A Singaporean shared on Facebook recently on how Singaporeans need to change their racist attitude towards our foreign workers. The writer also admitted that he himself was guilty of such racism to a certain extent.
Here is his full story.
Like many Singaporeans, I carry a stereotype towards foreign workers. Or used to. We mocked them with insulting names like banglas, ah neh, bengalis. Whenever we see them in trains, shopping malls, or simply come across more than 1 at any one time, we cringe and literally try to get out of harm’s way, as if they are some plague that should be kept away, out of sight and sound, as far from civilization as possible. The only time they should be allowed out to breathe is only when they are needed to build our nice fancy homes, shopping malls and what not, and to pave roads for us to drive our nice fancy cars. Other than that, please don’t let us see you. In the same way we curse Filipino maids for colonizing Orchard Road on Sundays, we avoid Farrer Park area on Sundays. We feel less safe in our own country, fearing especially for our young women and children, our mind having been sub-consciously conditioned that their black-skinned presence = more crime. Even on trains we instinctively hesitate to take a seat they have just vacated, as if black-skinned = dirtier.
In other words, we have become racist towards them. Me included. I don’t think Singaporeans are xenophobic; we have just become, subconsciously or overtly, racist towards certain groups. Imagine if these foreign workers are transformed into white-skinned Caucasians instead. Immediately, in our eyes, Farrer Park on Sundays turns from a third world stink hole into the new, must-go, chic lifestyle destination in Singapore.
The government, and media, do not help, by doing very little to address the national and community narrative around such stereotypes, inadvertently perpetuating such views.
This period has brought such views into sharp focus. We did not pay enough initial attention to one of the most densely packed congregations of people in Singapore at any one time, the foreign workers, in our Covid-19 control and containment measures. Like in normal times, they are just an afterthought. I have friends who say Covid-19 is now “gone”, because the community cases are virtually zero with most of the new cases being foreign workers. It’s as if just because only the foreign workers have it now, Singapore does not need to bother about it anymore. As in normal times, stay out of sight, don’t come and bother us, and you live or die for all we care. Even the distinction between community and foreign worker cases sounds wrong. Aren’t they part of the community? You mean there’s a mainstream community and another taboo, alien community?
I‘m writing this not as a socio-political critique, but as a personal reflection. In Jan, I was at Farrer Park for an errand, on a Sunday. In the past, like many of my fellow Singaporeans, I tried not to go there on Sundays, for the “sky is always dark” and the “air can be hard to breathe”. But it was an important errand. As I was walking back, this foreign worker tapped me from behind. I had dropped my purse. Nothing was missing, not the $300 cash, not the credit cards. I muttered an embarrassed thank you, and tried to offer him $5 as a pitiful, condescending token of reward. He just shook his head, flashed his pearly whites, and walked away. Again, my reaction, while instinctive at that moment, was actually racist in nature. Would I have offered the $5 if it was a Caucasian who returned my purse?
The cynical among you might say, many people are honest and would do the same thing. But that’s the whole point. They are honest, feeling human beings just like you and me. Why see, and treat them, differently? Why allow ourselves to be passively, lazily bound by pre-conceived notions about them?
The Black Lives Matter movement is reverberating around the world. Perhaps we, as a young nation increasingly wrestling with our identity, should also have our own BLM, a moment to reflect deeply and thoughtfully. Maybe not on heinous crimes like police brutality. But on equally important issues like seeing and treating certain races and groups as non-stereotyped, dignified, respected members of ONE community. Not as a castaway alien group whom we couldn’t care less even if they die from a virus.
Source: Storience.co