After destroying the town church, the Israeli occupation forces demolished the historic nun’s monastery and school in Yaroun, southern Lebanon despite the local Christians calls to preserve their heritage. Is this also an isolated incident?
Some thoughts on the recent commentary of Singapore as a “high trust” society.
It’s always amusing to me when people consider Singapore via their Western lenses. Singapore is a social system one cannot understand unless you (a) grow up here and left to see the world or (b) moved here and stayed for some period, often raising children here.
The underlying assumption for the narrative of Singapore as high trust is that it’s so low crime that you can leave your shit lying around and nobody nicks it. The thesis is that Singaporeans must really trust each other because why else? Any foreigner knows the police state allegations are overstated, the surveillance and state presence are present but unobtrusive. So the fact that you can leave your LV bag unattended in a restaurant must be indicative of a high trust society right?
Sort of. But not in the way you think.
Singapore has very high trust in the state but very low trust in their peers. But trust in the state doesn’t just mean use of force. It’s trust in the system.
A state works when its citizens believe that abiding by the social contract is better for their livelihoods than defecting. People who believe they are “winners” will never defect, and people who feel screwed over might defect, at which point you must deter defection via criminal and/or social punishment.
Singapore has a successful social psyop where probably >80% of the under 60 population believe they are, or are destined to be “above average” in the system. The people are inherently bred to be PvP (low trust) but inherently judge the system “fair” (high trust in system) because the system works for me.
Now the math works because Singaporeans are motivated by perceived social class. The math logically doesn’t work when you have to make >80% believe they are above average economically but you can make them believe they are “middle class / upper middle class” and / or morally superior.
One skill every Singaporean has is the socially conditioned ability to find a way to put anyone else down and downplay their achievements.
Rich? Wealthy parents / got lucky. Intelligent? Try hard grinder / mugger. Attractive? Must be dumb. Got a promotion? Prob slept with the boss.
The ability (and desire) to assert moral superiority in almost any circumstance creates low petty/violent crime incidence bc crime is for the morally inferior. (It does however have a ton of white collar crime as people cheat to get ahead but that’s a different discussion.)
The Singapore main quest line of leveraging to max ape property to flip to the next sucker is also a huge contributor to “stability” of the system. You will notice many young people decry the system as “unfair” until they buy a house. Once the 30 year mortgage is locked in, they pivot hard conservative and will literally commit zero crime or take any risk at all, lest they suffer the shame of not being able to meet mortgage payments and dump their investment on the next generation.
Another powerful, perhaps the most powerful, lever for low crime is racism. Yes, unironically.
Crime is low when people believe they are the overclass. Racism allows even a struggling incel Chinese cab driver knee deep in debt to say “eh at least my life is better than [the indigenous Malays or the foreign blue collar workers]”. A Chinese person in Singapore (>70% of population) always has someone to kick down on. Racism-as-a-cope creates low crime (except white collar crime) amongst Chinese population.
Would rant further but hitting character limit lmao.
I’d love to say so many things about what’s happening in Washington right now but I’d rather to keep my mouth shut and just observe
Those who follow me since a while will find it easy to read what’s in my mind, especially considering I never believed in coincidences 😅
We just lost billions in aircraft and aircraft carriers, hundreds of American lives, spent 50 billion taxpayer dollars, our middle eastern command center the 5th fleet, most of our military bases in the Middle East, depleted 3 years of missiles, and major defense credibility worldwide to basically turn a Khamenei-led Iran into a super power with a new $200 billion dollar a year revenue stream.
Explain it to me like I’m 5…
So…Israel STEALS nuclear material from the US.
Secretly makes multiple nuclear weapons.
Shows insane amounts of aggression.
Carries out an actual genocide.
But we team up WITH them and attack Iran.
Because Iran has ‘nuclear material’.
Israel's ex-defense minister outlines his plans for sending American soldiers to die in Iran for Israel.
No mention of Israeli soldiers joining them.
Zionists treat American lives like they are Palestinian land: property of Israel regardless of what the owners think.