Well, that's it. The 5^th column-elected new exco of AWARE has resigned in the wake of a no-confidence motion and a new one unaffiliated with the Anglican Church of our Saviour (COOS) or Thio Su-Mien (TSM) has been elected.

All this saga and waste of time and money brought on by Christian extremists who are way too fixated on one "bogeyman".

Bogeymen or cause célèbre is nothing new. Political and religious movements have used it countless of times throughout history to rally their adherents (ie: The Spanish Inquisition, Salem witch trials, burning of witches and perceived heretics, etc etc). Of course in modern day Singapore, it is too politically sensitive and incorrect to use another religion (like Islam in some Western countries) as their bogeyman. So what do TSM and her COOS fellow members do? They learn from their American co-religionist and target homosexuality. Delusional, they sincerely believe there is a hidden gay agenda with a gay mafia in Singapore.

Hypocritically I might add. Since there are countless things the bible denounced and yet they don't seem to have an issue with. For example, remarriage after divorce is adultery according to Jesus and adulterers do not inherit the kingdom of god. Yet we don't seem to hear TSM or Pastor Derek Kong having a field day with that.

But you know what's really sad? It's how AWARE got dragged into TSM and COOS's "spiritual warfare". Yes, they call their fight "Spiritual Warfare". "Holy War" chope by another religion lah.

As far as AWARE and everyone (everyone except you know who) is concern, they are a feminist organisation dedicated to the fight for equality and non-discrimination of females regardless or race, religion, age, language, cultural, financial and sexual background. Since their establishment in 1985, they have advocated, taught, researched, conducted workshops, counselled, etc. etc. Great work if you asked me. Of course some may disagree.

But never were they ever a "homosexual" organisation. The bone of TSM and COOS's contention is just a very small part of their comprehensive sexual education programme for schools which covered homosexuality in neutral terms (neither for nor against) for about 5 minutes or so.

Somehow or other, this was taken out of context by TSM and COOS and blown way out of proportion. All of a sudden, a feminist organisation became a "homosexual one" and fell into the holy gun sights of the extremists. And before they knew it, a fifth column was secretly installed and their members voted into the exco.

I don't blame the original AWARE for this. Never in their right mind did they think that a religious group in Singapore (of all places) won't do such a thing and never did they think they would be a target. I mean they are a feminist organisation dedicated to issues concerning women in Singapore, nothing too controversial about that right?

And who would have thought that a religious group that prided itself on being on the moral high ground would have resorted to such underhanded and distasteful (though legal) hostile takeover tactics usually practiced by greedy corporate raiders of the 80s.

Well, the battle is won for inclusiveness but the war is not over. The extremist likes of TSM and COOS will continue, just like comic book villains, always in the background but showing up once in a while to fight the heroes of the Marvel and DC comic universe.

The upside to this whole fiasco? It has exposed the face of Christian fundies in our midst and has also shown the whole of Singapore that religious extremism is not the sole monopoly of one religion and not all extremists are locked away by ISD.

As for AWARE, I hope the indignation, outrage and passion shown by old and new(est) members will translate into more zest and groundbreaking good work by them.

As for the rest of us, I think after this incident, not just AWARE but all civil societies and NGOs in Singapore should start looking into and tightening up their constitution to prevent another hostile takeover by outsiders.

***

• For minute by minute (well almost) updates of the EGM yesterday, please refer to http://wayangparty.com/?p=8732
  
  
• Also, do read the opinion of a neutral bystander who was appalled by how the new exco behaved at http://wayangparty.com/?p=8513

Labels: civil society, lgbt, religion, secularism, singapore