A Most Crucial Omission Saturday, Oct 25 2008

Wow. My letter to TODAY actually got published! To think that I nearly missed reading it because I skipped breakfast on Friday. Haha.

Unfortunately, I’m having extremely mixed emotions about this. After feeling a small wave of excitement, I realize that my letter, as it was published, sucks.

It has no point, and sounds like the weird rambling of an incoherent buffoon. Most importantly, it sounds mundane and boring. Which is so far from what I had intended it to be.

The reason why, is that the TODAY publishers omitted the most crucial sentence in the entire thing.

(I think most of you can already guess what sentence I’m referring to.)

Indeed, as our society rapidly changes, there is a need to rethink traditional notions of “family”. (”Confucius Will Flip”, October 20)

But imagine if, in an effort to preserve a particular family model, the government required that grandparents, parents and children all lived together, made it compulsory for married couples to have children, and forbid single parenthood.

Imagine the outrage society will feel: surely we have the right to organize our own private lives. Yet this imaginary scenario is all too real for gay and lesbian Singaporeans, who are banned from forming a family of their own.

Indeed, it is time for us to accept that different people have different ideas of what “family” means to them, and stop demanding that everyone adheres to one particular family model.

I’m still glad that I got published, I suppose. But the point of the letter is very much lost.

And of course, as characteristic of the Mainstream Media, the letter was accompanied by a picture of a typical heterosexual family, as though afraid that other people might actually realize the implications of what I’m trying to say.

The only good thing is that the idea of government non-interference in private lives still comes through. Kind of.

Oh well, Jia Yi, you’re half right. They published most of my letter, but they certainly didn’t publish my views.

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Letter to TODAY Monday, Oct 20 2008

Just sent in my second letter to TODAY newspaper. Don’t think not sure if they’ll publish it. Haha. I think writing such letters is quite fun. Quite relaxing too.

Dear Sir/Madam,

Indeed, as our society rapidly changes, there is a need to rethink traditional notions of “family”. (“Confucius Will Flip”, October 20)

But imagine if, in an effort to preserve a particular family model, the government required that grandparents, parents and children all lived together, made it compulsory for married couples to have children, and forbid single parenthood.

Imagine the outrage society will feel: surely we have the right to organize our own private lives. Yet this imaginary scenario is all too real for gay and lesbian Singaporeans, who are banned from forming a family of their own.

Indeed, it is time for us to accept that different people have different ideas of what “family” means to them, and stop demanding that everyone adheres to one particular family model.

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Isshokenmei Sunday, Oct 12 2008

Well, it has been ages since I’ve posted a new post, mostly cause I didn’t feel like writing anything personal while people were still swarming my blog to look at my previous post. Haha.

Now it seems mostly to have died down; people have longer attention spans than I expected.

I suppose I’m glad that I did what I did, and hopefully it encouraged people to give the issues a little more thought.

But anyway, we at the stone tables were talking randomly, and we happened to talk about the difference between Western and Japanese comics/manga. In Western comics, the magic comes first, then the purpose. Get bitten by a radioactive spider, then decide to stop crime.

In Japanese manga, it’s the other way around. You have something to protect, therefore (meaning a causal relationship) you have some kind of power.

Well, I was just throwing up the idea anyway, since I couldn’t be too sure whether that was true, since I don’t read much manga/comics. But apparently, the avid manga readers in my class agreed that that was the case.

And then Zhi Hui brought up another very common theme of Japanese manga: tsuyoku naritai. Roughly translating to “I want to become stronger”. This theme I can recognize very easily; you always see manga heroes going through intensive training, and always swearing to become stronger. This truly seems like a univeral quality of Japanese manga/anime, from the likes of Hikaru No Go and Yakitate, to the likes of Bleach and Samurai X.

But then, I stumbled across in my random readings another very common theme in Japanese manga: isshokenmei. Roughly traslating to “make a last desperate effort”. You know, whenever the protaganist seems to be losing a battle, he suddenly reaches out for some hitherto unknown powers and suddenly becomes super imba. I can think of many examples, like Bleach and Prince of Tennis.

And right now, I suppose isshokenmei is exactly what I need.

To make a last desperate effort, as though my dear life depended on it. In an important sense, my life does depend on it.

And really, I need to rally all my available strength to help me do this.

Every resource is expendable, every step worth the effort.

I have taken my final breath, and now it is time for the plunge.

It is time for the make or break intensive training period.

I must excise all distractions, kill off all frivolity.

In this endeavor, I will have my allies, and I will have my enemies. Time will tell which is which. Or neither.

Things that work against me must be destroyed. Those who do not help me must be avoided.

No longer, will I give what I do not receive.

I will throw off the shackles of comfort and wishful thinking.

It is time.

Seek freedom, and be captive to your desires. Seek discipline, and find your liberty.

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