Doctor Suspended From Medical Practice for 6 Weeks Due to Offensive Posts On Hardwarezone Forums

Last Updated on 2019-06-08 , 10:25 am

Let’s say you have a burning question. Where do you seek answers from?

Friends? Family? Instagram’s question feature? Your pet? The wise old man down the street?

Maybe… Hardwarezone…forums?

Since HardwareZone is a site which provides news mainly targeted at tech junkies (a far cry from who I am), my number one source of answers is *drumroll* my friends. It wasn’t until recently when I discovered the beauty of HardwareZone forums, whilst searching for reviews of private driving instructors.

There were never-ending threads which proved to be helpful and I realized the entire community is very caring; everyone was readily sharing their honest inputs. A handful of users inject humor into their replies as well which makes the long read even more entertaining. As with those who post qian bian (annoying) replies on purpose.

Long story short, the forums on HardwareZone are informative, and I enjoy reading different opinions on a certain topic.

But.

There’s a place called Eat-Drink-Man-Woman, and over there, the opinions are…pretty different.

Local Doctor paying the price for offensive statements posted online

According to The New Paper, a doctor who goes by the name of Dr Lee Kwan Chen was suspended for six weeks by the Medical Board of Australia on 22 April 2019 (Monday).

On top of his suspension which begins in May, Dr Lee was required to take lessons on ethical behavior and communications, focusing on social media usage.

The 31-year-old is based in Victoria, Australia and had been working for Tasmania Health Service for two years. He came under the radar of the Medical Board after posting “inappropriate and offensive statements online”.

With that said, both the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency and Dr Lee himself verified that the comments online has not affected his attitude towards his career.

So, what happened?

Offences Committed

The first red flag was when Dr Lee posted two pictures on HardwareZone under his moniker, Nachtsider – one with him in his doctor uniform, and the other with his degree certificates.

This is the very reason why certain organizations disallow members to post photos of themselves in uniform online, especially if (1) members are seen doing something inappropriate in the photo or (2) it can be used against them and (3) it would disgrace the organization.

In this case, Dr Lee exposed his identity making him vulnerable to the online community and has successfully caused distress to his workplace and alma mater.

With reference to The New Paper, Dr Lee then posted a comment back in 2017 in reply to an article about a male Egyptian lawyer who was sentenced to three years imprisonment for saying that women who wear ripped jeans should be raped as punishment.

“I’m surprised they didn’t give him a medal instead.” Dr Lee stated in his comment.

Unsurprisingly, his comment enraged netizens, to which he replied: “Some women deserve to be raped, and that supercilious little ***** fits the bill in every way.”

He further explained that the comment was made in “the context of a socio-political situation in Singapore/ Malaysia where as a result of certain events, a local female college student made disparaging remarks about (national) servicemen”.

In addition to his derogatory remark, Dr Lee started a thread on HardwareZone where users could ask him anything according to Alvinology.

Under this thread, he uploaded a disrespectful post which stated that if his marriage were to go south, “it would not end in divorce, it would end in murder”.

Dr Lee has reportedly acknowledged that his remarks were seemingly “inflammatory, misogynistic or racist” but regardless of that, he mentioned that he said all those in the heat of the moment and it has not impacted his work ethics.

To top it off, Dr Lee said his age, inexperience and one-sided view played a part in his unfavorable behavior as well.

Netizens have spoken

Seems like Dr Lee thought he could get away with whatever he said online.

And just a fun fact: HardwareZone is a subsidiary of Singapore Press Holdings. Users are free to post anything under the sun and the site does have volunteer moderators but ultimately, users will be held responsible for whatever they post/ moderate.

Timely reminder to be careful because whatever you post online may be used against you one day.