Keeping the young in touch with grassroots reality

Get our heads out of the clouds
HOW can tomorrow’s leaders be attuned to the grassroots community if many of us are confined to our privileged backgrounds and elite schools?
If all we fret over is getting first class honours or organising chi-chi parties, we will never understand how some struggle to put food on the table.
Many [...]

Service jobs: Menial or rewarding?

Nothing wrong with service jobs
AFTER working part-time at an ice cream shop for almost a year to supplement my income, I see nothing wrong with work in the service sector.
Despite having to stand for seven to eight hours four days a week, plus the less than glamorous cleaning duties and having to work on some [...]

I will survive – as my parents did

MY PARENTS’ tales of their early struggles have stayed with me.
As baby boomers, they and the majority of their peers had to toil hard to rise up their career ladders – without university degrees. They knew tough times and enabled their children – those of my generation – to stand on their shoulders.
They gave me [...]

What’s worth giving up your life for?

Defence is key
I FEEL strongly about securing the military defence of our nation, not only for the present generation, but also for generations to come.
This era of the 3G (Third Generation) Army has profound meaning for me as a Basic Military Training instructor in the Singapore Armed Forces.
My duty is not just to train [...]

Clipping Cupid’s wings

Job first, love can wait
VALENTINE’S Day may be just around the corner, yet I cannot even fathom its significance, having neither a significant other nor a full-time job.
Socialising is expensive in this downturn, particularly on a part-time salary of around $50 per day. For instance, dinner at a French restaurant in the CBD area could [...]

All hopes pinned on one man

By Eef Gerard Van Emmerik
MY GENERATION has come of age during the Asian financial crisis, the war on terror, the climate change crisis, and now the worst recession in a century.
Despite growing up in an environment that could have encouraged cynicism, the United States election last year and MrBarack Obama’s victory show [...]

Focus on (more than just) the Family

Last month, 28-year-old local poet and playwright Ng Yi-sheng launched a Facebook group protesting DBS’s corporate support of Focus On The Family (FOTR), a pro-family group known in the US for anti-gay messages. So far, the group has garnered over 1,000 members, many of them 25 and under. Youthinkers weigh in on the issue of [...]

How Singapore saw Mumbai

The dust has settled on last month’s Mumbai attacks, and the world has moved on. Local and foreign media have expended tremendous efforts and resources into covering the event. But what are YouthINK writers’ verdicts on the way they have presented the disaster?
It’s not just about her – or us
While my heart goes out [...]

Jury’s out on Net effect of online engagement

The power of new media
THE recent liberalisation of rules governing political activity in cyberspace not only signals the Government’s recognition of its influence on younger voters, but is also a tacit admission that tight regulation of the Internet is impossible.
New media is the most effective way in engaging us, as it is an integral part [...]

It may be time to rethink how we relate to foreigners

One in four Singapore residents is a foreigner. How are Singaporeans grappling with new stereotypes? Youthinkers weigh in.
Can’t tar all with same brush
IN THE hostel where I stay at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), female students share a toilet, and I have spent two of the past three years cleaning up after the Chinese nationals I [...]