Having lived abroad for about a quarter of my life, and having family abroad, I try to keep up on events in those places that I've lived. One such place is Singapore, Singapore's media is quite interesting.
The press is controlled there in a way that the press is not controlled in the US. There's an implicit agreement between the press and the government to not report things that will make the government look bad. For example, earlier this year when Mas Selamat, a terrorist, escaped from a detention center, the press did not blame the government for lax security.
The press is also somewhat less sensationalist than the press in the US, violent crimes generally don't make it into the press, but maybe that's because Singapore is one of the safest countries in the world.
The main newspaper, The Straits Times is also managed by the Singapore Press Holdings, which is generally headed by a civil servant. I do believe that a civil servant has very good reasons to not get on the bad side of the government. It's more than just self censorship that goes on, the people in the government are the same people who run the newspaper with the largest circulation in Singapore.
I suppose the difference between the US press and the Singaporean press is that the Singaporean press has no pretentions about digging up the truth on the government or acting as the check on the government. (Other than the Straits Times, there are about 5 other widely circulated English language newspapers in Singapore, and of those, 3 focus on human interest/tabloid type stories, not hard news.) The Singaporean press knows that its place is just to report what the government tells them is okay to report. Singaporeans know this too.
When I lived there, my colleagues often joked about the lack of “human rights” (they meant freedom of choice) in Singapore and that the newspapers often didn't tell the whole story. One colleague told me a story about a National Serviceman (henceforth known as NS man) who died while in the Army. His death was reported in the Straits Times, but they didn't report how he died. The NS man had committed suicide while in the camp. The only reason my friend knew this was because he was in the same troop as this guy.
So why this hush, hush attitude? In my opinion the Singaporean government sees itself as sort of a benign paternal figure that's working to protect its citizens from harm and hurtful ideas, including suicide. I don't have data here, but I have heard that after a newspaper reports on how a person has committed suicide or committed a crime, that there's a rash of copycats immediately following the report. It could be that the Singaporean government wants to prevent that type of copycat behavior, so they keep the press on a tight leash.
Anyhow, to end I pose a few questions. Is it a bad thing to have a controlled press, if it is controlled to protect the readers? Or does that just patronize the readers and gives them less respect than they deserve?
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4 comments:
My favorite part of your blog is that you have included a part of your own history in it. That personal aspect makes me look forward to reading your future blog entries and learning more about your views. I would have liked some information regarding the history of Singapore to help understand how the government is able to control the media in these ways.
Sherry, I enjoyed reading your article because I had no idea to what extent the Singapore press is contolled by the government. Forgeign press interests me very much because it's slant is unfamiliar, I dwell into more detail than usual. For your questions... The press controlled by government makes it an extension of the government itself. Whether it's good or bad depends on the nature of the political and social climate of the country. As far as suggestions for your blog...tell us more about the how the public 'percieves' this domination of the press by the government.
Very interesting blog. It's amazing to see the difference between American and Forgeign press. I read an article where a popular radio station in Venezuela was closed down for comments on the Government. I wonder what Singapore Gov't thinks about American Press???
Your blog is visually very well done and you effectively made it very reader-friendly. This is a very big topic, but I think that you did a nice job of centering it on Singapore and using a few specific examples to narrow the discussion in a useful way. The example of the prisoner escape is really a fascinating one, and I was wondering if you could find an article to link to on the web that illustrates the incomplete coverage that the story received, vs. how it was portrayed in other media outlets. The wikipedia article provides some leads on this, but it would be even more compelling to see some first hand media content.
You do pose some interesting questions at the end, and I would be very interested in seeing you elaborate on some of the pros and cons to government controlled media that you bring up.
Overall here you did well at bringing in your personal perspective and being informative on media issues in another nation.
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