Bhavani & Brown

First, the background. Last week, Mr Brown wrote this article for his regular TODAY column, in his usual funny style (it is a comedy column, remember?). Excerpt:

S'poreans are fed, up with progress!
Moving ahead is great but it would be even greater to be able to make ends meet
Friday • June 30, 2006

THINGS are certainly looking up for Singapore again. Up, up, and away.

Household incomes are up, I read. Sure, the bottom third of our country is actually seeing their incomes (or as one newspaper called it, "wages") shrink, but the rest of us purportedly are making more money.

Okay, if you say so.

As sure as Superman Returns, our cost of living is also on the up. Except we are not able to leap over high costs in a single bound.

Cost of watching World Cup is up. Price of electricity is up. Comfort's taxi fares are going up. Oh, sorry, it was called "being revised". Even the prata man at my coffeeshop just raised the price of his prata by 10 cents. He was also revising his prata prices.

Well, the Ministry of Communications, Information & The Arts evidently didn't find Mr Brown's article very funny. Here's the response from the press secretary, K Bhavani:

Distorting the truth, mr brown?
When a columnist becomes a 'partisan player' in politics
Monday • July 3, 2006

Letter from K BHAVANI
Press Secretary to the Minister for Information, Communications and the Arts

Your mr brown column, "S'poreans are fed, up with progress!" (June 30) poured sarcasm on many issues, including the recent General Household Survey, price increases in electricity tariffs and taxi fares, our IT plans, the Progress Package and means testing for special school fees.

The results of the General Household Survey were only available after the General Election. But similar data from the Household Expenditure Survey had been published last year before the election.

There was no reason to suppress the information. It confirmed what we had told Singaporeans all along, that globalisation would stretch out incomes.

mr brown must also know that price increases in electricity tariffs and taxi fares are the inevitable result of higher oil prices.

These were precisely the reasons for the Progress Package — to help lower income Singaporeans cope with higher costs of living.

Our IT plans are critical to Singapore's competitive position and will improve the job chances of individual Singaporeans. It is wrong of mr brown to make light of them.

As for means testing for special school fees, we understand mr brown's disappointment as the father of an autistic child. However, with means testing, we can devote more resources to families who need more help.

mr brown's views on all these issues distort the truth. They are polemics dressed up as analysis, blaming the Government for all that he is unhappy with. He offers no alternatives or solutions. His piece is calculated to encourage cynicism and despondency, which can only make things worse, not better, for those he professes to sympathise with.

mr brown is entitled to his views. But opinions which are widely circulated in a regular column in a serious newspaper should meet higher standards. Instead of a diatribe mr brown should offer constructive criticism and alternatives. And he should come out from behind his pseudonym to defend his views openly.

It is not the role of journalists or newspapers in Singapore to champion issues, or campaign for or against the Government. If a columnist presents himself as a non-political observer, while exploiting his access to the mass media to undermine the Government's standing with the electorate, then he is no longer a constructive critic, but a partisan player in politics.

Bhavani's letter is puzzling, and therefore interesting for a couple of reasons. I could comment a lot on it, but I'm pressed for time today. I'll just limit myself to a few quick observations.

The approach taken in Bhavani's letter is quite consistent with what Minister Lee Boon Yang recently said about how the government would regard bloggers:

"...we must take care not to allow humour or satire to mask the key issues. The bottom line is that a sense of humour is necessary but, more importantly, we must remember that elections and choice of leaders for the country are serious matters. Elections are certainly not laughing matters.

Well, you know how bloggers are. They're like terrorists, appearing and disappearing, running loose everywhere. Worse, they even tell jokes. Humour is not allowed, especially at the ruling party's expense.

There's just one thing. Mr Brown's article was published in TODAY, which is a newspaper not a blog. Mr Brown's practice is also to cross-post his TODAY articles on his blog, but Bhavani's reply focused entirely on Mr Brown's article as a newspaper article, not as a blog post.

So it seems to me that Bhavani is also implicitly stating (or reiterating) some rules for our local mainstream media journalists. Take a look at these paragraphs again:

"mr brown's views on all these issues distort the truth. They are polemics dressed up as analysis, blaming the Government for all that he is unhappy with. He offers no alternatives or solutions. His piece is calculated to encourage cynicism and despondency, which can only make things worse, not better, for those he professes to sympathise with.

mr brown is entitled to his views. But opinions which are widely circulated in a regular column in a serious newspaper should meet higher standards. Instead of a diatribe mr brown should offer constructive criticism and alternatives. And he should come out from behind his pseudonym to defend his views openly.

It is not the role of journalists or newspapers in Singapore to champion issues, or campaign for or against the Government. If a columnist presents himself as a non-political observer, while exploiting his access to the mass media to undermine the Government's standing with the electorate, then he is no longer a constructive critic, but a partisan player in politics."

... and let me break it down for you. Here are the Bhavani Commandments:

1. Journalists shall not blame the government for any unhappy things. (The government is never to blame for any unhappy things).

2. If you mention problems, you MUST offer solutions. (Otherwise just pretend the problem doesn't exist.).

3. YOUR opinions shall not be published unless they meet OUR standards. (And we're not humorous).

4. You cannot champion issues. (Next time, check with us before you expose any cheating scams like the NKF.)

5. You cannot campaign for or against the Government. (Just be a nation-building press exactly the way we like it.)

6. Constructive critics would not undermine the Government's standing with the electorate. (Nothing that makes us look bad could possibly be constructive.)

Interesting country we live in, huh.

Please note that the Bhavani Commandments represent Mr Wang's subjective personal opinions and interpretations of MICA's response to Mr Brown's article, and are neither intended to be, nor should be construed as assertions of fact. As such, the Bhavani Commandments constitute Mr Wang's fair comment on a matter of public interest and Mr Wang fully agrees that others are entitled to and may have different opinions or interpretations. Mr Wang acknowledges that Bhavani is an employee of the Singapore Government, that her response is made in her capacity as Press Secretary for the Minister, and that her response may or may not be consistent with her views in her own personal capacity.



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Technorati: Singapore; media; politics.