Jan 16, 2011

My Thoughts on The Online Citizen Getting Gazetted as a Political Association

I always knew that it was going to happen.

It was just a matter of time.

To me, the only surprise was that it took so long for the government to gazette The Online Citizen as a political association.

Then again, the elections are looming. So this too is the right season for the PAP to do what it did.

Years ago, I already realised that in the Singapore blogosphere, group blogs commenting on sociopolitical issues were at risk. The more well-organised, prolific and popular a group blog is, the higher the risk it would face.

That is one reason why I never joined any group blogs.

(The other main reason is that I like the freedom of having my own individual blog. Apart from yakking about sociopolitical issues, I can also yak about anything else that interests me).

In my opinion, as far as raising public awareness; promoting active citizenship and encouraging critical thinking among Singaporeans, the best form that the blogosphere can take is as follows.

(1) Lots and lots of individual bloggers.

(2) Many, many intelligent voices providing reasoned, constructive views.

(3) But no individual voice should be so compelling and outstanding that it becomes an obvious nail for the PAP to hammer down on (whether by defamation suits, political gazetting, public ministerial attacks, police investigations or the like).

(4) An amorphous, informal network among the active bloggers, so that they interconnect themselves with plenty of hyperlinks, "Friends", "Likes", blog comments etc.

The gist of the idea is that the Singapore sociopolitical blogosphere should be as big as possible, so that its collective influence is far and wide, and yet sufficiently diffuse, so that the PAP lacks obvious targets to attack.

Anyway, I'm reading the Internet commentary out there, and I see that many posters commented about the "foreign funding" aspect of the Online Citizen issue. (Gazetted political associations are not allowed to receive funding from foreigners).

This is a red herring. Or a non-issue. It just isn't the point.

Seriously, it costs peanuts to run a website. (And that is what The Online Citizen mainly is - a website).

Using Blogger, Wordpress and the like, you can set up free blogs and web pages within a few minutes.

If you pay for your own server space, that costs a bit more money. You get to pick your own domain name; you have more space to upload files etc. But seriously, it just costs a bit more money.

One doesn't need "foreign funding" to achieve that.

Personally, I don't see what's the big deal about foreign funding.

This is not the US, where political campaigns can be expensive. In Singapore, even if an opposition candidate has billions of bucks, the government will allow him only x minutes to appear on TV and talk to the people of Singapore.

It's not as if he's able to buy more airtime with his money. He's already constricted and tied down by a host of government laws, regulations and rules, on his campaigning activities.

Got money, also cannot spend.

Anyway, every other Tom, Dick and Harry on this island is a foreigner. The government adores them, talented or not.

So what's the big deal? About foreign funding?

Oh, remind me to write about something else in my next post. About my favourite poem. Or my daughter's IQ test. Or my new furniture.

Something non-political. Otherwise, who knows? Maybe the government would change the law again and say that even an individual blogger can be a "political association". LOL.

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was going to vote for the government this time. Having heard the cries of TOC, I'm beginning to reconsider voting for them this time around. I don't want a bully as a leader.

Anonymous said...

"In Singapore, even if an opposition candidate has billions of bucks, the government will allow him only x minutes to appear on TV and talk to the people of Singapore."
Mr Wang

Hahaha, Mr Wang, I think you have missed the point on this.

If I have a billion bucks, why would I want to identify with or support the opposition?

The govt policies are pro-rich and pro-business and there is good security and life here, unlike in some other countries where you are rich but you may not be safe.

Don't say billionaire, even middle class also won't support opposition and Singapore has a big group of middle class people.

Think about it, where did the 66.6%PAP votes came from?

Anonymous said...

Ref your last sentence.Iwould not be surprise since it is already law that ONE person can be an illegal 'gathering' for the purpose of arrest!

Anonymous said...

Better just write about your poetry and your basement being flooded. Otherwise you may not be invited to share your views on poetry in future.
Maybe we will see Ong Ah Heng or Lim Swee Say being invited to recite poetry in the schools in future.

Amused said...

You are too optimistic that they will tolerate individual blogs when the heat is on. Didn't they ban podcasting in the previous election? Aren't they banning political commentary/reporting outside MSM the day before election?

Anonymous said...

Your piece is not only symphathetic to the cause of the ruling party, but also shows your resignation to the fact that such subjugation is continuing and being successful. This is sad and dissappointing from a leading blogger.

Instead of condemning such gazetting, you are showing apathy for future more drastic moves. "See, I told so" type of blog is not inspiring.


madameG

Parka said...

The main problem with TOC's community to the government is, when you read the comments left by readers, it's predominantly anti-PAP. Not only that, people who leave comments don't substantiate their opinions with actual constructive. Negativity has a way of breeding.

Gazetting TOC doesn't really obstruct their activities if it's just to keep an eye on the funding.

The idea of many bloggers does give the government no main target to focus on. But that's the desired outcome - no main website for readers to go to.

Individual bloggers run bigger risk when they don't edit what they write, or don't have people reading their proofs before publishing.

The power of the Internet as a broadcasting medium is unparalleled. Not even the government can control it. Writers/bloggers just have to use it wisely.

"With great power comes great responsibility"

Anonymous said...

//
"With great power comes great responsibility"
//

My guess is the likes of individual bloggers like Mr Wang and LuckyTan barely attracts 50k *unique* local fans(potential voters). Barely a dent on the election outcome.

Btw, TOC has publicly admitted that that they are low on cash. Hosting a website costs peanuts. Putting content on it is an entirely different matter.

Having said that, I salute Mr Wang for his honesty. At least no claims to be Messiah here.

Anonymous said...

"The idea of many bloggers does give the government no main target to focus on. But that's the desired outcome - no main website for readers to go to."

You don't need some main website to go to. The collective subconsciousness on a particular strain of understanding will grow on its own.

Just like the internet and what they called cloud computing. You pick the understanding and you keep it for yourself.

Anonymous said...

Comments left by commentators on The Online Citizen and Temasek Review, being predominantly anti-PAP, is hardly a surprise.

Most supporters of PAP, even if they do leave comments supporting the PAP on such websites, will more often than not be beaten down immediately.

They will therefore rather keep their apple polishing to websites like Young PAP or others that lean towards the ruling party.

Amused said...

"The main problem with TOC's community to the government is, when you read the comments left by readers, it's predominantly anti-PAP. Not only that, people who leave comments don't substantiate their opinions with actual constructive. Negativity has a way of breeding."

What do you think abou this -

"The main problem with ST/YoungPAP's community to the government is, when you read the comments left by readers, it's predominantly pro-PAP. Not only that, people who leave comments don't substantiate their opinions with actual facts. Suppression has a way of breeding."

So according to your reasoning, it's okay to gazette TOC because it is "anti-PAP" but not ST because it is pro-PAP. I am constantly amused by such twisted logic.

Parka said...

If the government say they are gazetting TOC because they want to identify the funding sources, we have to take it as that. Anyway, transparent financial reporting is a good thing. And in this case, it doesn't really affect TOC's activities at all.

Anonymous said...

@Parka
"Not only that, people who leave comments don't substantiate their opinions with actual constructive."
Laymen do not have ready access to data and info. Also there is nothing wrong in raising issues and asking questions which the gahmen if they have any sense of responsibility and accountability to the citizens, ought to answer with full transparency. Why don't u question why the gahmen makes statements without substantiation? They have all the data they need but they do not substantiate their statements and that's alright with you?? For example, MBT says the latest cooling measures is in answer to property speculation. What data did he produce to prove that speculation is the cause of rising property prices?

mr wang says so said...

So many angles ... I'll just offer you one to chew on.

Have you ever considered this point? That maybe it's not your duty to be constructive.

If you go to a restaurant and the service is poor, you can legitimately complain. If you buy a new TV set and it breaks down soon after, you can legitimately complain.

But it is not your job to offer the restaurant ideas on where and how to train their waiters and waitresses. It is not your job to offer ideas on how the factory can improve processes to raise the QC standards of their TVs.

Now, if you see the government as a service provider - an entity who's paid to deliver services in terms of healthcare, housing, public infrastructure etc - do you see that maybe it's not your obligation to be constructive?

Maybe your job is merely to COMPLAIN. Maybe the ministers, who are being highly paid to solve the problems, SHOULD be the ones responsible for solving the problems.

Did you ever think of that? Or is it much too radical for you?

Alan Wong said...

I think there is more to it than just mere gazetting. It's more like a warning same as that to Catherine Lim not to cross that imaginary border that they have set.

Say if the same kind of website heaps a lot of political praise for PAP while critising the opposition parties, would they be the least bothered about its funding and the need to gazette it ?

The real issue should be whether there should be fair play or whether we should be denied of such a platform.

Maybe a warning like "All opinions in this website forum should be viewed with a pinch of salt" would suffice. There is absolutely no need to gazette it as a political association.

Isn't it a PAP joke that even NGOs like Maruah IS also a political association ? What next ? Aware ?

Anonymous said...

Actually, I don't know what you mean when you say you saw it coming.

This quite a good perspective, do tell me what you think about it.

http://dotseng.wordpress.com/2011/01/16/the-gazetting-of-toc-the-confessions-of-a-liaison-officer/

One problem we all face is mda is mum about why they ace done all this. I am not saying they are right or wrong. But if more Information was available it would not cause so much speculation.

Nice to see you back again. Btw I bought your book! And told all my friends about it. Keep writing Mr Wang, as there are so few of the pioneer bloggers left.

Ken

Amused said...

"If the government say they are gazetting TOC because they want to identify the funding sources, we have to take it as that. Anyway, transparent financial reporting is a good thing. And in this case, it doesn't really affect TOC's activities at all."

You are being naive. I see that others have already speculated (correctly IMHO) on their ultimate motive(s). Transparency is just how they "spin" it. If they are serious about transparency, why no one, not even the President, knows anything about the country's reserve, and information pertinent to the country's operations? It takes Wikileaks to show the other/real character of some of these actors. It must have been quite a surprise to Singaporeans. If you fully believe in transparency, you should ask they the real reason that they are gazetting TOC. That is TRANSPARENCY!

Aside, you, like the powers-that-be, believe that bloggers need to be held accountable to their words, i.e. have someone else proof read before publishing anything. This is pure suppressive tactics, pure fear-mongering. You didn't have someone looking over your shoulder when you wrote the comment. The accountability part is just a tool to suppress dissent.

Lucky Tan said...

TIC got gazetted because it was doing too well threatening to become the equivalent of Malaysikini. While they still have some distance to go, the PAP always acts early.

Andrew Loh revealed in his recent response to the gazetting that he funded the TOC operations out of his own pocket and has nothing to hide. To keep the site growing and progressing, it probably needs advertisers and investors. By cutting off foreign sources of funding, TOC has to sustain itself with local donors and only local funding....they may be reluctant ot too fearful to support them in a big way.

As for Mr. Wang's diffusion strategy based on a large amorphous network of individual bloggers, we might as well go back of the old days newsgroups, forums etc...and what was missing then was a well established site that extend participation beyond the cyberspace. The reason why TOC was gazetted is because it shows that it could do this with events such as Face-to-face and other events at Hong Lim.

The passion and spirit among the young people who got themselves organised to start TOC is what Singapore needs badly.....and what does the PAP do when they see this? They want to regulate it, they want to limit it, they want to be able to silence it. You see what is wrong with this country when you understand that we have leaders who want to stop young passionate Singaporeans from speaking up how they think this country should progress and how our future should be shaped.

It is time Singaporeans reclaim their future from these authoritarian leaders who pay themselves astronomical salaries to think of ways to repress our freedom and rights...

Kaffein said...

From what I can understand, only such group blogs and forums with social-political content can only be initiated by the PAP government. All else will either be taken in as part of the PAP eg round table, or closed down.

Kaffein

Anonymous said...

"Maybe your job is merely to COMPLAIN. Maybe the ministers, who are being highly paid to solve the problems, SHOULD be the ones responsible for solving the problems."

Good one. The convention that you should come up with a solution while complaining is commonly taken (educated onto us) that it has given someone who has messed up badly an escape route by ignoring your complaints / whining as without substance (since you are no better off than him in not being able to come out with a better suggestion).

It has somehow turned a defence into an offence where the focus has now shifted from the person who messed up real bad to the person who may look weak if he cannot offer any good suggestion besides complaining.

The focus should start with someone who have

Anonymous said...

TR may be more popular than TOC but TOC has real facts and analytic stuffs. Now that TOC going to get gazetted, its just a matter of time that it will become less vocal about SG issues. Like the speakers corner, its going to be restricted in all ways. It is going to die of a slow death. Sad.