Is Singapore really such a mature society?

Categories: Singapore

I was on a bus this morning when this question struck me. I was watching the TV mobile which was showing the promotional clips on an upcoming local production called "A Light Affair". The thing that caught my attention was when the girl was asked what type of underwear she likes, and she replied "I like nothing". Is Singapore truly so opened?

I find Singapore is a land of contradictions. You enlist 18 year old boys for reservist. Yet they are not allowed to vote in the election. They are given condoms on oversea stint and yet they cannot watch R(A) movies. And now you have Desperate Housewives and A Light Affairs and yet sex education is still a taboo although this is slowly changing.

Outwardly Singapore seemed to have reached a certain level of maturity. This is because Bedroom scenes are in abundance on our TV. And this include local productions. We even have the 'notorious' Crazy Horse performance, bar top dancing and I am sure others which I am not familiar with. All these presumed a certain level of maturiy.

However, there lies the contradictions again. People are 'encouraged' to be courteous. The Police have to 'defend' themselves when they try to stop racing on our roads. Camera had to be installed in lifts so as to 'discourage' people from urinating in lifts. The list goes on and on.

My suspicion that our society is a pseudo-mature one is strengthened when I read an article directed from tomorrow.sg by Sonic. The article highlighted that skateboarding is not allowed in the Esplanade. This may sound strange because here we have people harping on creating a vibrant society and at the same time we have people stopping what would constitute the creation of a vibrant society. Granted that the authorities is concerned for the safety of the people using the Esplanade, would this suggest that our society is not mature enough as to differrentiate between having clean good fun and infringing on others privacy?

So unless some tweaking is done at every level, our so called mature society status is at best a pretentious one.