Education Minister Commented on 2016 RI Blackface Image; Said Situation in S’pore & the US Different

You’ve probably heard of the 2016 RI photo incident that rocked Singapore recently.

If you don’t,

Here’s A Quick Refresher:

A 2016 post of Raffles Institution (RI) students posing for a photo to commemorate the birthday of a schoolmate with their faces painted black resurfaced on the internet.

One of them is holding up what appears to be a photoshopped poster of the movie Slumdog Millionaire, and another a “painted picture of a brown-skinned man standing next to sports cars”. There are also instances of Nivea lotion, deodorant and fake cash in the photo, with the last one presumably in reference to the movie.

Cue backlash and the photo was taken down from the student’s (who’s now in university) Instagram account.

He apologised for the insensitivity and said that it was “stupid teenager behaviour” and done with no ill intentions in mind.

You can read more about his apology here.

Education Minister Ong Ye Kung Speaks Up

In his first Facebook post on the incident, Mr Ong says that he is glad that young people in Singapore are taking a stance against racism and standing up for what’s right.

The 2016 post, he said, might have resurfaced because of what’s happening in America right now.

However, he cautioned, the situation in Singapore and the United States are different.

America, he says, has “a painful history of slavery, a civil war, and a civil rights movement that had to struggle against racial segregation”.

Singapore, on the other hand, was founded as a “multiracial country regardless of race, language or religion” since 1965.

That doesn’t mean racial discrimination does not exist, he added but pointed out that the Singapore government has enacted laws such as the Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act and set up councils to protect the rights of minority groups.

He wants students to know that in Singapore, racial discrimination isn’t condoned and they will always work towards the founding value of racial harmony.

To add on to what he’s saying, people who are detected for disturbing the racial harmony in Singapore have typically been harshly punished.

In other words, good job for standing up for what’s right but can we stop overreacting and digging up things that happened 4 years ago to crucify them for it now?