Sign up for a DBS credit card in support of the NEW Aware

[londontrader]

Considering a possibility is not the same as making an assertion


So have you considered the possibility that NEW AWARE is full of shit?
You seem very ONE sided for a person who keeps asking for a BALANCED view

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

94) paradoxarrow on TOC April 30th, 2009 10.03 am To the new AWARE exco that should not be

Now this is the story that we must tell
Some people are just playing it foul
Lesbians, deviants, they like to name
But who even invite them to this game?
I don’t give a care who’s your aunt-in-law
Don’t pull this dumb shit if she knows the law
Women got to teach what girls need to do
If you’re full of doubt, first go back to your school

Let those without a sin cast the first stone
The way we all see it you’ve usurped the throne
Be a good employee, go count money
Focus on your little own family
Don’t act like AWARE is your property
What you’re doing now we call moral felony
Understand first, we need a free country
Keep your tongue-speaking to church proximity
You should have shown a little transparency
You’re not God, so don’t fake invisibility

So why you need to gang up silently like that
Creeping through the backdoor just like that
Locking the door on poor women like that
Spider lilies what? It’s not like that

Just listen
The times are ahead of ya
Our brains are ahead of ya
We’re not afraid of ya
Peace won’t be there with ya

Even government would say we need a society that’s secular
Chinese non-Chinese we speak the women vernacular
But vision of your church is a tunnel monocular
So back down now, before things get uglier
Don’t get us wrong, this is not us against Christians
Just restore AWARE to its original guardians
We need an NGO that’s all inclusive
Ask yourself now, who’s making this explosive
Big men with guns toy with their weapon
True feminists don’t force down their opinion
Rational people can talk it out
So get out of your hiding and talk it out
Get out!

There is only one thing that I am very definite about in this post and that is it is immoral and underhanded to attack people in their livelihood.

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Scroobal, just to lighten things up abit...wonder what the Toh Payoh brothel must be thinking:p

79) Lyn on TOC April 29th, 2009 11.05 pm Very touching piece letter written by their pastor with the aim to take the old guard down.

A call to wage a ’spiritual’ battle for AWARE

———- Forwarded message ———-
From: Lee XXX XXX
Date: Tue, Apr 28, 2009 at 10:58 AM
Subject: Concerned Parents on Pre and Teenagers
To:

For those of you who are not plugged in to what has been happening in Spore in the last 1 month (esp my overseas friends), please uphold us in prayer as we wage a spiritual and moral battle for the control of a secular organisation that has been used by the liberals and gays to fight for homosexual rights in Spore.

This group is known as AWARE (Association of Women for Action and Research) and it is the leading women’s organisation in Singapore and their views are seriously taken by the govt in policy implementation.

In the last few years, this organisation has deviated from its original noble ideals of fighting against discrimnation against women in education and workplace and instead been taking up arms to decriminalise the homosexual act, promoting homosexual ideas thru their `sex education’ programs, sponsoring talks and the screening of a movie that promotes the homosexual lifestyle as `normal’.

At the association’s AGM about 3 weeks ago, a group of valiant women decided that `enough is enough’ and they decided to vote in people whom they knew stood for pro-family values and godly principles.

However, this obviously has not gone down well with the `old guard’ who accused the new EXCO of being anti-gay and using religion to advance their cause.

The old guard has powerful connections with the press (one of them was the former editor of Business Times) and I believe 3 of them are ex and present NMPs (nominated Members of Parliment).

The Straits Tiimes in particular have `demonised’ the new EXCO and have overtly been on the side of the old guard. We know that many of the senior editors of Straits Times are either gay or very liberal.

For those of you still standing on the sideline and think this is just a cat fight between 2 camps of `power-hungry’ women, let me tell you that this is the furthest from the truth.

I know one of the new EXCO members personally (some of you do as well..) and I can say for a fact that none of these women wanted to have their privacy lost, their families subjected to death threats, receive hate mails and sms-es, be harassed and misquoted by the press and media…..if not for a burning conviction that they are standing for the truth and holding back the tide of wickedness from sweeping our nation.

These women want to bring the organisation back to its original ideals of fighting for the rights of all women. This has nothing to do with religion.

Do not let the biased media blind your eyes to the truth of the matter. If you are a Sporean woman or PR, I urge you to walk the talk. Sign up for membership (go to http://www.aware.org.sg for online registration) and come for the EGM this Saturday to vote against the `no-confidence’ motion of the old guard.

I have been told that at least over 550 of the OTHER camp has already signed up to vote. We are the majority, not the minority, but by our apathy, we let the minority win the battle.

To quote Edmund Burke, `ALL IT TAKES FOR EVIL TO TRIUMPH IS FOR GOOD PEOPLE TO DO NOTHING”.

God bless you all,

XXX XXX

Please don't tell me that you are talking about climate change or saving the whale. Or what did you mean by all that.

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Scroobal, the piece by Terence that I referred to earlier

In Singapore: Surveying the responses to the AWARE Saga

Terence Chong
23 Apr 2009
The saga playing out at AWARE, Singapore’s women’s rights group, is now cause célèbre. It began on 28 March when a new and unfamiliar executive committee was voted in by a surge of new members, most of whom had only joined the group barely three months before. Many of the new exco members were subsequently found to have strong Christian links and trenchant anti-gay and anti-abortion views. Fearing a ‘power grab’ that would see the 24 year old NGO depart from its liberal stance, the older guard responded on 14 April by calling for an extraordinary general meeting (EOGM) to pass a motion of no confidence. Meanwhile the new exco removed several long-serving leaders within the group, claiming that AWARE had ‘lost its focus’ in the recent years, with the new president Josie Lau questioning the ‘motives and objectives’ of the EOGM.

So far the local media and observers have responded to the saga in three different ways. These responses are interesting because they are a telling indication of the brand of civil society politics that different quarters desire for Singapore. The first response is a kind of interested ambivalence. Many see the AWARE drama as part and parcel of civil society politics and that, in the marketplace of ideas, it should be allowed to unfold naturally if we want to mature politically as a society. The underlying rationale of this response is that if AWARE is permanently subsumed by Christian conservatives, then it only means that the liberals were quite properly taught a humbling lesson in self-organisation. If the Christian conservatives are voted out it would be testimony to fighting for one’s beliefs. There is a flaw in this ‘marketplace of ideas’ rationale.

In a marketplace of ideas, like-minded individuals come together to form a group to champion a cause or belief alongside contradictory views for public appraisal. This is not happening with AWARE. Instead, the new leadership, vis-à-vis this takeover, has sought to straightjacket the antithetical views within AWARE in the hopes that theirs may be promoted unchallenged. Josie Lau has spoken of AWARE ‘losing its focus’, becoming ‘too diversified’ and in need of ‘consolidation’. It does not take a stretch of the imagination to know that this means eschewing the inclusiveness of AWARE by dropping gay and lesbian causes (AWARE received flak for screening Spider Lilies, a lesbian film) and endorsing only conservatively defined pro-family programmes. This is not the recipe for diversity and the healthy competition of ideas.

Another common response is that this bickering has gone on long enough, and that if the two parties cannot resolve the problem, the state should step in. This type of reasoning does local civil society no favours. It swings to the other end of the spectrum from the first response. Here, people prefer an artificial veneer of calm over civil society. They seem to be more at ease with a quiet and sterile political landscape than a boisterous and vibrant one, and would probably prefer that the authorities intervene. Needless to say such an attitude is perfect for keeping Singaporeans politically infantile while cementing the government’s role as a cane-wielding father-figure.

The last response is probably the most serious and politically retarding. There are some who feel it is wrong to draw links between the exco’s Christian faith and lifestyle views, and the direction this would take the NGO. The rationale here is that identifying the new exco as ‘Christians’ is akin to playing up the politics of religion. Expressing this view is a senior writer in the main local newspaper The Straits Times who wrote, “Unfortunately, the label that I have heard some people apply to the new crowd at AWARE is not just a simple ‘conservative’ tag. It is ‘Christian conservative’ or ‘fundamentalist’… I think that what is worrying, and dangerous, is that this camp has chosen to throw down and play the religious card.” Such warnings push a lot of panic buttons in multicultural Singapore, which is why it must be debunked.

The strong religious links here should not be ignored. It has been discovered that many of the new exco members belong to the same church and one must at least consider the possibility that their Christian faith may influence their direction for AWARE. After all, it is not the Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu and Muslim ‘conservatives’ who are agitating for a new AWARE. This is in no way an attempt to paint the entire Christian community in Singapore with a broad brush but an empirical observation of the acts of certain segments within this community.

There are signs that some within the broadly tolerant local Christian community have become more pro-active in making their views heard on public policies. In 2004, religious conservatives campaigned vigorously to resist government plans to built the two casinos, with the Christian conservatives the most vocal. In 2007, the parliamentary debate over Penal Code 377A, a law that criminalizes homosexual sex, served as a public platform for the community’s vivid expression of its anti-gay sentiments.

Beyond self-mobilisation, a minority of Christians have had a history of inappropriate proselytizing in multicultural Singapore. The 1990 Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, for example, which guards against insensitive proselytizing and the pulpit politics, was passed in part due to the alarming incidents of Christian students attempting to convert students of other faiths on university campus in the late 1980s. More recently, a Christian husband and wife couple was hauled up to court for mailing over 20,000 ‘seditious and objectionable publications’ against the Islamic faith, as well as over 20 tracts to their Muslim colleagues. When asked if the purpose of her act was to convert Muslims, the woman replied, “I am sowing the gospel seed, but it is God that converts”.

Given these trends, warning against ‘playing the religious card’ is but a disingenuous attempt to pretend that such Christian activism does not exist in multi-religious Singapore. This is unhelpful. Instead, it would be more constructive to urge the more moderate and liberal Christians to speak out. The local Christian community is not homogenous but one that contains a gradient of values, and its time for those who are more inclusive and tolerant of differing life-choices to stand up and be counted.

Terence Chong is a sociologist at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

Please don't tell me that you are talking about climate change or saving the whale. Or what did you mean by all that.

 

[scroobal]

Lovely piece. Balanced, well argued and covers a wide angle. Also noted that he took a swipe at Paul Jacob.

One thing I do disagree with is the label "liberal" applied to the old guards. Actually, the old guards were too conservative and they have been criticised by academia and even the NGO world for this.

Scroobal, the piece by Terence that I referred to earlier

In Singapore: Surveying the responses to the AWARE Saga

Terence Chong
23 Apr 2009
The saga playing out at AWARE, Singapore’s women’s rights group, is now cause célèbre. It began on 28 March when a new and unfamiliar executive committee was voted in by a surge of new members, most of whom had only joined the group barely three months before. Many of the new exco members were subsequently found to have strong Christian links and trenchant anti-gay and anti-abortion views.

Terence Chong is a sociologist at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

 

[Lydia]

It's ludicrous that a bunch of Christian women should take over leadership of Aware.
Christian women are mostly completely subjugated by dominant male ideology.

Example:
you wives, be submissive to your own husbands ... thus Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, and you have beome her children if you do what is right without being frightened by any fear (1Peter 3:1,6)

If fundamentalist Christians were to run Aware, women's rights in S'pore will slide back by 2000 years.
I have never heard my friends express interest in women's issues, yet some are now joining Aware. Unbelievable!

 

[po2wq]

... I have never heard my friends express interest in women's issues, yet some are now joining Aware. Unbelievable!

ooh! ...

aware has now made ur frens more aware! ...

 

[londontrader]

Interesting and original point you make!
At a recent church wedding, I noticed the pastor making the same references ie. a woman should look after the family and support her husband
The bride didn't look too sympathetic to that view

cheers

It's ludicrous that a bunch of Christian women should take over leadership of Aware.
Christian women are mostly completely subjugated by dominant male ideology.

Example:
you wives, be submissive to your own husbands ... thus Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, and you have beome her children if you do what is right without being frightened by any fear (1Peter 3:1,6)

If fundamentalist Christians were to run Aware, women's rights in S'pore will slide back by 2000 years.
I have never heard my friends express interest in women's issues, yet some are now joining Aware. Unbelievable!

 

[Lydia]

Josie isn't interested in fighting for women's rights. The Church of Our Saviour wants to eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda.
Many Christian women are taught that women can only lead under a man's headship or authority. Will Josie operate under her husband's or pastor's headship? Will men be the hidden leaders of Aware?
That would be like Kenneth Jeyaretnam of Reform Party getting Lee Hsien Loong as his consultant.
Thio Su Mien 'groomed' Josie for years, telling her at family gatherings that she must not be self-centred, jetting here and there and asking when she would contribute to society. Thio is a puppet mistress. Josie was guilt-ridden and did what was required of her.

 

[Naturefarm2]

As far as i am concern, i think there is only 1 solution.

Let the new aware rally the christian and old aware rally the buddist and fight it out.

if the stand of the new aware is so strong, this is as if the muslim do not eat pork, so what they need to do is to take over the Pork importer assosiation and try to set rule to limit the pork.

 

[Lydia]

This isn't about Christians versus Buddhists. I'm a Christian and I'm totally against what the new Aware stands for - lacking respect for others, sneaking around and muscling in on others' turf.

Beware the brain washers in our midst. That includes Pastor Hong. He has his church under his sway.

 

[kakowi]

....eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda...

(1) I was trying to see if there is justification to this premise - that their initial involvement is to reduce the perceived pro-gay bias.

If you do not use this premise as a starting point, then you will fall into what the others are already assuming...that they want to impose their christian agenda on a secular organization.

Many people here assume that is the case. And take great delight in furthering their assumptions.

Hence the balancing point is to consider whether this aspect was initially true.


(2) I do not feel that a Church was initially involved.


(3) If their intention is to reduce the pro-gay bias, then the next question is to ask if they intend to make it anti-gay or gay-neutral.


If they intended to make it anti-gay, then I am afraid they need more justification to get involved in a secular organization that promotes women rights.

If they intended to make it gay-neutral, then we would have owed them a debt to prevent a secular organization being used to promote gay rights.

Unfortunately the events moved too fast and the onslaught makes everyone either offensive or defensive.



(4) I feel that the anti-church comments on the role of women is unfair.

But there is freedom of choice, and so if a woman feels that she is equal to her husband in every respect including earning the daily bread, contributing equally to the household, paying equally to the mortgage, paying equally to the child-bearing expenses, allowing the husband to have private use of his own money as she to hers, volunteering to bear exactly half of all post-marriage and if neccessary post-divorce expenses including possible alimony to her husband then by all means discuss that with her husband-to-be before marriage and affirm that intention mutually.

But if another woman believe in the christian role of marriage, that is her business and none of others to interfere.

After all, if hers proven to be an emotionally stable marriage, then it is a blessing to her, the society she is in and the family she bears. The Bible affirms that a faithful wife is a great blessing to her husband and will bring him great wealth while an adulterous wife will ruin the family. Neither does the Bible condone adultery by the husband. The Bible sets guidelines for family interaction - from wife to husband, from husband to wife, from parents to children and from children to parents. This biblical structure is the channel of the blessings that the God of the Bible promises to the Man and Woman He joined in matrimony.

(5) Thus there are many ways of seeing the situation. And it is for each woman to affirm her own understanding.

Feminism was and perhaps is based on an assumption of contentiousness between the two sexes.

The Christian way is based on an assumption that the husband and his wife have their own unique complementary roles to play in the family and such a structure will bring great blessings to them and their family.

 

[Zombie]

kakowi

Lydis said: "....eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda..."

Your focus: "I was trying to see if there is justification to this premise - that their initial involvement is to reduce the perceived pro-gay bias."

"Eliminate" and "Reduce" have materially different meanings.

 

[kakowi]

kakowi

Lydis said: "....eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda..."

Your focus: "I was trying to see if there is justification to this premise - that their initial involvement is to reduce the perceived pro-gay bias."

"Eliminate" and "Reduce" have materially different meanings.

Thanks, i understand.

I am not trying to change the context of her points.


And in that vein, I realize i should not have use the word 'you' either, because i am not referring to her but using it in a general sense.

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Well as each day goes by and more and more of the 'curtain' is lifted exposing the shenanigans of Pastor Hong, 'The Thiomenator', Josie and her Pussycats and certain others from COOS...I am inclined to agree with Jacob...

On the "liberal" tag, well it is then unfortunate and ironic...come to think of it...Pastor Hong, The Thiomenator and gang have played the LGBT card quite cleverly now appearing to gain support of the majority conservative singgies who do not appear to be thinking rationally and objectively just giving in to obvious irrational fear...when LGBT is NOT the germane issue here

Also noted that he took a swipe at Paul Jacob.

One thing I do disagree with is the label "liberal" applied to the old guards. Actually, the old guards were too conservative and they have been criticised by academia and even the NGO world for this.

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

"...The controversy should never have descended into a contest between secularists and religionists. The new team has clear faith-based leanings, evident in its virulent condemnation of homosexuality. It is free to make a stand, but how is gayness such a burning issue? There are matters of import, such as family deprivation in bad times, that could gain traction if they receive Aware's campaigning zeal. If the Christian women who captured Aware believed they had to because the secular outfit had gone down the wrong path, they needed only to set up their own society to promote their cause. They could have campaigned openly on a Christian platform and leaven their social programmes with Christian values. Let the public judge whether they make a contribution to society's well-being..." ST editorial 1/5

(1) I was trying to see if there is justification to this premise - that their initial involvement is to reduce the perceived pro-gay bias.

If you do not use this premise as a starting point, then you will fall into what the others are already assuming...that they want to impose their christian agenda on a secular organization.

Many people here assume that is the case. And take great delight in furthering their assumptions.

Hence the balancing point is to consider whether this aspect was initially true.


(2) I do not feel that a Church was initially involved.


(3) If their intention is to reduce the pro-gay bias, then the next question is to ask if they intend to make it anti-gay or gay-neutral.


If they intended to make it anti-gay, then I am afraid they need more justification to get involved in a secular organization that promotes women rights.

If they intended to make it gay-neutral, then we would have owed them a debt to prevent a secular organization being used to promote gay rights.

Unfortunately the events moved too fast and the onslaught makes everyone either offensive or defensive.

Feminism was and perhaps is based on an assumption of contentiousness between the two sexes.

The Christian way is based on an assumption that the husband and his wife have their own unique complementary roles to play in the family and such a structure will bring great blessings to them and their family.

 

[londontrader]

Well said
hope you'll be one of many women going to stop Josie & Co on Sat
My own sister (never interested in AWARE) got pissed off enough to sign up

cheers

Josie isn't interested in fighting for women's rights. The Church of Our Saviour wants to eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda.
Many Christian women are taught that women can only lead under a man's headship or authority. Will Josie operate under her husband's or pastor's headship? Will men be the hidden leaders of Aware?
That would be like Kenneth Jeyaretnam of Reform Party getting Lee Hsien Loong as his consultant.
Thio Su Mien 'groomed' Josie for years, telling her at family gatherings that she must not be self-centred, jetting here and there and asking when she would contribute to society. Thio is a puppet mistress. Josie was guilt-ridden and did what was required of her.

 

[londontrader]

Dear Kakowi,

"I was trying to see if there is justification to this premise - that their initial involvement is to reduce the perceived pro-gay bias."

I think it is already clear that Josie & Co (by their own admission) sought to STOP (not reduce) that particular agenda. I don't necessarily agree that the agenda was pro gay.

"If you do not use this premise as a starting point, then you will fall into what the others are already assuming...that they want to impose their christian agenda on a secular organization."

So they have an alternative secular agenda to offer the members?
If so, why does it sound so much like the agenda that COOS advances?
You're not going to tell me that COOS has a SECULAR agenda, are you?

"Many people here assume that is the case. And take great delight in furthering their assumptions."

People don't have to make any assumptions
The protagonists have made their agenda clear to everyone

"(2) I do not feel that a Church was initially involved."

The relevant question is:
Is a Church involved NOW?

"Unfortunately the events moved too fast and the onslaught makes everyone either offensive or defensive. "

Did it have to move so fast?
Josie & Co could have joined AWARE and openly debated the agenda they found objectionable.
Had they been more honest and open from the beginning, would the other members have reacted so offensively?

"(4) I feel that the anti-church comments on the role of women is unfair."

So what is the church's stand on the role of women (is it a submissive role?)
I didn't get a clear picture from what you wrote

PS: Still waiting for you to clarify your views on OLD AWARE (in the interest of BALANCE, of course)

 

[scoopdreams]

It's ludicrous that a bunch of Christian women should take over leadership of Aware.
Christian women are mostly completely subjugated by dominant male ideology.

That's a sweeping statement if I ever saw one. Many friends of mine who are Christian women are not 'completely subjugated by dominant male ideology.' Do you have any figures supporting that claim of 'Christian women are mostly subjugated by dominant male ideology.'?

If anything, the reason why 'dominant male ideology' is present in almost all facets of society - workplace, religion, family, etc - is because most cultures are patriarchal in nature. The Bible was written by men, and not women, because men were the dominant movers in society back then.

If fundamentalist Christians were to run Aware, women's rights in S'pore will slide back by 2000 years.

2000 years, no. 100 years, yes. You seem to discount the holding power and influence of education, philosophy, human rights awareness, and other forces that have shaped women's roles in society since 2000 years ago.

I have never heard my friends express interest in women's issues, yet some are now joining Aware. Unbelievable!

That's the power of the media. And yes, humans' propensity to rush headlong suddenly into confrontations, over beliefs that were never even thought about before, is unbelievable isn't it?

All I ask is to think before you make sweeping and grandiose statements. You make the anti-Thio camp look just as irrational and zealotist as the pro-Thio camp.

 

[scoopdreams]

Josie isn't interested in fighting for women's rights. The Church of Our Saviour wants to eliminate what they see as pro gay bias in Aware's agenda.

Josie IS fighting for women's rights. It's just that her version of women's rights fall under the tight operational framework of Christian values.

Many Christian women are taught that women can only lead under a man's headship or authority. Will Josie operate under her husband's or pastor's headship? Will men be the hidden leaders of Aware?

I really wonder which church teaches that nowadays? Most modern churches are encouraging women to take a proactive role in leadership, etc. Do you have any churches to name that actively reinforce this notion? I'm sure they'll be losing female membership extremely fast.

And to be clear off the bat, you make it sound as if Josie will be taking orders from her husband and executing them, without any opinions of her own. It is different, from say, Josie consulting her husband for perspectives and then making a decision on her own.

That would be like Kenneth Jeyaretnam of Reform Party getting Lee Hsien Loong as his consultant.

Men are not women's enemies!! Don't take feminism too far out into the peripheral boundaries. We must work together for the betterment of human society as a whole - we need your advice and perceptions, and vice versa. So, old AWARE's appointment of Mark Goh as legal adviser, would that be wrong too? Should they have gotten a female legal adviser?

Lee Hsien Loong is an idiot, and it would be stupid to get him as a consultant. However, if LKY offers with true intents to be Kenneth J's political consultant, I would say that is a goooood thing. That old vampire has a quite a few tricks to learn about politicking and governing a country - though he also have bad habits that must be avoided at all costs.

Thio Su Mien 'groomed' Josie for years, telling her at family gatherings that she must not be self-centred, jetting here and there and asking when she would contribute to society. Thio is a puppet mistress. Josie was guilt-ridden and did what was required of her.

There is nothing wrong with actively encouraging someone to contribute to society. However, Thio did major wrong in engineering the coup (if she was proven to have done it), and manipulating pawns under her.

By saying Josie was guilt-ridden, and did what was required of her, you cheapen her wrongdoings, essentially saying she was a mindless dolt who was simply mind-f**ked into doing this. She's not. She was fully aware of what she was doing, and she will have to take the responsibility and repercussions for her actions.