Man Who Was Caught Spewing Racist Comments in Bus Responded in FB About The Incident

When I was a boy, I was told that apology isn’t just about saying sorry: it’s about stepping forward, swallowing my ego and apologizing with the sincerest intention.

But nevertheless, the word “sorry” must still be used, because there would be some people who don’t get it.

In this latest saga that involved the worst tempered guy in Singapore and the best tempered guy in Singapore, you’ll get to see an example of an “apology” that, well, not only didn’t include the word “sorry”, but is a personification of this image:

Or maybe it wasn’t even an apology in the first place, but a justification for his actions.

First Thing First: What Happened?

Lest you’re a rich fellow who has been chauffeured since you were young, you would know that quarrels in public transport is as common as Nas Daily praising Singapore.

Usually, it about a bump, a brush or simply a stare.

But the quarrels would be simple and usually end fast unless you’re this auntie:

However, if the quarrel extends to something violent, then it’ll be newsworthy.

Or if the quarrel extends to something…racist. Like this latest example.

Viral Video That You’d Have Thought is from the 90s

This video, posted by Facebook user Taufiq Istafan, shows a Chinese man and a Malay man locked in a tense argument about, well, being racist. In the video, it can be heard that the Chinese man said “shit Malay”.

Later, the Chinese man said something that you could only hear in the 90s: he asked the Malay guy if he wanted to fight, and added this classic sentence: “You not happy, we fight!”

He even suggested to “go outside settle”.

If you’ve watched the video, you’ll see a guy in yellow trying to stop the argument. It turned out that other than being the peacemaker, he’s also pretty involved in the whole incident: apparently, according to the video description, the guy in yellow had accidentally knocked on the Chinese guy while they were going up the stairs to the upper deck.

The Man-in-Yellow, whom we should now address as MWTBTIS (Man With The Best-est Temper in Singapore), had apologized profusely, but the Chinese guy had allegedly acted like he’s PMS and kept on spewing racist remarks at MWTBTIS.

The guy with a cap buay tahan and confronted him, while MWTBTIS sat silently, but eventually stepped in to separate the Chinese guy and man in cap in his cool and gentle way.

What a story.

And you’d have thought it’s over, because the Chinese guy might just have a bad day.

While we all marveled at MWTBTIS’ calmness and wondered if he was deserving of some awards, the Chinese guy, for some reason, decided to explain his side of the story before anyone CSI him out.

And it’s nothing short of amazingballs, I’m telling you.

Chinese Guy Posted in Facebook

To prevent any harassment, and with our main purpose being to educate instead of to shame, the name has been censored.

Here’s the amazing response he has made:

Not surprising, netizens weren’t impressed.

Two minutes later, he posted this.

Was he trying to paste a wall of text?

And about thirty minutes later, he posted this.

This morning, he greeted everyone a “Morning” like your see-once-a-year uncle who just discovered Facebook, and let’s just say that while netizens might have goldfish memory, they won’t have forgotten sagas within 24 hours.

Apology or Justification?

Well, firstly, even if you read the two posts a few million times, you’d have interpreted it as a justification: he did not explain his actions nor apologize. Instead, he spoke about his own values in his first post, and in his second post, it seemed to imply that he does have people who supported him.

Since I’ve reached my word count, I’ll end this article and may you have a good day.

…okay, maybe not.

About Semantics & Pragmatics

With a number of English & English Lit (these two are different, okay!) majors in Goody Feed, here’s how we’ll simplify the chim Semantics & Pragmatics for you: when someone says or types something, meaning is inferred and interpreted differently based on the context.

In other words, when he posted about his values and his supporters / haters, with the context already in netizens’ mind, people might not take what is written in face value. Therefore, unless it’s a direct apology, the meaning might be interpreted in many other ways.

Yeah, chim, but what you need to know is this: if you want to apologize, say sorry directly. If you don’t want to apologize and just want to say you’re right, say you’re right directly. Bushing around the beat is going nowhere because context is already established.

Goody that you’ve our app and learn something new, eh?

So next time, don’t try to humblebrag online. The logic is the same (people would interpret your #ThrowBackThursday as #humblebrag).