A lesson learnt, says MP and dad Wee Siew Kim
‘What she said did come across as insensitive. The language was stronger than what most people could take.
But she wrote in a private blog and I feel that her privacy has been violated. After all, they were the rantings of an 18-year-old among friends.
I think if you cut through the insensitivity of the language, her basic point is reasonable, that is, that a well-educated university graduate who works for a multinational company should not be bemoaning about the Government and get on with the challenges in life.
Nonetheless, I have counselled her to learn from it. Some people cannot take the brutal truth and that sort of language, so she ought to learn from it.
In our current desire to encourage more debate, especially through the Internet, our comments must be tempered with sensitivity.
I will not gag her, since she’s 18 and should be able to stand by what she says.
The new media of the Internet is such that if you don’t like what she has said, you have the right of rebuttal.
Hopefully, after the discussion, everyone will be the richer for it. As a parent, I may not have inculcated the appropriate level of sensitivity, but she has learnt a lesson, and it’s good that she has learnt it at such an early stage in life.’
- ANG MO KIO GRC MP WEE SIEW KIM on his daughter’s comments (Source: The Straits Times, 24 Oct 2006)
