Post for 17th of February

Topic for 17th February Task 4: How should Singaporeans respond to the recent spat between her neighbours and her?

I believe that Singapore instead of retaliating, should remain silent or issue a public statement to clarify things as a whole once and for all. I feel that we should let the public see the truth for themselves as time will solve all problems.

Take for example, the accusation by Tun Mahathia Mohammed, alleging that the land reclamation projects in Singapore was the root for Johor's flooding problem. However in the annual environment report of the world, it was obvious that the rise in water levels, which contributed to the floods in low lying areas, is due to the 1degree Celsius rise in global temperature, causing the melting of the polar icecaps. If after reading this report, people still choose to rouse up nationalistic feelings, then regardless of anything we do to try and clarify things, it would all be fruitless effort on our part.

Another thing is the spat between Thailand and Singapore over the sale of ShinSat, a Thai national asset, to Temasek Holdings, a Singapore company. This buy over is caused fury among Thai nationals and they have demanded the recovery of ShinSat. The Thai military had also pointed an accusatory finger at Singapore for listening and monitoring their military communications. However apparently, in the Newpaper of the Saturday, 24th of February, a group of Thais, probably from ShinCorp, the mother company of ShinSat, clarified that the military communications is not routed through the satellites of ShinSat and thus is impossible to be monitored by Singapore.

Therefore, similarly for the sudden ban of sand trade between Singapore and Indonesia, I feel that Singapore should remain silent and stay in a neutral position, so as to maintain our relationships with neighbouring countries as positive as possible. Besides due to the size of our country, we cannot afford to offend our greater neighbouring countries, lest they launch an attack on us; one which we may not be able to defend against.

"Do you think professional parenting is the way to go for Singapore?"

To many in Singapore, professional parenting is the way to go, however in my point of view, this is one thing that should not be sanctioned. Most of the time, the need for professional parenting is closely intertwined with the long job hours of BOTH PARENTS.

What are parents and their roles in the society or even the small family units that exists now? Parents are supposed to be the guide and guardians of the younger generation, ensuring their healthy growth both physically and mentally such that the young will grow to be useful individuals in the future and society. However the trend now is that the "parents", instead of personally taking care of their young, are putting their sacred duties aside and are fighting for materialistic wants under the pretext of "giving their children a better life". I understand that people may try to justify their actions by stating that their financial output is greater than their income. On hindsight, if one do not have the means to pay, why spend so much?

Moreover there is not a universal definition of a "better life" to children or adults. Parents nowadays have the tendency to tie this idea down with materialistic satisfaction. Thus they embark on their journey to climb corporate ladders for greater financial benefits and giving their children a life of no worries, such that anything they ask for, they will get it. In this sense, it is obvious that parents fail to see the fact that it is only through facing adversity together can family members bond and understand each other better. It is also through adversity that children can be moulded into upright characters and thinking individuals. Not forgetting, children also require their emotional wants to be satisfied too. This can never be done by the money that parents work so hard for.

Regardless of any reasons given, it is undeniable that parents spend most time with their children, and are thus at a better position to change and affect their children most. Therefore I feel that professional parenting is not the way for Singapore as Singapore requires and relies heavily on human resource and the only way for growing talents and useful individuals is through cultivation of the younger generations within the small family units, done personally by the parents.

Carbon offsetting becoming good business(The Straits Times 2/2/07, World)

In recent times, "Environmental Conserservation" has been the buzz term on everyone's lips, regardless of politicians or common folks. Definitely, it is reassuring to see that efforts are put in to find the best methods to conserve and to match the global notion to "Save our planet". We might not have realised but the notion had been around for the past decade or longer and had been spread through many different mediums, for example campaigns and media. Just in Singapore, we had the "Clean and Green" campaign, which went on for several years, the "Pollution-free" day, when people are strongly advised to take public transport in a bid to reduce pollution from vehicles, and the "Smoke-free zones", which was implemented last year, prohibitting people to smoke in public areas, except for the limited smoking zones specially allocated to them. Cartoons were also used as a medium to educate the young on this notion. An example is " Captain Planet". This cartoon depicts the adventures of 5 teenagers, all from different parts of the world and from all walks of life, who dedicated their lives on environmental conservation. They each received the powers of Wind, Water, Fire, Earth and Heart respectively, and when these powers combine, they summon a superhero called Captain Planet.
In these way, this cartoon is spreading the message that as long as everyone work together, the destruction of our Mother Earth can definitely be avoided.
Through these various ways, people all over the world will be inculcated with the idea of environmental conservation. However these efforts are mere talks. The real cost of Environmental Conservation can amount to figures that people may not be able to imagine. Just in Singapore alone, the government had already invested an estimate of S$2billion into researches of water and environmental technologies, which include the cleaning up of sewage, toxic waste, reducing everyday pollutions from vectors like vehicles, fossil burning for fuels, and etc. Moreover, even the costly "green" cars which run on either electricity or hydrogen gas are only in their initial research phases and are not so much ready to be put into practical use. Our local government has introduced the installation of a hydrogen gas tank in cars as an alternative to petroleum fuels. This will reduce the pollution levels but due to the fact that people will have to travel all the way up to Jurong Island in order to refill the tank, puts people off the idea.
Now with companies getting people to pay in order to offset their carbon pollution incurred on the environment, it has presented environmental conservation researches with a funding that comes from not only the country's annual revenue, but also from the public directly. Undeniably, this will give a boost to the efforts on Environmental Conservation but there is always two sides to a coin.
Concerns have been raised on this act by companies. Arguments had stated that such acts are more of a bane than boon to our global notion. Concerned parties fear that this will mislead people to thinking that it is alright to pollute the environment so as long as they contribute to the fundings for the related scientific researches to save our planet. Possibly, this is the dangerous thinking that will destroy our Mother Earth. Therefore, i feel that these companies and related organizations should reach out to people and emphasize that carbon offsetting is merely a temporary effort to aid the finding of viable environmental conservation solutions, and the best solution to put an end to our environmental woes would be to avoid and minimise our individual pollution.
In short, this would be a critical action plan to put forth, especially when our climate is facing major changes, with global warming becoming increasingly serious. It was reported in the news on the 2nd of February that in the past year, our climate had a rise in temperature of approximately 1 degree Celsius, which resulted in the melting of icebergs at the poles and the consequential floods all over the world.