Okay. I have unfinished business. I thought I’m finished (for a while at least). But then I read this on the ST Forum. How can a self-respecting Singaporean woman not comment on this? So one last post before I do a Paula Schultz to myself.
“Time for the Singaporean girl to play the ‘little woman’?” , ST
After reading this article, I feel compelled to, as Miss Wong Mei Xuan says, “make an impassioned defence of the hard-to-please Singaporean woman”.
In a nutshell, Miss Wong is commenting on how the evolution of the modern Singaporean women has come at an expense of their love lives, and subsequently affected the nation’s birth rate.
She argues, apparently enlightened, from the male point of view. I’m afraid most Singaporean women will differ. I beg to differ.
She starts by making comparisons between Singaporean women and Malaysian or Vietnamese girls. But there is no point in making such comparisons. We may be female all the same, but we are differentiated by cultures, by societies, by the climates we grew up in.
If you want Singaporean women to be like their Malaysian or Vietnamese counterparts, please transplant all female babies in KK Hospital to those countries now. You may laugh at how ludicrous this proposal is, but your laughter only goes to show how impossible the act is. Malaysian and Vietnamese women are what they are because they were moulded by conditions in certain environments. Singaporean women similarly, are the way they are because they were moulded by conditions in yet another environment. If so, then there is, I repeat, no point in making such comparisons.
Singaporean women have one of the highest education levels in the world. Since we are educated so, and we worked as hard as any other man to reach this level of education (with support from the government in providing a conducive environment of course), why should we be afraid to express our views, our opinions, our beliefs? We have as much right to a brain and intelligence as men. Intelligence, passion…are these qualities only to be exalted in a male form and not female?
So I ask Miss Wong, just what is wrong with being driven by ideals and emotions? Just what is wrong with debating and arguing impassionedly? Or does it seem wrong just because the form that is doing all these is female?
But I agree to a certain extent with Miss Wong, that the Singaporean woman is a challenge to love. What I want to add is that the Singaporean woman is a challenge to the traditional idea of love. If love is, as Miss Wong implies, the image of the submissive, soft-spoken woman pandering to the needs of the man, then I want no part of it. Why should I? Why should we?
I think the notion of love has already changed with time. A love relationship now should not encompass the domineering male and the submissive female as Miss Wong seems to advocate.
On how Miss Wong claims that Singaporean women are “twice as likely as her Malaysian or Vietnamese counterpart to stride away in a huff or throw water on the male’s face or hold a public screaming or crying fitâ€, I have three points to make.
First, that is yet another generalization that will not hold under proper scrutiny of the issue. Not all Singaporean women are like that. Certainly, not all women behave that like that. To use the phrase “twice as likely†is stretching things a bit. The striding away in a huff, or the public screaming and crying fit at most represents a side of the particular woman’s character. It has very little to do with nationality.
Secondly, Miss Wong seems to imply that those acts clearly put the women in the wrong. But we are too quick to judge by our eyes, and too slow to investigate the underlying reasons. There can easily be a variety of reasons why those women acted the way they do, and these reasons might not be unjustified.
Thirdly, let us suppose that the phrase “twice as likely†is accurate, and that Singaporean women do subject their men to these types of behaviour more than their Malaysian or Vietnamese counterparts. If so, then I say that Singaporean women do that simply because we can.
Take the case of a middle-aged Singaporean man who married a Vietnamese girl and provide her with not only emotional love and material support, but also a permit to remain in Singapore. Can the Vietnamese girl throw a tantrum even if she is displeased?
It is not Singaporean women who need to change. We are the best fusion of Western and Eastern values. It is the Singaporean men who should catch up instead with the new notions of love. Throw away those obsolete views of how a man will marry a sweet girl to support him in everything he does. Support in a relationship is mutual.
Miss Wong then tries to quote materialism as an example. I have to say, I love shopping. But I pay for my own things so what is wrong with that? I remember the day I bought my first diamond with my own paycheck. It was small. Nothing much, and definitely not a Tiffany. But I gleaned more satisfaction from that than if it came from a man. Materialism is a condition in all capitalist societies that not only affects the women, but the men too. You may say “That is, to a lesser degree.” But no. We just spend on different things. Generally, women buy clothes and cosmestics and men buy gadgets and cars. So what is the exact point she is trying to make?
She also comments that Singaporean women treat love as conquests. But I, for one, do not treat love relationships like conquests fought in the office arena. And I believe that any other mature Singaporean woman will not treat love relationships as such too. Miss Wong talks about women like that, but what about men? Don’t some of them treat love as sexual conquests too?
Then Miss Wong laments about the declining birth rate.
Marriage is not a no-no for most Singaporean women. Yet child-bearing is a serious issue. It is not as simple as popping a bun in the oven. The Singaporean woman is concerned with several factors, amongst which is the worry of having enough time or not to raise the child properly.
Other than these concerns, there are other aspects to the issue. Inhospitable environment for having children is one. Couples not having enough time for sex is another. What I am trying to say here is that Miss Wong should not blame the nation’s falling birthrate on Singaporean women alone.
Besides, we are not mere child-bearing vessels. We have brains, we have emotions, we are as human as the Singaporean man working his ass off in a cramped cubicle now. Generations of Singaporean women have contributed to the nation, and not only by giving birth. We are not adverse to giving birth, but there are certain concerns we hope to be resolved before we do so.
To quote the late poet Sylvia Plath, “After a while I suppose I’ll get used to the idea of marriage and children. If only it doesn’t swallow up my desires to express myself in a smug, sensuous haze. Sure, marriage is self-expression, but if only my art, my writing, isn’t just a mere sublimation of my sexual desires which will run dry once I get married. If only I can find him…the man who will be intelligent, yet physically magnetic and personable. If I can offer that combination, why shouldn’t I expect it in a man?”
Indeed, why shouldn’t we?
The other point I am trying to make, using Plath’s words as an illustration, is that educated Singaporean women have much more to hope for in life than mere marriage and children. I am not adverse to either of this, but I will not have my ideals, ambitions or emotions disappear “in a smug, sensuous haze” if I do decided to get married and have children.
In fact, if I am to meet an intelligent, physically magnetic man, I might just want to have children with him. To digress a little, I must clarify that I am not saying that I want to have his children (Language use does makes a difference). If Miss Wong wants to get the government on her side and use the situation of the falling birthrate as ammunition for this argument, then I can pander too to PAP’s quietly eugenist policies.
“Match smart Singaporean women with smart Singaporean men and we get …… (drum rolls) SMART CHILDREN TO BOOST OUR GDP!â€
If so, then it is still not Singaporean women who should change, but Singaporean men who must.
I must say, not all male chauvinists are men.
And I say we women are a magnificent sex
Don’t ever let what Miss Wong says put us down.
