… Samantha, caller on 91.3 FM’s The Married Men show): “I live in Holland Village, and I just can’t understand why people from the heartlands want to come here. We people are cultured, and you heartlanders are definitely not cultured,” she said.
She defines heartlanders as being “people from Ang Mo Kio, Yishun, Toa Payoh and the nearby Bukit Batok” who “have no manners”, “talk loudly” and wear “cheap clothes from Bugis Street”.
“People who come here are cultured. So if you want to come here, you know, when you’re in Rome, behave like a Roman. When you’re in Holland, behave like us – cultured people. “
Samantha also questioned heartlanders’ ability to afford the things that people in Holland Village enjoyed, such as a bowl of laksa, which she claims is more expensive in Holland Village than in Bedok.
But before I proceed, I would like to thank Senior Senile Mini$ter Goh for coining this word and creating a class divide among Singaporeans. Terms like these, along with “quitters” and “stayers” creates nothing more but division among the people. While Goh has the respect of many Singaporeans with his allegedly more consultative style of leadership, this ‘divide and conquer’ strategy (which I considered his modus operandi) has never endeared him to me.
I have no idea wat gave Samantha Salamander the idea that heartlanders are all boorish. It is fortunate (for her) that heartlanders generally refer to just HDB dwellers. Otherwise, her ‘people from…’ comment would then include even those living in landed property as long as they are outside Holland Village, and in fact even include some of our mini$ter$ who lived just a stone’s throw away near Sixth Avenue in Bukit Timah. I can’t help chuckle at that when someone pointed that out.
The Straits Stooge Times wrote that “one of her qualms with heartlanders was that they liked to ‘shove and push’ everybody. She added that some Caucasians along Orchard Road had also complained of the same thing.” It certainly appeared to me that to her, the only people who are cultured and mannered are white. It doesn’t matter we have all encountered ill-mannered people from all races and cultures. I am amazed that after so many years after we broke free from British rule, some people haven’t gotten it into their heads that white people are not any more superior, well mannered or cultured! Well done, Salamander!
There was so much outrage to Salamander’s comment that someone even organised a ‘walk about’ at Holland Village, specifically in sandals and singlets on a particular day just to make a point. Salamander had managed to unify Singaporeans when many of those so-called nation building programs have failed. The government gahmen should perhaps give her an award for contributing to Total Defense! Well done, Salamander!
As if all of these isn’t already bad enough, Salamander then apologised and she said she was just ‘slightly insensitive’ when she made those comments. Now, that was an exemplary lesson on how to apologise and yet ensure everyone remained pissed off. Well done, Salamander! Though I wished she would have done a video apology, so that I can put a face to it just like how ‘Boomz!’ goes with Ris Low.
Now, there is talk on several social media platforms on whether this is 91.3FM’s idea of being funny. Some people mentioned that it is rather rare that a listener would be able to call up and get through to the same radio program two days in a row. If this was indeed a prank, it is too early because it is more than a week before April Fool’s. While in general the idea to package something as entertainment to attract listeners is a good one, stomping on the sensitivities of many people is definitely not funny at all. Had this been a real prank, I would expect those who are responsible to not only publicly apologise on TV, but also resign. Do they sincerely expect us to let them get away with this as being ‘slightly insensitive’ after many of us are now riled up?
Rants aside, this episode has spawned a whole lot of discussions among netizens and some interesting comments. I’ll quote one of the interesting exchange below, and indicate them by acronyms to indicate that they came from two different individuals.
Cultured is as cultured does. To claim one is cultured and another is not, is already being pompous. I’d rather be with a so called uncultured person who doesn’t make disparaging remarks to make another seem inferior, than to talk to one who is ‘cultured’ and yet clearly or subtly puts down anyone he or she feels like. – TF
I am not surprised that there is a group of such elitists.. In fact I’ve seen these happening at ‘elite’ schools in Singapore. Such is the failure of segregating our education systems to ‘gifted’ and ‘normal’ streaming. – ET
Actually being in a better stream, doesn’t really make a person look down on those from the “normal” stream, I remember how we used to mix around despite being from different streams. I believe the difference lies within the way our leaders behave. Being the highest paid (thus viewed as extremely successful) and having that ‘better than thou’ attitude with a huge dollop of self-proclaimed ‘we are the elites’ image, many in society are turning into soulless selfish money-comes-first individuals. Thus when people who behave somewhat differently comes into the picture, they are viewed as a lower form of class or culture. Unless you’re wealthy, then the hypocrites will just pander you and say you’re eccentric and true to self and down to earth. Then of course there are the rascists who ironically look down on their own heritage and race, by placing foreigners as those with the de facto class of aspired culture. – TF
… Many would never openly admit but Singaporean society has all along been moving towards worshipping the successful, looking down on the lower group.
… Singaporean educational system have forced emphasis on subjects that will get you to uni/ poly in view of getting great jobs in future and less on personal development. We need to break this. – ET
Sentiments such as those of Salamander are heard time and again (such as those of Wee Shu Min. I cheekily mentioned somewhere in between the above exchange that if I wanted to stretch the truth a little too far, I would have called this some kind of structural discrimination instituted by the Tali-PAP gahmen. It is the social engineering of the Tali-PAP that created this ‘class divide’.
Elitism is not the only problem this country faces. We are now facing the side effects of the Tali-PAP’s ‘Two child policy’ and the de-emphasis of the importance of Chinese education which includes the dissolution of Nantah and the marginalisation of the Chinese educated of that era. These policies of the Tali-PAP definitely play a part in our current predicament whereby we face economic stagnation without an influx of foreign labour or immigrants, and also the seemingly irreversible degradation of Chinese standard among the local born ethnic Chinese in Singapore respectively.
I am not saying we pin the full blame of the side effects of those policies on the gahmen. Unfortunately they are rarely discussed even by opposition candidates. The media of this country has so successfully engineer the false reality of an infallible Tali-PAP gahmen, that even if the opposition candidates were to bring it up they would be summarily dismissed.