From Harrying Long-Haired Men to Embracing Casinos

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From Harrying Long-Haired Men to Embracing Casinos


November 10th, 2013 | Author: Contributions



In 1984, Japanese musician Kitaro
canceled
his two sold-out shows in Singapore one day before the scheduled date.
Defying Singapore immigration’s order to chop off his tresses as a condition for
entering the country, Kitaro coolly hopped on the next flight back to Narita
with his entourage of band and crew in tow.

Recalled
the New Age musician,

…when I went through immigration, they were like,
Kitaro, please come over here, you have a problem. You cannot enter with long
hair. They said, “If you would like to enter Singapore, you will have to cut
your hair.” I said, “I don’t want to cut my hair, so I would like to cancel the
concert.”

Kitaro was not the only casualty of our government’s revulsion at long-haired
males. Back in the 1970s, Cliff
Richard, Robert
Plant and others also suffered the indignity of being turned away at the
Singapore immigration.

Ludicrous as it may sound, this insane policy was enforced from the 1970s
because our holier-than-thou government had equated long-haired males with
gangsters and morally depraved persons who had succumbed to the undesirable
influence of the western hippie
culture.

An Anglo-Chinese school spokesperson was convinced that long hair would
transform our youth into hippies. The then Permanent Secretary of the Education
Ministry was reported as saying, “It is in the national interest for
our youth to have short hair.” (“Bringing
back the ‘botak’ look,” ST, 29 July 1970).

Perhaps taking inspiration from China’s ongoing Cultural
Revolution, the Singapore government actually launched a campaign in May
1973 to coerce and humiliate men into keeping their hair short (“The
long-haired may get the sack,” ST, 8 Oct 1974).

Under this “snip
snip drive,” if you were a citizen and a man sporting long hair, you would
be served
last at all government offices (see image below), refused entry into
institutions such as schools
and fire
stations, and would have a hard time getting
employed.

If you were a civil servant, refusing to trim your mane could cost you your
job (“5,700
long-haired men warned,” ST, 11 Dec 1974).



(National
Library Archives)

Hypocrisy Unveiled

In his 1994 interview
with Fareed Zakaria, Lee Kuan Yew averred, “Certain basics about human
nature do not change. Man needs a certain moral sense of right and wrong.”

Our leaders’ principles and righteousness, however, did not even outlast
Kitaro’s signature tresses.

In the 2000s, Kitaro, long
mane and all, triumphantly returned to Singapore to hold his concert. He was
again accosted by our immigration officers, this time not for his hair but for
his autograph.

In 2004, exactly two decades after Kitaro’s run-in with Singapore immigration
officers, the ruling party pressed ahead with seeking casino
proposals from potential investors despite strong opposition from civil
society (see here and here).

In 2010, this was what Lee
Kuan Yew said to justify the government’s decision to hold F1 in Singapore
and to build two casinos,

We always re-examine old policies and positions,
and changed them with changing world circumstances. For example, we were against
F1 for many decades because we were a crowded city; and having cars racing
around would encourage people to race along our roads. But recognising that F1
has a jet-set following, and could generate economic spin-offs for our people,
we decided to allow F1…

Similarly, we were against casinos for decades and
refused offers of seedy casinos from Macau. But seeing the casino industry has
developed in Las Vegas, a city in a desert, and their casinos have activities
like big convention centres, live performances with successful Broadway hits,
food and beverages with famous chefs, we have allowed two integrated
resorts.

So much for all that highfalutin talk on unchanging moral values.

It’s the Economy, Stupid

On the government’s recent decision to block
access to the Ashley Madison website, Communications and Information
Minister Yaacob
Ibrahim said,

It was very clear that they want to set up shop
here and promote things which we think run counter to our values.

And so we decided that (we had) better not wait
for them to set up and just tell them they are not welcome here, because we need
to safeguard our family values.

If you believe this is a move by the government to uphold our moral and
family values, you are grossly mistaken.

As some astute netizens had pointed out, it all boils down to economics.

Unlike the gambling industry that has more deleterious
effects on families and our society but contributes more than 3% to our GDP, there is no
government revenue to be collected from the extra-marital dating site.

If we look deeper, economic calculations also drove the 1970s campaign
against long-haired men.

Ostensibly, the campaign was presented as a moral battle against the creeping
influence of undesirable “western” culture. In truth, the young nation then
needed its people to slog for its economic survival, and thus slovenly
long-haired males, as a embodiment of the anti-materialism hippie
lifestyle and values that would undermine productivity and retard
Singapore’s economic development, had to be swiftly brought into line.

So do not be beguiled by the government’s rhetoric: what has always
underpinned PAP’s policy is neither morals nor conservatism but GDPism. This has
never changed from day one.

One thing has changed though: in the early days of nation building, economic
growth had benefited most Singaporeans; today, it has degenerated into a pursuit
to enrich a certain privileged class at the expense of ordinary
Singaporeans.



Singapore Armchair Critic

* The author blogs at http://singaporearmchaircritic.wordpress.com/


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