In this public forum, a very impressive array of panellist was selected. They were Tan Tarn How - playwright, policy researcher and social commentator; Eleanor Wong - playwright and lawyer; Sylvia Lim - Chairman of the Workers Party, Non-Constituency MP and law lecturer; Gayle Goh - JC student and citizen commentator/blogger; and Martyn See - film maker, most famously for "that" movie about Chee Soon Juan, "Singapore Rebel". And making sure that the whole thing did not run amok, the playwright Alfian Sa'at took the chair as moderator.
All of them did a great job in giving their views and take on a lot of issues in a very clear and lucid manner. It was practically a no-holds-barred discussion, and thankfully the audience (which were made up of a cross section of Singaporeans) participated very actively. Some of them were moving and impressive in their own right, Braema Mathi (President of Transient Workers Count Too and former Nominated MP) was especially so.
The topics discussed are way too many to write about here, but there were two things that stayed on my mind.
1) Did you know that as we progressed from third world to first, our political space and freedom has actually regressed? We actually have less of it now then our forefathers did before. Interesting eh?
2) And the most important point to me is the (not new) idea of moral courage. Disregarding all the technical talk about political maturity, consumer choices, voting from heart or mind, or even academic and intelligent discussion on the state of politics in Singapore, the one clear question as posed by Martyn See was whether we as a people or an individual have the moral courage to do the right thing when it's called for. Or as Braema asked, when the crunch comes, will we pass the litmus test? *gulp*
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797)
And at this point, I will leave you with some pictures I took at the forum.
Tan Tarn How, Alfian Sa'at, Eleanor Wong, Sylvia Lim & Gayle Goh
Alfian Sa'at, Eleanor Wong, Sylvia Lim, Gayle Goh & Martyn See
From the side view
Sylvia Lim speaks and everyone listens
The crowd, quite big actually
The end of the forum
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Spotted among the packed audience that day were the Political Editor of ST Zuraidah Ibrahim and her hubby, ex-ST journalist Cherian George. As expected, our MSM was silent on this event, except for a short trivia article in ST Life. Ah well..
BTW, what do you mean by "MSM"?
I am glad you found the forum as engaging as I did. :-)
The "litmus test" of political matureness, citing the phrase used by Braema Mathi at the forum, is when the substantial points raised at the forum are reported in the MSM.
My guess is snatches of comments during the forum will be quoted by Ms Zuraidah Ibrahim in her future columns.