COMMENT: We should live our “narratives”, not just write them
Kirsten Han is a Singaporean blogger, journalist and filmmaker. She is also involved in the We Believe in Second Chances campaign for the abolishment of the death penalty. A social media junkie, she tweets at @kixes. The views expressed are her own.
In his latest “Big Idea”, Singapore’s Thinking Asian Kishore Mahbubani suggested three narratives that we should tell ourselves to “strengthen the Singapore spirit”. By perpetuating narratives of Singapore’s economic success, racial harmony and social equality (or “caring”), Mahbubani believes that we will come together to squeeze out a Singaporean spirit that will be the envy of the world.
The piece is stunningly superficial, glossing over a host of issues without acknowledging even the possibility of different experiences. His claim that immigrants to America have shed “deep national identities” in favour of being American seems bafflingly out-of-touch. Anyone who has followed the case of George Zimmerman and his shooting of black teenager Trayvon Martin can see that Mahbubani’s claim of American unity – and their supposed willingness to “die for each other” – is problematic.
His claims of Singaporean success, equality and racial harmony are also questionable. This makes the advocacy of such “national” narratives very troubling; it would not be to society’s benefit if we clung on to these stories without introspection and discussion.
Although myth-making and story-telling are common to all societies, we should not be forcing complex and controversial situations into neat fairytales so that we can feel good about ourselves. Such a process is inherently exclusionary; ‘national’ narratives are almost always written by those in privileged positions of power, with little thought given to the fact that other groups might have completely different experiences of these narratives.
In fact, why should we be looking for narratives at all? The focus should be on living our stories, not just writing them.
Singaporeans don’t need any more top-down narratives touting rags-to-riches success. We have more than enough of these stories, seen in various ministry-backed campaign videos and the SG50 ads that already play before each film in the cinema (despite that the fact that our 50th year is next year).
What we need is the space to figure out our own stories. What we need is the space to speak up about our own experiences, and to listen to one another. What we need is the space to get engaged in our society, not via establishment-approved channels, but on our own terms. Civil society groups need the space to bring out the struggles that we all need to be aware of, without the threat of funding cuts or defamation suits.
The opening up of such space might be messy. With the plurality of views out there, it’s only to be expected. But it is only through such conflict and challenging of ideas and ideals that a society’s spirit is forged. After all, we cannot be expected to feel connected to a narrative if we have no voice in it.
