Question: Minister, can you tell us your response to the shooting of Charlie Kirk in the US? Is there anything Singaporeans can take away from the incident?
Minister: What happened is horrific. But you can’t really be surprised. For some time now, political divisions within the United States have been getting worse. Very harsh, toxic language used against political opponents, persons with opposing views, essentially labelled as enemies. Unending cultural wars between the left and the right, and the middle ground-man in the street is completely confused – a winner-take-all mentality without compromises. Add in a general worsening of public life and easy availability of high-grade weapons and a society where crime seems to have gotten out of control, the drug situation is seen to have gotten out of control, and now you get killings of high-profile political activists. You have seen Democrats being attacked – shot dead too. You have seen Republicans and those on the right being attacked. Charlie Kirk is a victim of this.
You step back and you ask – the key purpose of democracy. Having a democratic process and structure is that people will have differences within society, on how to structure society, how to deal with problems. And you try and deal with the differences through available fora, including in Singapore – say Parliament, you try and manage the differences, identify a way forward that benefits the broadest section of society.
Some compromises are necessary, and that’s what politics should be about. And in Singapore, our situation is – so far, we have avoided some of the things that you are seeing in other countries. We have a much calmer situation, but there are some worrying signs. The starting point is that the way we structure our society: you have to have law and order before you can have proper democratic discourse. If people are shooting at each other, it’s difficult to have a proper discourse. Law and order means people must feel safe; there must be low crime. You need to create trust in institutions. So, if you look at our approach – zero tolerance for gun violence, zero tolerance for drug trafficking, zero tolerance for hate speech and speech inciting violence, and we are tough on crime. So, if you discharge a gun, you face the death penalty. If you do drug trafficking, you face the death penalty. If you incite violence or engage in hate speech, you face severe punishments. If you encourage violence against any racial or religious group or any group of persons, you will face punishment. If you go on the street and rant and rave against a racial group or try and burn a holy book in the name of free speech – in the US you can because of free speech, in Singapore you will go to jail. You commit a crime, you are likely to be punished, and it won’t take very long.
While we are tough on crime, we are also focused quite extensively on rehabilitation, so that once you serve your sentence, you have a good chance of staying away from crime. Our politics has largely operated within that framework, where we discuss our differences in a mostly civilised way.
Question: You talked about zero tolerance to hate speech. But it seems like now, in the Singapore online space, there have been various camps of people, some even celebrating his death, while some are even worshipping his assault. What is your response to that?
Minister: What can the response be? A man gets killed by an assault rifle probably, and you celebrate it? I think it is despicable. I think people can have different viewpoints, you try and discuss them; you can disagree very vehemently, but to say that such a person ought to be killed because you have a different view, I think it shows a very sorry state of affairs coarsening of public discourse.
Question: Is it worrying that that is even happening in Singapore among Singaporeans online?
Minister: I think, largely, it’s not the case. But remember, Singapore is different because of the fact that I outlined earlier - law and order, we are very tough on crime. We are not idealogues on the left or right. We do what is practical, what our people want, what is safe for our people. Commit a crime, you are likely to face punishment and it won’t take very long. And I’ve said what we have zero tolerance for. We also have zero tolerance on crime, in the sense that we are tough on crime. We are also tough on the causes of crime that you know some other politicians in other countries have said. We are really tough on the causes on crime, which is why crime rates are low. But don’t for one moment think that Singaporeans are somehow very different in our make-up from those in other countries.
This situation in Singapore is different not because we are inherently different from the Americans, or other countries. It’s different because of our laws and our social policies, and the fact that we have been able to explain that and get the buy-in from our population. We have the death penalty for drug traffickers, we get the buy-in from our population, and in fact, support of the death penalty has been increasing – more than 80% of Singaporeans support it because we have explained how it actually keeps society safer, otherwise, more people, more children or women will die. Likewise in other contexts, why we have to be tough on racial abuse, why do we have to be tough on abuse of religious groups, why we have to protect minorities, why we have to protect a majority from racial attacks from others too? Why we have to protect, say, you cannot attack say the LGBT groups based on their sexual preferences; incite violence against someone.
So we have framework-ed it, we have explained it to the population to get the buy-in. But we are prepared to politically make those decisions, put in the framework. You can put in laws which say what you cannot do, those don’t make people like it automatically. You still need policy that brings our population together, and you need activist policies. And I have spoken about it elsewhere, on the ground, what the People’s Association does day in, day out, weekend activities – our population is integrated, we come together, we celebrate each other’s festivals. Those are part of our social policies. But we also have the laws. That’s what makes Singapore different, not because we are inherently different or superior beings. And online, some people will vent, but I think it is despicable if you start celebrating somebody else being killed.
Question: Do you see Singapore’s politics going down this same path as the US, and given how these ideologies continue to spread?
Minister: Identity politics – asking people to vote for you on the basis of a certain identity; it can be skin colour, it can be religion, it can be other markers of identity, is a basic fundamental of politics. We in Singapore have defied that largely and gone on a different route. And the Government, the PAP Government, tries to keep a broad hand and tries to be as inclusive as possible but it means making compromises.
And I see some worrying trends, where some politicians, are playing identity politics – based on race, based on religion. We have seen that, and in every country, there is political profit in doing that. If we go down that route, well, ultimately Singapore will suffer. So far, we have largely avoided it, but I see worrying signs.
Question: So you mentioned against playing racial politics. But one can also say that in Charlie Kirk’s case, he actually spoke along those lines, and there is a group of Singaporeans online who support him. What is your take on that?
Minister: I start by saying the assassination is despicable, regardless of whether you agree or disagree with Charlie Kirk’s views. Why that has happened, I have attempted to set out. When you start using very toxic language to describe your opponents, their outlook, you try to make them sound sub-human just because they have different viewpoints. And if they are sub-human, you can go and use violence against them right? Add in the availability of guns and the other factors I mentioned, I think you can understand why things would take a certain course. I think if you create those conditions, these consequences will follow. I just hope we ever go down that route. People can have their opinions and viewpoints; we try to manage them in a civilised way, have proper discourse, have various fora for these kinds of discussions, and ultimately Parliament is the highest forum where you can discuss and debate, and eventually we try to reach a compromise. It cannot be a winner-take-all situation. You have to compromise within different sections of society. Everybody has got to feel that they have a stake, and they have to trust the institutions, they have to trust Parliament, they have to trust the Judiciary, they have to trust the Police Force, the SAF; that the Government is honourable, working for them, they have to trust the media. And Singapore so far is a high trust society. You look at the Edelman Trust Barometer Global Report, there is high trust in all these institutions that I just spoke to you about, and that is necessary if you want to try and keep the calm and peace, and try to mediate between different viewpoints; some people want this, some people want that, and sometimes there's not a compromise.
Question: So, what can Singaporeans do to ensure that heated discussions don’t turn into violence?
Minister: Look, I have explained, we are different because of the way our politics is run. We have largely kept away from identity politics. Singaporeans will have to first understand what has worked well for Singapore, why other countries are in the situation they are. What is the difference? I would say one key difference is we have, despite the multiplicity of races and religions, one of the most religiously diverse places in the world. We have largely kept away from identity politics. And I hope Singaporeans will continue to eschew identity politics. The moment we go down the road and we encourage politicians to play identity politics, then that’s highly corrosive for society, and that I think, is a key lesson. As I said, I see some worrying signs. I hope we won’t go down there.
