Any discussion about Amy Cheong probably starts with a statement along these lines: "She made highly insensitive racist and uncalled for remarks about another race, and compounded them by using expletives in her Facebook posting."
I think a statement like that, to reflect the ordinary public's views, serves as a boiler plate. Beyond that, there is a spectrum, from hostile to sympathetic.
She made racist remarks. But was she racist? The person in the US who reportedly made the anti-Islamic video never recanted. The American pastor who burned copies of the Koran never recanted. But Ms Cheong has since apologised, profusely and repeatedly. She also did not blame her employer, NTUC, for sacking her.
Pointing the finger at ourselves ("Let him who is without sin..."), how guilty are we of prejudice if we have made jokes that made fun of others based on stereotypes? Some social psychologists say we define ourselves by first marking out what we are not.
Is it all right if we made "incorrect" remarks, slurs or jokes within a private circle (ie, just don't get caught out)? Did Ms Cheong -- presumably a savvy Facebook user -- not realise that once she hit the Enter button, that's it!
She said she thought she was giving vent to her irritation only to her circle of friends. But -- importantly -- she seemed to have been "betrayed"; otherwise, how did her remarks go viral online?
I am glad New Paper (today, Oct 9), managed to interview her before she left the country:
A balanced commentary can be found in this piece posted in insing.com:
http://news.insing.com/tabloid/peoples-court-of-social-media/id-38613f00
The ‘People’s Court’ of social media
by Elaine Ee
Social media’s ability to galvanise waves of people for a single matter in a matter of hours, faster than any conscription call to arms, allows it to functions like a powerful people’s court -- where the people, for better or for worse, are going to have the final say.
The people -- not the law, not the media authority -- decide whether someone’s post is good or bad, fair or unfair, and whether that person should be pardoned or found guilty-as-charged in the social media world. Sometimes these repercussions spill over into the real world.
At best, this results in highly charged comments and posts flying around cyberspace; at worst, we see violence on the streets such as that in Egypt, Libya, Sydney and Jakarta over the notorious anti-Islam film released in the US. Not to mention those controversial Stop Kony and Anonymous movements.
In Singapore’s context, we now have Amy Cheong’s sacking from the membership unit of the Singapore labour movement.
But this is not a comment about her being fired. While her words on Facebook were undoubtedly offensive, I don’t know enough about her as a person or her job performance to say whether this move by her bosses was justified or not.
This is a comment about the force of social media.
With so many uproars online and seeing that most of us have some social media presence, understanding the nature of this public space and how people behave in it is more important than ever.
This goes beyond whether what a person posts is right or wrong. It’s about how people react to and deal with these posts, how conclusions and perceptions are formed, and the social punishment (or reward) that is meted out by the crowd.
This is a powerful force to have at hand. It can swing votes in an election, turn people into heroes -- and in the same breath, take them down and drag them through the mud in disgrace. It can be a force for good, or a force for hatred. It all depends on how we use it and for what we use it.
We can express our anger, indignation and opposition to something and still be a force for good, if we do it in a way that rallies us around a just cause, communicating in decent, human ways.
Or we can, in spite of standing up for a just cause, become a force for hatred, if we let ourselves fall into mean-spiritedness and mob behavior.
NO JUDGE
Online anger, I believe, is symptomatic of fissures that already exist and upset people in society. It reflects to a large extent what is already out there.
But the way emotions arise and spread online is unique to this medium. Emotions run higher online than face-to-face. When a person can’t see the other person with whom they’re dealing, an invisible barrier drops inside and they feel freer to use strong language, express their opinions forcefully and be confrontational.
And the viral nature of social media means that it gives power to emotions to be infectious, spreading like a wildfire that is put out only when it exhausts itself.
The problem is, social media is a people’s court with no judge.
Everyone is in control, which means that no one is in control.
Tides of joy or fury take on a life of their own and sweep people up in their path. This power is immense, but it is often a runaway train. And when it goes off, we can only stand by and watch it complete its crazy course, and hope that it is for good and not hatred.
At the same time, the ability lies within each user of social media to harness this tremendous power. In a way unprecedented in the history of mankind, people have the collective capacity to shape things and bring about positive change across physical boundaries.
Social media is people power in its purest form. So the next time someone or something gets put on trial, let this court of the people show that it can be a force for good.
And when we post something, think about what it is we’re posting, because if we get taken to task, it’s the people to whom we’ll have to answer.
(Elaine Ee writes about Singapore, the city she lives in, covering the arts, events, personalities and social issues. Her stories have appeared in Time Out Singapore, Tatler Homes, Food & Travel and Jetstar Asia. She’s also an editor at publichouse.sg, a Singapore community-driven website run by socially conscious denizens.)
(The views and opinions expressed by the author and those providing comments are theirs alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of inSing.com and SingTel Digital Media Ptd Ltd.)
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