Greetings to one and all. I am a very senior editor from the world famous magazine, Far Eastern Economic Review. For the benefit of the ignorant, the FEER is a very popular magazine which regularly publishes reports that cover key topics in Asia. These reports are very informative and important to the marketeres, businessmen and also academics. We have many wonderful side-publications such as "China's Elite", "Managing in Asia" just to name a few. We regularly publish special reports focusing on topics relevant and significant to Asia. Such innovative ideas by my colleagues and myself have won the magazine many awards such as the "Excellence in Specialized Reporting" by Society of Publishers in Asia, the Honourable Mention for Magazine Front COver Design by SoPA and the Excellence in Magazines by SOPA.
Now that I've introduced the magazine i am in charge of, let me move on to the main topic which we are all gathered here for today. Fortunately, we have freedom of speech here and I am free to express my most sincere and honest opinion on this issue which i am unable to do so when in Singapore. Honestly speaking, the government do not want people to think for themselves but are trying their best to indoctrinate their own set of political and social values into the Singapore citizens. This is the reason why they keep targeting my magazine and colleagues whenever we publish the truth which they feel is inappropriate for people to know. In the late 1970's, my poor colleague, Mr Derek Davies, was sued by Lee Kwan Yew for participating in a"diabolical international COmmunist plot" to poison relations between Singapore and Malaysia. In the 1980s, Lee banned my magazine in Singapore after it published an article about the detentin of Roman Catholic church workers. It seems like time after time, we are being victimized by the overpowering forces or the government. However, that did not have much of an impact on my magazine as we have publications worldwide. In 2006, we were sued again by Lee Kwan Yew for defamation as we suggested that they were corrupt, but what we stated were all facts! Then they banned our magazine totally, and the poor deprived citizens could not even subscribe to our journals. Now after telling you all this, you may be thinking that i have been complaining about my plight. Actually, we are feeling more sorry for the citizens of Singapore rather than ourselves, because it really doesnt matter whether we can make sales or not in Singapore, we got the world in our hands. However, the poor Singaporeans will no longer have the chance to read the valuable insights on issues concerning them in our magazines anymore. They will be spoon-fed by the government, forced to believe that whatever the government says is correct. While you may think ignorance is bliss and argue that they are still living quite happily and are prosperous, what i want you to know is that being ignorant is defintely not a good thing. You may think that your life is perfectly fine now, but you do not know how much better it could actually have been if not for all the restrictions. I would not like to speak more on this issue as i am worried that somehow i will get fined like my fellow colleagues. To end off this speech, I would just like to remind Singaporeans not to believe everything the government says. Have a mind of your own, dare to voice out your opinions... Thank you.
Done by: Shi Hua, Samantha, Lin Bo, Eileen, Vincent 09SO7A
No comments:
Post a Comment