Singapore in Colour | Hacker News Reader

Singapore in Colour

straitstimes.com

116 pointscolinprince93 comments

i love the names for these colors. very evocative of singapore landmarks that i didn't previously realize were that strongly associated with a color. "Monsoon Grey" did get a laugh from me - i used to joke that there are basically 2 seasons in SG - wet and wetter.

the scrollytelling is also a work of art. the rescrambling towards a neighborhood palette was a wow moment for me. i feel like online data journalism is its own art form that deserves a museum.

I’m also pleased that the Merlion made an appearance with “Merlion White”.

I don't mind wet and wetter, I mind the 3 seasons — hot, hotter, hottest.

Some areas of Singapore - e.g. Bendemeer, Kovan, Fort Canning Park - are available on the aerial "45 degrees view" of Google Maps.

I would call it already quite colourful from the aerial view.

I would love the ability to classify my own images by palette similarly and geolocation. Is there any code available to replicate this?

After visiting both Malaysia and Singapore recently, I feel like many villages in Malaysia are significantly more colourful than Singapore. Building and roof colours they use are not something you would see in my part of the US

Malaysian here. Yeah some of the historical sites in Penang or Melaka come to mind. I think the Peranakan [1] culture is one of the most obvious examples in using colors and is widespread to the region, not just in Singapore.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peranakans

I think one thing Singapore does that is fairly unusual is paint the HDBs a wide variety of colours. For context, Singapore builds a lot of high-rise housing and sells it to locals with huge subsidies. About three quarters of locals live in these types of buildings.

https://www.timeout.com/singapore/things-to-do/the-most-inst...

The strangest thing; I found this one interesting comment in this thread with a large subtree of comments that was somehow so downvoted that it became hidden:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37356809

I wonder what caused that.

An admin caused that, most likely to prevent a political flame war.

Something about Singapore really triggers us, the descendents of the old empire.

HN is far more censored and moderated than it appears.

Good concept, improper expression. It may be interesting to relate the visually bright aspect of Singapore to the perception of unnatural, stressful, unconvincing feeling it may give, as «if the feeling of being on antidepressants was a city» (as per the poster), but the note expressed as it was seems too disconnected from the submission.

"Barcelona, the skyline": "Organized in view of proper flow" vs "Makes you forget the traffic" vs "Ah yea but the traffic".

Discussions about "life in Singapore" can be, I concour, very interesting (some of us have this dream of the champion city) - just not anywhere and anyway. So, it is normal that some people will go "what is this here" on an imperfect post. I don't see why you call it t«he strangest thing» and what is there to «wonder».

Update: downvoter explain yourself.

It’s difficult to pinpoint the exact reasons but Singapore constructed to be a nationalistic/patriotic country. Children are made to sing the National anthem and recite the National pledge every morning in school, sent to participate in the National Parade at least once in their lives, constantly reminded of the fragility of the Nation from foreign influences (Total Defence), all males are conscripted into what is called National Service for a period of two years. Coupled with the lack of civil and political liberties, resulting in the infantilization of the citizens, even justified criticism of the country is often considered as an attack on the country and/or their identity. The conflation of the state with the government with the one-party authoritarian system makes that even worse. [0]

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politi...

Than you for the suggestion of Singapore: Identity, Brand, Power from Kenneth Paul Tan, and your note is interesting,

but I doubt that post got primarily downvoted by nationalists :)

You’re welcome. He is among those whom I consider scholar-in-exile, scholars who were forced out of the local academia for politically motivated reasons (writing against the authoritarian government). Cherian George being the most well-known of them. [0]

My other recommendations would be Jothie Rajah’s Authoritarian Rule of Law [1] and Sergei Guriev & Daniel Treisman‘s Spin Dictators [2].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherian_George#Academic_career

[1] https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/authoritarian-rule-of-l...

[2] https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691211411/sp...

I lived there for 3 years & this summed it up perfectly. Under the shiny surface is an unpleasant authoritarian nanny state run by an oligarchy.

It's nice if youre there for a week on vacation or on are an executive on an expat package but theres a rot underneath.

Don't think it has worked though. People in generally don't seem to give a shit. Everyone is worried about day to day stuff - the price and availability of housing (getting kind of stupid now), inflation, job security, trouble with neighbors, ... etc.

Personally, the only good thing about Singapore is its relatively good governance - which covers a lot but it's not perfect; e.g. housing.

For me, remove that and its just an island in the Pacific.

If I'm supposed to be feeling some sort of patriotic zeal, it hasn't happened yet. But maybe that's because I'm a bitter old man living in a rented one room flat who is now really feeling the apparent temperature of 32C at 09:45pm.

> Coupled with the lack of civil and political liberties, resulting in the infantilization of the citizens, even justified criticism of the country is often considered as an attack on the country and/or their identity.

When you write things like this, you sound like you are saying something along the lines of “stupid [Singaporeans], they are too brainwashed to understand why I’m right!”.

Did it ever occur to you that the reason why so many Singaporeans disagree with your “justified criticism” is that they actually do understand what their country is like and they want it that way?

A lot of good architecture there but I found Singapore the most existentially-horrifying place I've ever been. It's like if the feeling of being on antidepressants was a city.

William Gibson famously called it “Disneyland with the Death Penalty”.

So Florida but without an actual Disneyland?

I looked into living there almost a decade ago (doing remote work, software work is still not valued highly locally, afaik) but after a few visits and talking to tech people there I realized I probably wouldn't enjoy living there.

I think Singapore is the number one indication that the corruption indices are bogus.

It’s the Corruption Perceptions Index. Not the Actual or Measured Corruption Index.

Exactly.

Can you explain a bit? Why is Singapore corrupt?

Most of the problems I was made aware of had to do with international trade, not domestic trade.

One guy I met said he privately imported (some of) the goods needed to build his home by containers from Europe because buying them locally was like double the price, because that meant buying them from essentially government-party-appointed resellers.

I obviously have no way of verifying the truth of that statement but you did ask.

i mean thats gotta be a huge home because no way that economically makes sense if you think about it

so that was what you meant by corruption? like corruption not in the governmental and bribery sense but corruption by evading loosely-regulated law?

> One guy I met said he privately imported (some of) the goods needed to build his home

Someone having their own home built in Singapore would have to be extremely wealthy. And the fact that shipping goods from Europe made any kind of economic sense suggests these were luxury goods.

So, yeah. I'm going to entirely discount this anecdote.

Singaporean here. Singapore has always be a free port. Anyone can setup a business and legally import items. There are no such thing as “government-party-appointed resellers”.

Best to entirely disregard this anecdote.

FWIW. https://www.academia.sg/academic-views/singapore-crony-capit...

> I think Singapore is the number one indication that the corruption indices are bogus.

You haven't even come close to supplying any real evidence to back this claim.

What kinds of corruption have you observed?

It's a sad state of affairs when even the corruption indexes have fallen prey to corruption. But then again, what financial center around the world isn't corrupt? Where money congregates, corruption is the rule.

Having lived and worked in a number of Asian countries, Singapore remains as one of the countries with very low levels of corruption.

I work for a FAANG in Singapore. The above statement about remote work and software work being not valued are not based on facts/reality. My manager is the least bothered if I come to work or WFH, as long as I delver results/work assigned.

Historically engineers (including software) are considered blue collar - that’s what I heard multiple times from the locals. That’s what I experienced myself while living and working there. FAANG is not a good example, try working outside of the FAANG bubble and see for yourself.

I think this would help put this topic in context: http://elijames.org/the-two-tiers-of-singapores-tech-compani...

Can you briefly summarize this wall of text?

The point of providing a link here is to outsource the explanation to someone who does it better. If you take issue with that, you could always get chatGPT to summarize for you.

I thought you had a point to discuss and linked the article to illustrate that point. That would have been interesting.

If this link was purely informational - I’m sorry, I’m not interested.

Freedom of speech is obviously an issue in Singapore, and I think the government using legislation to “fact-check” the media is quite troubling, but…

I really don’t think Singapore is very corrupt. I’ve lived and worked there, and every interaction I’ve ever had with the government reinforced my perception that they would always deal with me fairly. I trust them more in that sense than I have trusted the governments in western countries that I’ve lived in (many of which have recently started to abandon the free-speech advantage they’ve previously held over places like Singapore).

Singapore is one of the few places I’ve been where the government is both highly competent and is predominantly focused on the best interests of its people rather than itself. POFMA is an issue. It’s a socially conservative country, but the government is a little more liberal than its people; I get the impression the government leans more conservative than it would like to, just to keep the pioneer generation happy.

This is basically true. Liberal cosmopolitan types are the government, may be not the MPs although they are being pulled anyway from their younger technocratic underlings. The older folks, religious folks, etc are the reason for the social conservatism, it's essentially done to appease them. I don't think government cares, just like most global businesses, they've found doing the corporate-rainbow capitalism stuff is good for business, which is a mixed bag for progressives in general but is what it is. I think in with a different public the same technocrats in the PAP would end up being as rainbow capitalist as the rest of the world, with it's benefits and issues.

Singapore isn't really corrupt, it's just that the rich are allowed to play and everyone else is allowed to suffer.

Hyperbole aside, I actually really enjoy my life here. It's just really expensive (that's the "rich are allowed to play" bit). People are very friendly and down to earth which is something I don't usually experience in the other big, dense cities I've visited (San fran, LA, NYC, DC, Paris, etc).

This puts into words how that city made my wife and I feel. Very well said, in my opinion

You get the feeling it's the way the world would be if it were run by an all-powerful computer.

I live in Singapore and haven't found this at all. My only real complaints are (a) it's hot, and (b) it's a small, dense, urban environment with too many cars, it often feels quite suffocating.

There is a third issue (freedom-of-speech), but I figure as a foreigner it's not my place to complain about that.

Same. When I hear things like that I don’t see how it relates to Singapore at all. Maybe if you’re a tourist here for a few days and never leave the city centre, or if you’ve never visited and just read that Disneyland article that is mentioned every time Singapore comes up on Hacker News. I spent yesterday wandering around nature, saw a giant atlas moth, some snakes, and some crocodiles. The very opposite of “existentially-horrifying”.

> too many cars

Compared to where? Singapore is probably the best example of ubiquitous public transport on earth. Owning a car in SG is more a flaunt than sensible decision from a financial or health point of view.

> There is a third issue (freedom-of-speech)

As an ang moh can relate but what exactly is stifling you from speaking your mind? Here we are talking about it. The young are rising up in the country and it's great to see, there's been windbacks on laws against gays along with other pretty stark sentiment changes in the population, there's a real fear in the ruling party about being the first to lose government and they are quick to bend to the whims of the populace.

The main outlet for an everyday person is online and here we are. No one is stopping you, no one is certainly stopping r/singaporeraw

> small, dense, urban environment

Borneo, one of the most biologically diverse places on Earth is an hour away on a plane. There's untamed jungle trails an hour across the border if you care to walk them.

> it's hot

For the first few months, then you adapt.

Singapore has a very high level of space devoted to car infrastructure. It has little infrastructure for cyclists, despite cycling being a large part of it's history and a common use of transport for many today, so pedestrians are forced to fight for space with cyclists on the tiny drain cover sidewalks that do exist. In SG, by law you have to yield to cars everywhere, some have internalised this so much they yield even in zebra crossings that by law motorists have to yield to pedestrians. Walking in sg is a chore, given you have to yield at every informal crossing (termed "unmarked crosswalk" in US parlance). This is even more mafan on bicycle because you have to stop and stand. All of this for a city where only 11% of people own a car, mostly people who are wealthy enough to afford COE, meaning they can fork over 100K+ sgd every ten years just to drive, or have company car (rich ang mo), it's a great example of the class stratification that exists but has been systematically squeezed out of the consciousness and discussion or has been substituted by racial or anti-foreigner sentiments.

The public transit saves the city and the fact walkways do exist everywhere is great and a lot better than for example the US (hard to do worse than the worst), but it is seriously car centric of a city.

> it has little infrastructure for cyclists

Singapore has over 500km of cycle ways: https://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltagov/en/getting_around/acti...

What are you comparing it to when you say "little infrastructure for cyclists"?

You need to be very clear about who is the competition here worldwide because they are aiming for 1300km of cycleways by 2030 and this is a tiny city state 50km wide.

> You need to be very clear about who is the competition here worldwide

Since Singapore likes to set extremely high standards for itself, its competition is places like Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Cambridge, etc.

Admittedly the parent commenter mentioned 'infrastructure', which Singapore has a bit of, but there's more to cycling than just pathways laid across the ground and painted with bicycle motifs. For Singapore to be truly a 'good place for cycling', it's got to have the right mindset for cycling. This means giving less priority to motor vehicles.

Singapore ought to narrow its roads. There are too many non-highway stroads, and there is no reason for a semi-residential road to be 3+ lanes wide in each direction—look at any number of the Avenues in Toa Payoh, Ang Mo Kio, Bishan, Serangoon, Queenstown, Bukit Batok, Bedok, etc etc. Cars can easily reach 70+ km/h on these roads, which also makes it very unsafe for cyclists and pedestrians. The extra space from getting rid of these lanes could instead be used for much wider footpaths and grade-separated cycle lanes.

Pedestrianise the city centre and residential cores. This is related to the point above, but some roads (e.g. in the CBD) could be completely blocked from vehicle access altogether. Consider using trams in the CBD instead of buses and trains.

Improve bike-parking infrastructure. There are a handful of bike-parking spaces around MRT stations, but very few in other common areas like parks, HDB void decks, hawker centres, etc. Again, refer to the cities above for examples of how dense bike parking could possibly be.

Bring back park-and-rides. Singapore used to have them, but ditched them in favour of directly linking the heartlands into the city, which have made MRTs packed.

Incentivise bicycle ownerships: vouchers for bike shops, cycle-buying schemes, and of course, a bicycle licensing scheme similar to e-scooters and e-bikes (and cars).

There's a lot more, but these are the lowest hanging fruits.

To be fair, there are very few dedicated cycle lanes in the sense other countries have them. The CPN is basically just a line on a wide PCN path that pedestrians mostly ignore. It, along with with the PCN, is genuinely really fantastic for getting around by bike for the average person. However if you are a cyclist who takes their sport seriously, or somebody who commutes a decent distance by bike, you will be fairly limited because there’s usually plenty of pedestrians and a speed limit of 25km/h. And honestly, I don’t really fancy cycling on the roads in Singapore because the drivers aren’t used to dealing with cyclists. So I understand why somebody might say there’s little infrastructure for cyclists. Personally I cycle a fair amount and think Singapore is great for it, but I don’t go particularly fast and I do frequently have to slow down and weave my way past pedestrians anyway.

Why?

As someone who's lived here for more than 20 years, I really don't know what you mean.

I know. Lived there for 6 years, leaving it was the best decision of my life.

At first, this site made me see red.

;)

It’s probably important to note that all public housing in Singapore, where ~80% of Singaporeans live, have two cameras in each lift and a couple others pointing at the entry points to the lift and staircases, all connected to the police department, “for their safety” of course.

It is also 'probably important to note' that Singapore is the safest 700 km² on this planet. One is ridiculously unlikely to get robbed, raped, catcalled at, threatened with a gun or other weapon, step on used hypodermic needles, or encounter a variety of unsavoury activities that one would otherwise see in pretty much every other world city (except maybe Tokyo and Seoul—see a pattern?).

It's also not like these cameras are pointing into private dwellings—this is illegal.

> is the safest

Please specify the source. Evaluations vary.

> “for their safety” of course.

Where do you suggest is a safer place to live?

Check the Economist Intelligence Unit at https://safecities.economist.com/safe-cities-2021-whitepaper...

Personal security («crime, violence, terrorist threats, natural disasters and economic vulnerabilities»), 2021:

> 1 Copenhagen; 2 Amsterdam; 3 Frankfurt; 4 Stockholm; 5 Brussels; 6 Paris; 7 Wellington; 8 Toronto; 9 Lisbon; 10 Madrid; 11 Sydney; 12 Barcelona; 13 Singapore; 14 London; 15 Zurich; 16 Tokyo; 17 Osaka; 18 Melbourne; 19 Taipei; 20 Santiago

Other lists will be available.

This one list is odd, because Singapore ranks in the top five for other measures related to security, but is ranked in the second of four quadrants for personal security, "second" to cities with presumably very different policies.

I'm sorry, but that list is very inaccurate (even if it is by The Economist—what are they smoking?). Singapore, below Paris? Below Barcelona, and below Frankfurt? Within two hours of setting foot in Paris, I nearly got my passport and 1400+€ stolen. I've lived 26 years in Singapore, and I have seen nothing of the sort. I left my phone in a hawker centre, and it was still there when I came to retrieve it, several hours later.

Yes I also found it quite odd.

Those list make me wish data were expressed outside aggregates, in forms that quantitatively specify proper odds, and qualitatively display reasons that justify data. It is again like being shown dumb aggregates.

Check the post from Gmerc nearby - the notes about London about apparent unorderly behaviour and similar amount of monitoring -, and London being ranked near Singapore.

Of Barcelona, somebody on these pages (as I remember) posted about criminals cutting tyres of cars at semaphores to rob the driver. Others swear it is one of the safest places in the world. Official USA (as I remember) indications for travellers talk about a hive of scammers and petty thieves. This makes one wish for proper stats indicating rates of events, and reasoned data.

Reminder: Just before the Pandemic, the US got the #1 ranking on pandemic preparedness while most of Asia including Singapore got trashed.

Rankings are for profit endeavors that sell people metrics they can use to justify their policies or actions.

Like best employer.

The economist specifically has an almost comical beef with Singapore that draws derision in Asia year after year. Colonial Butthurt.

Frankfurt over Singapore. Lol

I've been to most of these cities and it surprises me the Asian ones aren't higher up.

I absolutely felt safer in Singapore and Tokyo than Toronto.

I'm also surprised Shanghai, Beijing, and Shenzhen aren't on the top 10.

If you read the report, that chart seems to combine inputs (effort expended) and outputs (results observed), and when you look at just the results, Singapore is top and several Asian cities are similar. The report says:

> As with other pillars, personal security inputs and outputs have a high level of statistical correlation. Within this context, some individual cases differ markedly. On personal security outputs, Singapore scores an average of 97.3, markedly ahead of second place Copenhagen (92.7) and well over the index average (67.2). At the same time, it finishes in 40th place on inputs (51.7), falling below the average (57.3). Although the most extreme case, several other Asian cities, notably Tokyo, Osaka, Seoul and Taipei, have much lower input than output scores.

Speaking as a Brit living in Singapore, the idea that Singapore and London are even in the same ballpark when it comes to personal safety is absolutely insane. The two cities aren’t even remotely similar.

I took a look at the report you mentioned and I think the chart might be misleading you. Yes, the chart does give those rankings. But look at the prose:

What’s all this about inputs and outputs? Well inputs are the effort a city puts into promoting personal security, and outputs are how good the personal security actually is.

Here are the inputs for personal security:

  - Use of data-driven techniques for crime
  - Gun regulation and enforcement
  - a) Threat of terrorism
  - b) Threat of military conflict
  - c) Threat of civil unrest
  - a) Police personnel per capita
  - b) Prosecution personnel per capita
  - c) Professional judges or magistrate personnel per capita
  - Expenditure on social security
  - a) Laws on domestic violence
  - b) Laws on sexual harassment

And here are the outputs for personal security:

  - a) Prevalence of petty crime
  - b) Prevalence of violent crime
  - Organised crime
  - Severity of terrorist attacks
  - Deaths from substance use disorders
  - Level of corruption
  - Enforceability of contracts
  - a) Income inequality levels
  - b) Share of population in vulnerable employment
  - a) Female homicide rates
  - b) Prevalence of domestic violence

In short, the report you are citing is saying that not only is Singapore by far the safest city, but in fact it’s the safest despite putting comparatively little effort into it.

This is what other commenters here mean when they complain that a lot of the criticism of Singapore here is from afar without experiencing or understanding the place. Anybody who has spent time in both London and Singapore would think that calling them similar in terms of personal safety is crazy.

Thank you very much Jim for your attention and time, spent to understand what was "wrong" in that report.

Those graphs are one the most misleading thing I have ever encountered.

It is also paradoxical that effort is factored in the final ranking: if some place has good output in spite of low investment, it means that it has "natural" good output (e.g. "inhabitants of X need little policing because they already incline towards honesty"), which means it should - if anything - be ranked higher!!!

I can leave my iPhone on the table in a food center to “chope a spot”

Not yet seen the drawbacks of the cameras - certainly prefer the situation to SF where leaving your bluetooth enabled notebook in a car trunk is “asking for it”

I can leave my door unlocked, my parcel can be dropped off at my porch without porch bandits (lol) and car theft is non existent.

One can jog at 2am in any park at night wearing an expensive phone and earbuds and feel perfectly safe.

There’s no active shooter drills in schools, no need to clutch your handbag for it to not be snatched away by an errant bike, no drug zombies inhabiting specific areas of town. We go have dinner in the red lights district because food is great there and can leave the car unlocked.

There is no “no-go” zones or ghettos. No harassment on the subway apart from the occasional phone creep who invariably gets arrested.

So pray please, why is safety in quotation marks? Singapore absolutely delivers value for the tradeoff of cameras in practical, real world fashion and people absolutely understand that - so selling them abstract concepts like “real western freedom” falls short because they see the tradeoffs in every other country when they travel.

My son lost it at 7 years of age when we went to London and he experienced the authentic subway with belligerent drunks, homeless sleeping on the ground and shouting sports fans accosting a woman all in one ride - all things he’d never seen before.

Rich Americans pay for this “freedom” by their gated communities, Lake Tahoe retreats and corporate modes of transportation. In Singapore, every resident gets it.

Having lived here for a while, it stuns me how reflexive and ideological the conversation is about these tradeoffs and how misguided people’s perceptions are.

Most think Singapore is a Capitalist wonderland, not seeing the housing market is centrally run, the majority of locals working for the government in one form or another (GIC/Temasek Crown Companies/PSD)

Singapore defies western ideological expectations, it’s not neatly divided into left and right, capitalist vs socialist, western vs eastern societies, it’s 35% immigrants, 4 major races and religions, it controls racial composition of housing blocks and the nuance required to understand the country and the outcomes it produces, for better or worse is lost in the desperate attempts to make it fit into those narrow definitions.

It’s not a paradise, it’s not an utopia, there’s crime, there’s scams, there’s human vice, it’s election districts are more like Alberta or Bavaria or Texas but it does have safety and safe housing for every resident in a way no other country has and without the immediate tradeoffs western narratives are so hard on. Sure heroin trafficking gets you killed, but on the backdrop of the Opium wars or the US drug crisis, their strategy, whether killing or not is key to that, actually works in measurable outcomes for everyone. It’s been, well forever, since an addict stole a thing from me - a regular occurrence in SF id you visit into a few times a year. It’s western perspectives that try to “frame that” - it’s clear this strategy isn’t gonna work for the US.

But that doesn’t stop either side of the western debate from framing Singapore within their ideology, a kind of constant colonial mansplaining you get here - condescending explanations and quotation marks aiming to reassure Western audiences that their societies tradeoffs are the right ones.

Questions not asked by the very people who should:

- “Why don’t the cameras work in London?”

- “Why does gun control work for every developed country but the US?”

- “How did these guys pull of country level SSO that works”

- “How were they able to switch to remote work and learning without as much as a hitch”

- and my favorite.. “how do they manage world class public service, transportation and a government employing half a million people more or less directly with a progressive tax rate where most people pay lower single digit percent and the top end is not even 25%”)

all deserve to be examined holistically for the nuanced, multi-layered background of those policies executed by what I would consider the worlds most professional public service.

But especially for former colonial powers, this is really really tough and so escapism in form of slogans like “authoritarian” and “it’s just a city” are paraded 59 avoid them.

Reading the western coverage always reads like Singapore’s mere existence and choices are an affront to the the west because they point out that ideology had limits.

But Singapore doesn’t exist to prove hard on drug crusaders or believers in technocracy or authoritarian government right - it exists purely out of its own right and the sheer will of Lee Kwan Yew to think outside the box, to not accept prevailing narratives and choose the right solutions for the unique location and situation rather than the east ones.

> colonial mansplaining

I am going to use this phrase whenever someone from a Western country tries to tell me why Singapore is a 'dystopian totalitarian authoritarian shithole police state'.

Some of these posts (both here, and on Reddit) read like they took a thesaurus and looked for all the words that end with '-ian' or '-itarian'.

> I am going to use this phrase whenever

And you would lower yourself to the same level of unsubstantial label tossing. I would avoid that and go back to the normative normalcy of looking and reasoning.

> London ... the authentic subway with belligerent drunks, homeless sleeping on the ground and shouting sports fans accosting a woman all in one ride

Interesting that the Economist Intelligence Unit, as I posted nearby, ranked Singapore and London as neighbouring for what regards personal safety.

Some people in HN have described native Singaporeans as remarkably warm-blooded (similarly to your sentence above, though apparently without effect): would you concour with that view?

The Economist has an almost famous beef with Singapore likely rooted in the competition with London. There’s a lot of spicy ambassador notes from Singapore in response to some of their contortions and cherry-picking over the years.

Having lived in a variety of places… I’m not sure I would phrase it that way, but I didn’t find “Southerners” to be remarkably hospitable or Canadians overwhelmingly polite.

It’s hard to piece the expat bubble in Singapore - because many people come here for a few years, live in Condos and send their kids to International school and work in MNCs, so getting to know locals can be tough and take a while.

And that’s not necessarily because people don’t want to mingle, it just is.

- You need a green card equivalent to send your kids to local school and even if you have it, the curriculum is easily a year, if not 2 ahead of other countries (because of high investment in education, different school culture and the practical need to offset 2 years of military service following school and maintain international competitiveness)

- You can’t buy government housing that 80% of locals live in as a foreigner unless you have the equivalent of a green card and fulfill a long list of requirements (including finding a block with space for your race)

- Your job is gonna be in an MNC which will be a lot more mixed.

If you live here long enough without getting home sick and overcome these, yes you will make local friends and I would say they will more likely be well educated, well travelled and fun to hang out with, especially when it comes to anything food or travel.

But warm blooded? Not sure that’s a word I would use.

The short answer is: there is much more to life than safety. For example, your son will likely be the safest if you simply lock him up in the bedroom for his entire life - but that’s not a life worth living.

1) The surveillance is excessive and unnecessary in a country with extremely low crime rate. 2) Such intrusive and widespread surveillance is very problematic in an authoritarian state with a history of persecuting dissidents 3) Public funds spent on unnecessary projects means less for tackling issues such as high inequality

It might not be apparent to one, depending on the area they live in, the wealthier areas receive much less surveillance than the public housing areas. Privately developed property do not have police surveillance in their lifts or estates and have less surveillance in the general area (eg. bus stops). Vice versa, the number of surveillance cameras is much higher in the low income public rental/housing areas. There is a lot of discussion on inequality in the US but Singapore has even higher inequality/Gini coefficient. There is much more than what meets the eye, especially in a state characterized by scholars as “sophisticated authoritarianism”. [0]

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politi...

I live here. Right now. For years. I lived in the US before, I lived in Europe including Eastern Germany? I lived through the collapse of the eastern block.

How is this not exactly what I just called “colonial mansplaining”? A bunch of quotes from a bunch of statistics and feel good metrics? Some handwaving about projects not spent for the common good? Which ones, do tell. Be specific, educate me about my oppression!

Do tell me, how does this unreasonable surveillance manifest? Are you explaining freedom to me? Surveillance?

Number of cameras === bad? Poor London. Poor american amazon ring infested suburbs. Seems like a bad metric.

Also: All properties have cameras in their lift lobbies, by law. There’s no difference between private and public. Condo cameras are monitored by condo security and directly accessible to police.

In practice

- Haven’t yet to see weekly harassment by local police trying to make their ticket quota at a local high school

- In fact, most of the police you see, if any, is kids doing their national service

- Never once had a gun pointed at me by officials - happened twice in the US

- Never stopped at a roadblock in 10 years.

- Pretty sure internet wise it en par with what the NSA does, but setting encrypted DNS is all that’s needed to get past the porn blockers.

- There’s a camera in my lift lobby. It seems to make it nobody steals my parcels. If I ever kill anyone, my freedom to move the body is infringed.

- There was monitoring bracelets during early covid if you were on home quarantine. If I broke the law, the bracelet and the camera would have made short work of me. Singapore had a world class pandemic response with much shorter lockdowns than other countries.

Gino Coeffient: That’s a long and nuanced conversation (part of Singapores Sentosa Island is literally built to attract rich people fleeing China) and having a high concentrations of billionaires destroys the statistic from the top and ignores that there is two worlds in Singapore.

One for locals with subsidized housing (basically zero homelessness, 80% ownership, plentiful subsidies and almost free education) and one for foreigners with very very different economics.

There’s plenty of legitimate criticisms one could make, especially on LGBTQ+ rights, etc, but this? please.

If you are actually interested in understanding, I suggest this interview by the man we just elected President yesterday by a landslide.

https://youtu.be/hpwPciW74b8

Otherwise, thank you for making my point exactly and perfectly. Stop for a moment and think just how arrogant it is to lecture someone living in a place you probably never visited about how their are oppressed with a bunch of statistics. And maybe don’t do it again next time and instead ask yourself if maybe your perception of the world is very limited from your vantage point of Cambridge studies and Statistics.

Think for a moment of the freedom to not get bankrupted by a medical emergency, the freedom to be free of hate speech talk shows and politicians, the freedom to not have your home broken in my drug addicts, the freedom to jog at night in the park without fear are actually real freedoms people may care about.

First of all, do not attempt ad hominem argument by assuming you have knowledge of my race, background or gender.

Second, a president elected through an electoral system purposefully designed by an authoritarian prime minister, whose party the same president-elect was part of, who was elevated to the unelected permanent position of Senior Minister in that party - hardly qualifies as a reputable source. Here are a few reputable alternatives written by Singaporean scholars:

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politi...

[1] https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/authoritarian-rule-of-l...

[2] https://www.ethosbooks.com.sg/products/air-conditioned-natio...

Thanks master for your colonial wisdom explaining the role of the president in the country I live in to me, very relevant.

I am deeply moved by your superior knowledge and experience about my country.

Also — ad hominem - there’s now way to criticize mansplaining with out addressing the man. So randomly throwing out latin phrases and invoking fallacies isn’t making you look smart. I indeed meant to criticize the person for engaging in behavior.

The issue is you assumed I am white, male and a foreigner, and thus unqualified to discuss the topic. That is the definition of an ad hominem argument. You need to address my argument.

Don’t take my word for it, decide for yourself. Check out the readings I quoted earlier, all of them are written by Singaporeans, are in academia, come from a variety of backgrounds and not all are males. If you’re short on time, academic reviews provide a good summary (on whether it is worth reading). Here’s one for you: https://pacificaffairs.ubc.ca/book-reviews/singapore-identit...

I must note that the irony of quoting books and articles published by Cambridge University in protest of the allegation of "colonial mansplaining" is not lost on me.

One of the quoted scholars apparently has a runs a research network called "British Colonial Legalities" LOL

Ad hominem issues aside, I don't think "colonial mansplaining" necessarily means you're a white foreigner, not even necessarily a man (it's obvious this is adapted terminology from feminism). It just means you're just parroting the ideology from their (Singapore's) former colonial masters and assuming they don't understand it well enough.

TBH it's quite futile to engage with "your" arguments when all the issues (3 of them?) are already addressed in the long replies by gmerc. The rest that you probably think is unaddressed is just stuff written by somebody else, appealing to "colonial" authorities. When you've been through these "debates" you know how it goes: The western ideology is always correct, and even if theory doesn't work out in the case of authoritarian Singapore, well, they're still wrong for preferring harmless cameras over homeless bums, drunkards, and routine violence. TBH, I'm not sure why somebody would make such a weird choice, but hey, I'm not judging, and frankly speaking, if that's what you prefer, I fail to see how further discussion can be productive.

I happen to agree with many of your points, but I do agree with the points of your critics as well. Perhaps a way to reconcile these views is by means of an analogy, one that involves asymptotic analysis.

So suppose we have a mode of governance that is in opposition to western principles, let's call it f(n). Then through the perspective of your critics, they are focused on the worse case analysis, and going on about how the big-O of f(n) is bad. You can think of this as them making the case that if you take a mode of governance that violates western principles to its logical conclusion, it can only be <insert reason why it's bad>. I do not think they are wrong in that regard.

However, having a mode of governance that is in opposition to western principles doesn't mean that the worse case would (always) materialize. Think of it like quicksort, which in its worse case, is O(n^2). In practice however, we're more likely to get the average case, which is theta(nlogn). In this regard, you (and I) are looking at the average case of f(n), which happens to match the governance of Singapore more accurately.

Ultimately, anyone who has learnt about asymptotic analysis should know that it's a theoretical framework that aims to provide a qualitative assessment of the runtime of an algorithm. While it's useful, there are various factors in real life that could contribute to an end result that contradicts that assessment (processor speed, parallelism, being cache-oblivious etc). The dispute between the critics and their opponents is analogous to that, with critics who have never been to Singapore viewing the country as an authoritarian state (theoretical worse case analysis), while those who live there would struggle to reconcile their views (average case analysis) with that of their critics.

I hope this semi-shitty analogy does put things in perspective for various readers who are trying to make sense of the opposition between these two camps.

I'll offer another perspective.

The naïve libdem (roughly speaking) types has for decades convinced themselves that the theory of democratic government is the only true way to run government and country. Among their epic failures is predicting 30 of the last non-existent China's economic collapses because we all know authoritarian governments can't sustain GDP growth.

Singapore is another of those cases they can't explain, and so it ends up being an attack on the ideological front -- name calling essentially. And while apparently Singapore is not worse than "Western democracies" in measures that actually matter, they claim that the bad things that happen are worse under authoritarian governments because they're authoritarian.

"Freedom and Democracy is always better" is so hard-wired into people's brains that they seem to feel offended when counter examples stare at them in the face. Instead of adopting a curious mindset and trying to figure out why, most of them simply dig harder to uncover bad things that authoritative governments are doing, then accuse others of whataboutism when they point out that these things are common in democracies too.

When one side talks about ground truth facts, and the other is resorting to dogma and a priori reasoning and appealing to authority, there's definitely one side that's "more wrong" than the other IMHO.

Update: There are a number of comments with the equivalent of “name me a safer country”. It is undeniable that Singapore is one of the safest country in the world. The issue here is there needs to be a balance between safety and other aspects that constitutes a good life. You’re most likely the safest if you lock yourself at home your entire life - but that’s no way to live. Such surveillance is unnecessary/excessive (Singapore has had an extremely low crime rate) and intrusive. It infringes on one’s civil and political liberties (not that the law affords Singaporeans much), which are necessary to a good life. [0] My comment is a reminder that underneath all that color, is an oppressive one-party authoritarian (police?) state.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Covenant_on_Civi...

What a bizarre comment again. Police State? What are you smoking?

Do yourself a favor and check when the last person was choked to death, beaten to death by police over here, how many police shootings we have per capita, how many people have their property taken by police at traffic stops, what our imprisoned population ratio is, and how many policemen and three letter agencies we have to oppress us.

Find us instances where our President or Prime Minister openly fabulate about shooting protesters, cheers about kids with assault rifles doing it for him?

Continue to research if police in Singapore can claim qualified immunity, whether we have a thin blue line here, whether minorities have to fear police in Singapore. Please go on, educate us how we are oppressed and cannot have a good life as a result.

Tell us how the police in Singapore is feared by a large percentage of the population because skin color means potentially getting shot through the windshield. Maybe find some cases of systemic police violence that have gone unpunished in our country? (Did you know public servants, including police get their punishment doubled on conviction because, shockingly, they are held to a higher standard here rather than receiving immunity and protection).

By all means, educate us on the last time a Singapore SWAT team accidentally shot someone in their bed, or in fact a single case of successful murder by Police/Swatting here. Or the last time police leadership covered up for a serial killer or rapist in uniform, we are burning to hear your insights into that.

We actually, by a large margin, like our police force here. Many of them are kids doing their national service.

Oh I get it, these things are not oppression, the Economist has a statistic somewhere that they are the price of freedom.

What is it with people who feel compelled to post “just reminders” that Singapore is definitely not a pure western democracy like Texas or Alberta or Bavaria who have true one party rule on the same population scale on random threads about … checks … the color palette of Singapore?

Is it fragility? The inability to accept that there are places in the world that are comparatively thriving compared to the West?

Further Reading: https://thekopi.co/2020/06/12/how-did-singapore-avoid-the-po...

Gmerc, your comment is borderline abusive.

What is happening in other countries has no bearing on whether Singapore is a police state or not, it is what Singapore does that qualifies it. While the term “police state” might be too strong for Singapore, here is why it might apply:

1) Internal Security Act - The ability to detain anyone deemed as a “national security threat” indefinitely without trial. Lee Kuan Yew famously argued against it before independence. After independence, he retained it and went on use it against political opponents. (Who do you think are the new colonial overlords telling others how to behave, what to say or what to think?) 2) Lack of civil and political rights to act as check and balances against overreach by the state. Eg. Widespread and intrusive surveillance of much of the country, especially in the poorer areas; extensive power of the police to investigate with little oversight - TraceTogether data debacle; politically motivated persecution of dissidents and journalists etc. 3) Control and manipulation of the local media landscape in order to achieve/support their goals.

[0] https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691211411/sp...

Let me remind you again that you need to address my arguments to refute it.

Ah, your cherry picked definition of authoritarian police state. And custom definition of abuse as freedom from having your nose thumbed into cognitive dissonances.

No, I need to do no such things as to address the vapid statements you make more than pointing your the internal inconsistency and massive cognitive dissonance of Americans and Brits trying to define true freedom.

By all means, let’s glance over the National Security Letters, Family Separation at Borders, the Snowden and Assange clown shows, Guantanamo, Black Sites, Texas or North Carolina travesty of governance but mention at any random thread about Singapore (colors!) that it’s authoritarian because … princeton study says it is. What is the thought process behind this urge? You avoided this question at every step, yet you demand engagement and protest abuse.

No, I don’t need to refute your arguments. Because they are none, but shifting strawmen. They are massive blinders of cognitive dissonance. Spare us your judgement over here, all you have is books and definitions and colonial mansplaining.

May you one day travel the world and get cured from your indoctrination.

> cognitive dissonance of Americans and Brits

Gmerc, you have provided good information and insight - and I myself have noted about 24hrs ago here that if someone wants to mention authoritarianism (or oddity, whatever daring idea) in a page about colourfulness some reference about how the two would relate is required -, and I understand that hearing the same in-ways weak ideas past the n-th time can make one edgy,

but look: if a Norwegian noted that Swedes have bumpy roads, he is not at all mandated to live somewhere without bumpy roads. The bumpy roads of Sweden are such if it is reasonable to call them so after fair assessment. The bumpy roads of Norway become relevant when somebody is denying that.

There are not just «Americans and Brits» in the public, there are not just people interested in defending one specific position in public, and crossfire that gets divergent from substance is not good for the system.

Some people may instead look at Singapore with interest (naturally also its counterpart: concern) because they are seeing a crisis in their own environment and may look at apparent champions with hope.

Assumptions should be limited. And we should remain coolheaded.

> Let me remind you again that you need to address my arguments to refute it.

It's getting hilarious at this point. It's like you think you had a valid argument and expected others to engage with you on your level.

You had empty assertions. GP explained why Singapore is not a "police state". Now you admit Singapore might not be a "police state" effectively agreeing with them, then finally follow up with substantial arguments, and accuse the GP of not engaging with them.

I'm not sure whether you're aware, your "arguments" are like so tired that I might have seen them hundreds of times. Why even bother to engage with an evangelist who's not interested in constructive discussion but rather in some toxic "refutation" of one's arguments?

If you believe I do not have an argument, feel free to refute my references and construct a coherent argument backed up by credible references (YouTube or thekopi.co are not).

Here is a selection:

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politi...

[1] https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/authoritarian-rule-of-l...

[2] https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691211411/sp...

[3] https://www.ethosbooks.com.sg/products/air-conditioned-natio...

None of these seem relevant to the question of why you feel the need to jump onto a thread about the colors found in Singapore with colonial mansplaining about authoritarianism.. backed up by writings from Cambridge, cherry on top by a writer specialized in Colonial Law.

Since all you do is basically spew links while ignoring any of the attempts to have a conversation, we thank you for your service of acting as a poster child for colonial mansplaining we shall be using in an upcoming article on the topic.

If I wanted to refute a bunch of random scholar's books and papers I'd be in academia already.

The fact that you think a reference ending in cambridge.org and princeton.edu is "credible" quite laughable. They're literally a government's propaganda reserve. It's like claiming studies funded by narcotics companies are credible for informing you about the benefits of smoking to your health. (Hate to "mansplain" for you but the main source of funding for universities are governments.)

> the main source of funding for universities are governments

Further off-topic, but extremely important: was a way ever found to avoid that pitfall, of intellectual production being bound by financial contributions? Freelance intellectuals living on other means (e.g. book sales) may be only somehow less constrained.

Aware of the issue of biased sources, you will have faced the problem: do you also have keys to get to unbiased sources?

This conversation perfectly illustrates the sort of bad reasoning common among anti-vaxx, conspiracy theorists etc. They have little understanding of what constitutes good, credible evidence - Cambridge and Princeton publications are "literally a government's propaganda reserve" while the sources used are "YouTube and blogs such as the kopi.co". Along with this erroneous standard is poor reasoning - "I read a blog post by thekopi.co on standards of the Singapore police so Singapore is not a police state"; "universities are funded by government hence universities are biased". When they are faced with overwhelming evidence against their views, instead of changing their views, they refuse to accept the evidence and resort to ad hominem arguments plus abusive language. If all else fails, they move the conversation to something else (shifting the goal posts) - "this post is not about politics, we shouldn't be talking about politics".

It is impossible to convince someone with reason if the person is simply unreasonable - erroneous standards, bad reasoning, fallacious arguments - but it has been illuminating on how such minds "work".

Carry on hnfong and gmerc, I'd love to add more to the above.

If you think online discussions are to "convince" people of anything, that is really hilarious.

If anything, to me, the more interesting discussions are the ones that present me with unexpected views that challenge my established views.

Your parroting of stereotypical Anglosphere academia ideologies is pretty boring TBH. You can't convince anyone with evidence they've already known. I have a law degree from Hong Kong and you better believe me when I say I've read enough of those Cambridge and Princeton crap on ivory tower notions of how governments should be run.

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