When I Was Young

I REFER to the letter, "Let law handle troublemakers" (my paper, April 27).

It is not uncommon to see people turning a blind eye to those who commit anti-social acts in public.

A friend was waiting to cross a road when a man appeared next to him, puffing away on his cigarette.

The smoke blew in my friend's direction. He covered his nose and mouth before taking a few steps away from the man.

The man said loudly: "Why? Cannot smoke, is it?"

This is the kind of attitude and reaction you can expect from some perpetrators of anti-social acts.

I am beginning to realise why coffee-shop owners do not take action against patrons who light up in no-smoking areas.

People usually do not step in when others break the rules because they want to avoid trouble or are afraid of being beaten up.

There are also times when reminders to fellow train commuters that eating is not allowed on board are greeted with rudeness.

Indeed, it is hard for the civic-minded to ensure that rules are not broken by others.

Singapore's citizen-journalism platform, Stomp, is proving to be a powerful tool the public can use to warn or report people caught indulging in anti-social or inconsiderate behaviour.

Mr Sebastian Tan

From myPaper, My Say – Tuesday, 05-May-2009

I SAY

Are we missing the point about graciousness?

Jeremiah Boon

I refer to "Nothing wrong with Victorians" (April 22) and "What's wrong with today's kids?" (April 20).

The explanation provided by Mr Zaveed Husref is a good one; to label a school over such a minor act is exaggerated. But it has made me look at the bigger picture.

For the past couple of years or so, ever since Singapore started its campaign towards becoming a "gracious" society, have the population's social graces actually improved or become worse?

One cannot help but notice the amount of letters to newspapers about how a citizen found the action of another "ungracious".

In addition, it has become almost a fad to capture anything "ungracious" on one's camera phone and submit it to a local citizen reporter website.

Are we missing the point here? The word "gracious" is so severely overused today that it is losing its meaning.

I believe the society Singapore is trying to head for is when an individual like Ms Trina Tan Ker Wei (the writer of the second letter) would actually help the student diners clear the trays if the fast food restaurant did not have sufficient manpower at that time to do so.

While that sounds too good to be true in the society we live in, it's also the "gracious" spark we are looking for.

I question the effectiveness of nitpicking anything out of the ordinary and showing it to the world through the media.

Not to mention that this course of action only turns society into a place where one is forced to help, or otherwise risk being ridiculed, rather than wanting to help out of goodwill and consideration.

While citizens do their part towards forging a "gracious" society by submitting pictures of ungracious acts through various media, we are also opening ourselves up to being misconstrued by the rest of the world.

From TODAY, Voices – Thursday, 30-April-2009