondering, Bangladeshi Wonder, where do you think things might be better for you?
It's certainly not perfect here, but I am realistic enough (I think) to know that home (NZ) is certainly no better - for me anyway. This is one little island I will be happy to call home for a wee while yet.
For your first question, it's not DIRECTLY relevant to this discussion. This discussion centres around singapore and not somewhere else. I just injected a few contrarian ideas to this otherwise bland discussion. Most forumers are apparently of the opinion that singapore is heaven on earth while I merely pointed out that the same place, with the same peoples occupying it, is NOT quite as great if you happen to belong to some "undesired" group, say some undesired "nation" or "religion" or "race" or something along that line.
Since you brought it up k1w1, is there anything remotely resembling a racial slur for people from Bangladesh in NZ? Is "Bangla" considered the worst of the worst slurs in NZ? I'd be glad to know if it exists over there. I'm pretty sure you'd be much better informed than myself on kiwi attitudes towards foreigners (which I suspect will be somewhat linear - as in either an attitude of disgust , or one of nonchalance or of admiration etc will exist and it will be the same for ALL foreigners. In singapore, certain foreigners are highly admired while others aren't even considered human, so the general attitude towards foreigners is not uniform, it varies greatly depending on who the foreigners are).
For the second part of your post, I don't think I need to make a comment as that's just YOUR opinions.
Besides what point is there of stating the obvious - it isn't perfect in singapore (obviously!) and it isn't anywhere else on earth either (again, obviously!).
No society is free of crimes and neither is singapore. BUT for MOST foreigners, isn't Singapore relatively crime-free? No one complains about crimes in Singapore. Similarly there are bound to be many places where the extent of overt (or even, covert) discrimination is much much lower than Singapore and other places where it's somewhat higher. Stating the obvious isn't of much use IMHO....esp. in this context.
This is one little island I will be happy to call home for a wee while yet.
Even if we were to ignore my comments as "foolish", wouldn't your own assertion above, that you won't like to stay in singapore for an extended period of time, tell us about how desirable, how great it is as a place to stay in?
I understand there are many foreign construction workers in Singapore, hailing from India, Bangladesh, Thailand and many other countries. But given that there are Singaporeans who are locally known as "Indians" no one will like to make the "Indians" the subject of ridicule as it may lead to racial riots. Given the racist inclinations of the Singaporeans, they'd much rather deride a different "race" of workers and consequently the one country that they all agreed upon to deride is Bangladesh.
While given the myopic local viewpoint, this is perfectly reasonable no society that wants to avoid the label "racist" will brook such nonsense in the first place. Afterall, for the singaporeans, Bangladesh is a poor country. There isn't exactly a sizable minority of Bangladeshis in Singapore who call it their homes and the cultural and racial differences from a Singaporean either of Chinese or Malay descent is so great that Bangladeshis seem to be the perfect scapegoat for ALL things alien and wicked/troublesome.
Basically that's why they think it's fun to consider a certain nation to be below themselves, as I myself often noticed during my interaction with many Singaporeans. Funnily enough, foreigners from neighbouring countries aren't much better in Singapore. Malaysians, Indonesians and many Indians (from India) are of the same ilk.
While it may surprise many of you, the LEAST racist people turned out to be foreign white/Caucasians, who in Singapore are generally perceived to be the greatest race (as in, they are generally respected the most and held in high esteem) by the majority of its inhabitants, whether they be local singaporeans, or foreigners from neighbouring countries or from India, China or many other countries.
As it turns out, there have been many genuine friends I made who were white. But not even ONE singaporean/chinese/indian could I trust because of the (same good old reason) attitudes of condescension.
Try to think about it, why did no singaporean/chinese/indian/malaysian or other asians find me suitable as a friend/equal (not just asians, any nonwhites) while white persons of european descent more often than not did?
I can't ascribe it to my attitude, to my lack of understanding of their cultures or even my nationality. It just seems plainly obvious that only a certain group of peoples hold the least amount of bias, in general, relative to other chinese/malay/indian/malaysian/PRC/korean/japanese/etc etc ethnicities.
I'm just worried that stating the obvious (that whites, those people of european descent, are generally highly regarded by all nonwhites IN singapore) may lead to censorship. But it isn't my intention to deride or glorify any "races".
I'm just curious as to why only a minority of inhabitants in Singapore will display favourable attitudes towards myself while a majority, in fact, ALL of the local singaporeans, the foreigners from china, india, malaysia, indonesia, brunei, thailand, korea, japan, vietnam etc did not.
I'm eager to know WHY the friendly people came from ONLY among those of european descent. Mind you, not ALL caucasians were friendly and nor was I towards them. And that's what I consider perfectly natural.
What's unnatural is that americans (just an example, other foreigners of chinese, african, or japanese descent were alike) who're NOT white behaved in exactly the same manner as the nonwhite local or foreign population in singapore.
Perhaps to all those ultra pro-singapore fanatics, it just happens that a LOT of white guys and I have an attitude problem. The rest of the people in Singapore, like the chinese, malays, indians, malaysians, koreans, americans of chinese, korean or african, etc descent when it comes to dealing with "snobs" like myself show me the appropriate respect.
I just wonder how many such ultra pro-singapore fanatics are out there.
. 
Been here 5 years and love it!!! 
for him to send home. His grandma passed away in the unfortunate event.
. Why? Somebody please tell me, as its one of the only annoying aspects of this place. In the end, you learn to drive the same, but I don't like it one bit. All in all though, that's a minor complaint in an otherwise very pleasant country.
