In Singapore, we see a growing generation of tech-savvy individuals who are spending increasing amounts of time on social networking platforms. With a fast pace of life, many of us find ourselves compensating personal interaction with communication online.
However, it is going to take time to learn how to live publicly. Recently, a National University of Singapore (NUS) scholar used his blog to post insensitive and degrading comments about Singaporeans. While his post represents a minority, the public response of outrage could very well lead to xenophobia and hatred/dislike in the long-term. This could spell disaster for Singapore as we are a nation that depends a lot on foreigners, and have an extremely sensitive multiracial society that lives together in close contact. Hence, we can see that people still have a lot to learn about their online boundaries.
Moreover, emotional space could be compromised as a result of sharing personal information online. For example, in last year's general elections, one of the major talking points in online forums was Tin Pei Lin, a young local minister, who received public scrutiny based on her personal Facebook, which contained pictures of her and expensive handbags. In the long run, this could become a liability to a person who becomes constantly misjudged based on a one-off incident as content on cyberspace is hard to control. In a country as small as Singapore, such news travel quickly, and can actually affect the reputation of a political party. Hence, to share information online is to open yourselves to emotional vulnerability.
Copyright: Mr Shermann (my GP tutor)
Edited by: Jaslin
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