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Teaching our kids to 'live and let live' |
 I was somewhat reminded of an experience at a family restaurant when Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spoke last night on the need for religious groups in multiracial Singapore to exercise tolerance and restraint and adopt 'live and let live' as a guiding principle.
My family and I were having lunch at the restaurant last week when I witnessed an unpleasant scene between two large groups of patrons. One group had apparently made a reservation but was several minutes late, while an equally large group was waiting for a table. This family that had been asked to wait in the restaurant lobby became increasingly impatient, glancing at an empty table that had already been set. About ten minutes later, the family which had made a reservation turned up.
The waitress who attended to this family was of the same ethnic group, and as she seated them, one of the members of the waiting family passed a remark that triggered an unpleasant exchange of words between the two families. Overhearing the exchange, I gathered that the remark inferred that the second family had gotten a table first because the waitress was “giving preference to her own kind”. Eventually, the manager intervened and managed to seat the second group at another table. However, the mood at the restaurant was tense after the incident and most of the patrons, including my family and I, soon left.
This incident showed all too clearly that as highlighted by Mr Lee, race and religion are “the 'most visceral and dangerous fault line', compared to the potential divide between the rich and poor, and between Singaporeans and new-arrivals.” Messages on racial harmony and religious tolerance abound in public campaigns, schools and locally produced programmes. In addition, Ministries and statutory boards are usually careful to ensure that administrative guidelines and procedures are free of any ethnic and religious bias. However, incidents such as these show it may not take much for questions of race and religion to bubble up to the surface.
Children are remarkably free of such preconceived notions but the question is, how long will they remain so? In particularly, would they bother to learn tolerance and restraint if they have witnessed others not doing so, or if they themselves have been negatively affected? Yes, race and religion are sensitive subjects which most people are reluctant to raise. However, we cannot pretend that we have never encountered incidents tinged by racial and religious prejudice, nor can we shield our children and loved ones from such experiences in the future. We can tell our children that the choices are up to them – they have the right to empower themselves with the principles we choose to teach them. They have the right to walk away from a potentially volatile situation, or to stand up for themselves and others when they see fit. And most importantly, they have the choice of treating those of different races and religions with the same impartiality, tolerance and restraint that they wish others would express towards them.
What are you thoughts on this? We would like to hear from you.
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