Apathy in our government.

Last night, I sat around a bunch of 6-8 people who were sharing their thoughts on what they are unhappy about the PAP government. Ok ok ... it was like a complaining session. But on hindsight, thinking about what were discussed, it wasn't really about how we were all affected by their methods of governing. After all, almost everyone there are either married or partly married, have a stable job and income ... nothing really much to complain about. But what I was really glad is that, these generation of adults (er hem ... us 20-30 year olds :D) were talking about the plight of our poorer counterparts, how the lower income people are suffering, and how out of touch our current ruling party is. Basically summing up the adjectives to describe the PAP: arrogant, out of touch, apathy and unfair.

I am particularly disturbed about the obvious apathy on the side of our government. They way they were so relunctant to increase the subsistence allowance for the elders living alone from $260/mth to $290/mth, and yet proclaiming themselves to be a combination of Bill Gates+George Soros+Mother Theresa shows what kind of individuals they are. The insensitive daughter of an MP who spoke like an elitist well groomed (and supported in claims) by putting down individuals whom she deems lazy by her standards points to the kind of vicious cycle we are in. Our new PAP talents who are so well paid by our taxes and increasing GST are just a bunch of insensitive and thoughtless people who have not seen the real sufferings of the ever increasing population who receives less than $1200/mth - just like their increasingly out of touch senior mentors. Have they actually visited these 1 room flats in Ang Mo Kio, Toa Payoh, Chai Chee and many other parts of the island? Have they looked in their faces and tell them, "eh, you're not contributing to the society anymore, so sorry, only $260 for u".

The wake up call for these MPs will have to come, but I am not sure in what form it will take. A 60% win of a GRC versus a self projected 80% i suspect will only impact so much as a forgettable slap on the ego. When they haven't have to take a 1 over hour travel ride to work eveyday on their so called world class public transport system, and start complaining about why we singaporeans are not content with what we have - I think they have seriously learn the meaning of "putting themselves in others shoes". And maybe they are, but they are still thinking in terms of "Oh if I am in their shoes, I would do this and that" when they should be asking "What kind of environment and opportunities are provided to these people that cause them to be in the state they are in?"