Tag: Rony Tan

Commentary – Rony Tan (II)

Rony Tan is in the news again. This time, he was reported to the police for comments which offends homosexuals in another sermon video.

The video, which is believed to have been uploaded to the church’s website in May last year but was removed from the homepage just one day after the apology was issued, had a new lease of life after it appeared on a blog maintained by Kenneth Tan (no relation to the pastor), a Singaporean working in Shanghai. In the video, the pastor attributed childhood abuse as a cause of homosexuality and linked homosexual people with paedophiles.

He further linked homosexuality with bestiality saying: “If you allow [homosexuality], next time people will want to get married to monkeys. And they will want rights. They’ll want to apply for HDB [a colloquial term to mean a government subsidised flat]. With a donkey or a monkey or a dog and so on. It’s very pathetic.”

Even though I don’t believed in it as a Christian, I joked with my friend that Rony Tan this year 犯太岁 (meaning: in conflict with the Chinese deity ‘Tai Sui‘) considering the kind of ‘bad luck’ he is getting. I even jokingly mentioned that he should hire the services of old ladies in Hong Kong to 打小人 (literally, ‘beat the vile character’) – a pagan ritual in which a paper effigy is beaten with wooden clogs and cursed. In fact, I even wondered if he was born in the year of the Tiger.

But jokes aside, I haven’t watch the video and I don’t intend to. After all, it is not uncommon for Christian pastors to speak out against homosexuality. From just what is quoted, it would appear to me that to accuse him of linking homosexuals with with paedophiles is a deliberate mis-interpretation of his words. The argument that the acceptance of homosexuality will open the door to the acceptance of paedophilia, necrophilia and bestiality has been a common point for many pastors, Christians and conservatives. Everyone should be aware that if Rony Tan is convicted for such an argument, everyone who has presented this argument in their rejection for more rights to homosexual, bisexual and transgendered (HBT) people will be in danger based on precedence.

While I do not know the entire context of his sermons, I will leave my comment regarding this remark at this. He could have been mean in presenting his views or even dismissive HBT people, but I do not intend to join the chorus of condemnation. Beyond that, I will question the motives behind digging out a 9-month old sermon, hot on the heels of his recent ‘coffee meet’ with the Internal Security Department [ISD]. As a Christian, I cannot help but feel there is a political agenda and objective here. Unlike what happened in AWARE which was a clear cut ‘power grab’ by Christians, this is outright persecution of what Christianity can teach as moral or immoral.

I believe the person who pirated the video from the Lighthouse Evangelist site and posted it on Vimeo also made the following commented on Fridae.com to justify his action:

“The Sedition Act prohibits speech that promotes ‘feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore’. This will be a good opportunity to test the government just what it means by ‘different classes’. Are sexual minorities considered ‘class’?”

Perhaps. But this person should be wary that everything can cut both ways. Someone jokingly commented after he read this comment: ‘They’re considered a criminal class, last I checked the statutes…’ While I do not endorse this statement, I do however find it funny when I considered it in the context of Section 377A – a law against sodomy between two males. Anyway, I am not sure whether anyone charged under Section 377A will be considered a criminal.

Now that I am on the point of sodomy (and in particular male sodomy), I must point out that fellow Christians generally loses the argument against the HBT activists the moment they are rapped with a discrimination clause. Though Christians won’t go so far as the Free Community Church in their view on homosexuality, most Christians failed to stand firm and argue that Christianity does not discriminate against homosexuals. It simply has a very strong moral stand against the act of sodomy. I will not go into specifics, since one can easily obtain these so-called ‘hateful’ Bible verses on pro-HBT websites on the topic of ‘homophobia’. (A word which I consider a misnomer since homo as in homo sapiens simply means man. I am not afraid of all mankind and homosexual-phobia would have been more apt.)

To put it in an analogy, I do not discriminate against smokers, but I am certainly against (and I object to) second hand smoke being blown in my face. In a debate on smoking, am I thus discriminating if I stand and speak up for policies that limits or prohibits smoking? Similarly, we must not discriminate against Muslims when we speak up against the acts of terrorism committed by terrorists and extremists who profess to be one. (Not that I even consider the terrorist a person practising Islam to begin with!)

To condemn Christianity for their moral stand against sodomy as being discriminating against the HBT, is the equivalent of meat eaters demanding from religions with teachings against killing animals not to discriminate against them. In short, HBT activists and lobby should stop taking Christians as a convenient punch bag to further their own personal agenda. Christians in Singapore have no quarrel (and do not intend to quarrel) with HBT persons. Simply, most Christians want to say is:

We fully respect those with homosexual (or bisexual / transgendered) tendencies who manage to withstand the great trial that we not required to stand, but we will not legitimize those who do not overcome their ‘instincts’.

On top of which, after the fiasco at AWARE, some Christians here are now increasingly wary and alert to some of the tactics used by the HBT activists and lobby in the U.S. Christians like myself will not yet claim persecution of Christians for the action taken against Rony Tan, but we will make no excuse to condone sodomy.

The HBT lobby in Singapore should be reminded that if they push the Christian community too hard, they might not like it when the Christian community collectively pushes back. Note that a collective effort by conservatives in the U.S. has resulted in 31 states repealing homosexual marriage laws.

I would like to remind my fellow HBT Singaporeans of the freedoms they already enjoyed in Singapore. Do not forget that other than Thailand, Singapore is probably the most HBT-friendly and tolerant in the whole of South East Asia. Take Rony Tan to task for all I cared, but be careful when you start questioning why no Christians object to it. After all, setting a fire may produce warmth, but when out of control a fire might also consume the person who set it.

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Commentary – Rony Tan

Some times, I get really annoyed with the actions of my fellow believers. First, it was Thio Su Mein and Josie Lau with their coup stunt at AWARE. Now, it’s Rony Tan with his offensive remarks of other religions.

I do not know what goes on in their minds. Perhaps for Thio and Josie Lau, they felt themselves to be champions defending good Christian values against homosexuality. While I can understand the ends, I definitely cannot agree with the means. In the case of Rony Tan, perhaps he was overjoyed that someone has come to embrace the love of God and would like to show case it, but he does not need to sound like a jerk while doing so.

In my opinion, the result of the action of both groups had put all Christians in a bad light. Not only did it do nothing to further the Christian message, it is now a set back as more people will be convinced that Christians are religious bigots who are incapable of tolerance and condescending of other religions.

Rony Tan got off lightly just like the person who made offensive comics on Jesus Christ. The ISD merely slapped him on the wrist by warning him. He could have been fined (or jailed?) for sedition just like the couple who put offensive tracts into the mailbox of their Muslim neighbours. Fortunately for him, the magnanimous leaders of the other religious communities he so offended had accepted his apology. Unfortunately for the rest of us Christians, the general animosity against Christianity from members of other faiths probably raised a few notches.

Looking back at the entire matter, I had originally wondered why would Rony Tan made such offensive remarks to the general public. I then discovered that he did so to his congregation, and the video was then made available on the public domain – the church website. His biggest mistake was to believe that since this is meant for the consumption of his church members or other Christians, they would perhaps have found it inspiring or acceptable. Sadly, not only did he fail to consider the possibility that among the congregation there could be non-believing visitors invited by Church members, who would hope that they would be inspired by the message and turn to Jesus, he obviously also failed to understand anyone could have accessed the website to view those videos and make a copy due to the open nature of the Internet.

Though without a doubt his message was offensive in nature, I must also ask why a person who does not already agree with the Christian message is viewing the video on the church site. It would suggest to me the objective of this person was to clearly seek contention and clearly he ‘hit a gold mine’ this time. I absolutely question the intention and the purpose of the person reposting those videos to the Internet since some of the reaction would definitely not be directly at Rony Tan, but would spew over to the rest of the Christian community. But before I go further into that, I must point out that unless Rony Tan (or his church) was dumber than I thought, it is unlikely they would have given permission to post these videos on Youtube. As such, some copyright laws have already been broken in this case when the video was produced by and legally belonged to the church. The person who post it should be wary of this on top of the other associated troubles.

Now, back to the objective of the posting those videos on Youtube, I would hope that the intention is not sinister and solely for the purpose of getting Rony Tan to understand the seriousness and stupidity of his remarks. However, I wondered had the person first confronted Rony Tan directly, and only chose the drastic action of publicising the videos only after the pastor was unrepentant and uncompromising. After all, the videos on Youtube will now alert and even anger more people who would otherwise not have known of those offensive remarks.

Since Rony Tan has apologised and the leaders of the offended religious communities have accept his apology and even gone so far to declare they do not intend to unnecessarily pursue the matter any further, I cannot help but suspect there is a more sinister intent – to incite public anger targeted at the Christian community at large – for every other minute the videos remain online.

I believe the Internal Security Department (ISD), which is ever vigilant in preventing any outbreak of animosity between racial and religious communities in our country has already considered this and planned to take appropriate action. Otherwise, it would indicate to everyone that it is perfectly alright to incite anger and hatred against Christians when there is now no further purpose for the videos to remain online. Since the comments of Rony Tan are seditious, shouldn’t anyone who continue to publicise them now be considered an accomplice of sedition, no matter what his original intentions and purposes are? Just like when the Far East Economic Review (FEER) published the libelous comments of Chee Soon Juan, it was also sued for libel by our esteemed leaders of the government gahmen. To further elaborate, if these videos are allowed to stay on Youtube, does it not suggest it is alright for anyone else (or even me) to publish those tracts online even after the couple who distributed offensive tracts about the Muslim Prophet has been convicted by a court? I doubt the court would look at it kindly even if I argue (or justify) my intention as educating the public on what is offensive to our fellow Muslim Singaporeans.

While the ‘delivery method of the offense’ between the tracts and Rony Tan’s comments is different – the former being active (delivered to the doorstep), while the latter being passive (brought to attention by someone else), the question now would be who should now be held responsible for ‘delivering the offense when those video are left online after the culprit has admitted and apologised. Consider the scenario: When this matter has blown over, another person who may have no recollection of the entire affair may come across these videos several years down the road. Would it not then have caused continual distress and anger to this person, even when Rony Tan may no longer have made any such comments for a long time?

I would also want to point out, now that a pastor can be criticised for his message to his congregation, the pandora box is now opened for anyone to take any religious teachers to task using the same methods as long as they considered the remark offensive. While I am not suggesting that it is wrong to take Rony Tan to task, it is possible that instead of promoting religious tolerance the exact opposite is now achieved. It certainly implied to me that it is now ‘open season’ for anyone to criticise a teacher of another faith as long as he didn’t like what is spoken about his religion.

To think of it… atheists who considers all faiths to be hogwash and superstition should take note of the plight of Rony Tan and be wary whenever they mock believers of a religion.

Addendum: I was informed that one of the users have removed the video from his Youtube channel.