The Guru’s Muse: Civility in Singapore …

According to Grayling, “civility is a matter of mores, etiquette, politeness, of informal rituals that facilitate our interactions, and thereby give us ways to treat each other with consideration” … Well thought and said but in Singapore’s social milieu, do these reminders of what constitutes civilized human behaviour have any relevance? While its value is never in doubt, I do believe however that in our social context, civility is nothing more than an ideal, … a bonus rather than a given. While the apparent general lack of civility in Singapore does not necessarily make us less human or inhuman; unfortunately, it can make life in Singapore less pleasant or even tolerable.

I am often contemptuously amused by the sudden bout of stupor that seize many unsuspecting teenagers and working adults, almost as if members of a local cult led by a crazed bearded leader had decided to introduce an anesthetic into the MRT train cabin. Bowed heads, in deep contemplation, rehearsed open-mouthed drool … Does anyone bother to look up and check to see if a pregnant lady or an 87-year old lady walking with an unsteady gait is around? I ‘praise’ them for their unstinting belief in the equality of the sexes but I scoff at their laziness to go to a sleep clinic to check for sleep apnea or go for an eye check-up. I often wonder if the problem that lies at the heart of this sheer indifference in our society is education, or the lack thereof. Our society often asks: shouldn’t it be the school’s job to teach people how to behave. Ah yes! … But then, maybe on the day that the lesson on CME 101 Civilised Human Behaviour was being conducted, these individuals were cramming for other exams like BS 101 Business Studies: How to Get Rich or CB 101 Chemical Bonds: The Atomic Structure of Botox. Ignorance could be one valid reason, but shouldn’t there be others?

Why do we shun helping those who have collapsed in an MRT station, clearly frothing at the mouth and in obvious pain? Could it be because we think this is a form of street theatre and our interference could erode the quality of the performance or that we don’t know what to do and our ignorance could cause us embarrassment in the eyes of those nonchalantly passing by? Why do we not clear our plates after we eat in a food court? Is it because we believe that by doing so, the elderly members of our society and migrant workers from neighbouring countries would be deprived of employment or that we don’t want our manicured fingers to be stained with soy sauce from a plate of Hainanese chicken rice or peanut sauce from a plate of rojak? Why do Singaporean car drivers love to sound their horns at others? Is it because the collective sound of horns blaring adds mirth to a traffic jam or that we wish to massage our ego by alerting everyone around to the fact that the person in front of you does not know how to drive a car better than you can? And now, the mother of them all, … why do Singaporeans love to leave their handphones on during a concert? Is it to emphasize the point that the rendition of Beethoven’s magnum opus, his ‘Ninth Symphony – Ode to Joy’, sounds better digitized than played by a world-class orchestra in a cavernous concert hall with state-of-the-art acoustic facilities or do we perceive ourselves as someone so important that the very security and survival of Singapore depends on our responding to a phone call from the Istana post haste?

So, the next time you decide to punch a bus captain in the face, violate a library book by stripping it of its pages or leave scatological art pieces in a public toilet bowl for the next user to appraise, ask yourself what are your reasons for doing so … are you doing it for the right reason?