The erotic is too much fun

On 30 April 2005, there were 3 stories on the front page of the Straits Times. One of them was headlined, "Injecting fun into 'Dullsville Singapore' ".

This front page lead introduced many more articles on an inside page, all examining how to make Singapore a fun place. This previously sacrilegious idea -- a generation was brought up to believe that Singapore was serious business, not fun! -- has now become speakable, because none other than Lee Kuan Yew said recently that Singapore needed to become a fun place. He appeared to have had this epiphany when thinking about how to justify a casino. See the story Look how the casino chips have fallen.

It's painfully embarrassing how our media snap to attention each time a senior politician says something remotely new. Before this, one would not have lead writers from the Straits Times point out our sterility; on the contrary, more likely than not, they might be writing defensive rebuttals rubbishing foreign press reports painting Singapore as a soul-less, boring place. Now it is permissible -- more than permissible, it is judged necessary and politick -- to pick up the government's droppings and whip up a soufflé with them. Thus, we get feature after feature, week after week, on the same bloody theme, without ever asking, why did it take so long?

So much for media freedom. No, the government does not often tell the press what to print [1], but the editors know to wait at the feet of their masters, saying nothing novel until one or more ministers first say it.

The Dullsville article of 30 April made it quite clear, for instance, which exalted dropping fertilised it.

Strait-laced Singapore was recently told by Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew to be fun and to be "with it". It's part of the very serious effort to ensure the country doesn't lose out in the tourism and global city race.

I thought that paragraph just about said it all, not so much about the how to make Singapore a fun place, but about how wrong-footed this whole exercise is.

I mean, look at those words again -- we have Singapore being "told" by Lee to "be fun", and that it's a "very serious effort" for economic supremacy!

But the truth is, nobody is fun (not "has fun") just because he's been told to be fun, and once fun is goal-oriented, it isn't really fun anymore.

Never mind that that single paragraph said more than needed to be said, a whole page in the Insight section was further devoted to this issue, interviewing various people for their comments. But ultimately, it had no additional wisdom than something just about everyone already knows: The problem lies in

... the barricade of rules that continues to keep fun in check.

Our entire political system and the panoply of bureaucratic powers are designed to kill spontaneity and the unconventional. What is allowed is contingent on first being found to be "good". And "good" is defined very narrowly.

For decades, "fun" wasn't good. Even now, I won't hold my breath. I won't be surprised, now that "fun" isn't considered all bad, to see the puritanical distinction made between "wholesome" or "clean" fun (good) and all other kinds of fun (bad).

Really, such feature articles in the Straits Times don't mean a thing, because it is focussed on the wrong issue: fun. The key issue is something else: our political system and our state ideology. If these don't change, we're never do more than pretend to "be fun".

* * * * *

On the same say, 30 April 2005, Straits Times' sister newspaper, The New Paper, had this front page:

The main headline was "'Erotic' drink too sexy for S'pore".

In smaller print, "Govt agency: Change name, replace some ingredients".

The story (on page 4) was about a drink imported from Germany that got into trouble with the Agri-food and Veterinary Authority (AVA). The canned drink was called Peep One, with a sub-name "erotic drink" (see the manufacturer's website, www.peepone.com).

The AVA refused to approve some ingredients such as the supposedly libido-enhancing lapacho, from the bark of a South American tree. Lapacho's side effects are not fully known, and there have been reports that large amounts may cause weakening of the immune system. Fair enough, that's what a food safety agency is supposed to watch out for. The manufacturer was required to reformulate the product.

But the AVA also objected to the sub-name "erotic drink". The importer had to get it relabelled as an "exotic drink". Presumably, going by the remit of a food safety department, anything termed an "erotic drink" would ruin your health.

Sarcasm aside, The New Paper reported that the AVA's defence was that "the food law requires importers of food products to ensure that all claims made on food labels are not misleading."

The AVA must be a bunch of half-wits. No adult is going to take it all that literally. We've been exposed to enough marketing hype to know the name is probably a bit of a lark. Instead, all this shows is that our nanny state thinks Singaporeans can't be trusted with knowing such things for themselves, and nanny must make sure we're not confused!

The product is sold in Europe and America under it's original name, "Peep One, erotic drink". Only two other countries have demanded a change of name, and in only those two countries has it been marketed as an "exotic drink". They are absolute-monarchy Dubai and humourless, ayatollah-ruled Iran. Singapore now shares the honour with them.

Are we having fun yet?

© Yawning Bread 

Quotes from the Straits Times Insight feature of 30 April 2005: 

Footnotes

1. However, the government does tell the publishers what NOT to print. Stuart Koe of fridae.com had recently been interviewed by the Straits Times, but the interview was never published. When he asked what happened, he was told a blanket ban on gay-related stories was in effect.
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