Who should take “The Blame”?

Although it is now past midnight, I could not resist the urge to reply a comment that was published on The Online Citizen. Titled “Singaporeans, take responsibility!“, the person “Sg-PR” called on Singaporean to stop blaming others and start taking responsibility.

While I believe that this stand is unpopular, but I do believe that true-blue Singaporeans are partially to be blamed for underachieving. Yet Sg-PR has done everyone a disfavour by harping only on one point and arguing from a single perspective, backed by his own personal experience. His dualistic approach oversimplies the conundrum that Singapore is facing and make it seem that foreigners are the solution to Singapore’s prosperity.

For every Singaporean student he/she claims to be underachieving, I can think of another foreign student that can fit the similar bill, or Singaporean who obliterates academic competition. However, I am most perturbed by the myth of meritocracy that supports the main line of argument.

I go as far to propose that meritocracy is not fair, even though the principle of meritocracy attempts to award on basis of merit.

The common analogy would be to liken life as a race. Meritocracy would reward the person who can complete it in the shortest possible time. But the biggest loophole is that there is no common starting point.

The educational race would much favour the rich if we assume the stereotypical scenario of excessive tuition and enrichment classes, as opposed to those of lower income levels.

The NS factor is another hurdle that all healthy Singaporean male would have to cross. And no, anyone who thinks that those two years are going to be useful icings on one’s resume, should have a reality check.

Finally, taking on an open-door labour policy, the number of contestants in this race would increase exponentially. While at the end of the day, the race would have clocked record timings, courtesy of increased competition, the unfortunate tradeoff would be that Singaporeans who have been relatively slower would lose out.

Taken to both extremes of labour policy, it would most certainly be detrimental to Singapore. While I admittedly favour a slightly less xenophobic outlook, my chief concern would be to level the competition so that Singaporeans, be it rich or poor, male or female, can start off at roughly the same point in this race of life.

Only then, can we judge whether that Singaporeans are truly underachievers.

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