Hmm

Some of you might have felt unsatisfied about my brief account of why I almost always won't vote for the PAP. You might have felt unsatisfied because you can't quite feel the force of my guiding principle, which is my desire for Singapore to be something more than the PAP. I won't say much if you don't share the same desire; my brief account was not out to influence you to my viewpoint in the first place.

What I have to say instead will hopefully give you an idea of the kind of appeal that that desire has for me. We consider an analogous case. People often say that remembering or preserving the past is important. The brochure for this year's Singapore Arts Festival says this:

In remembering, we also look at histories both public and private that inform our sense of self and identity. Ranging from events, periods and generations
past, these productions serve as reference points as we navigate the future. Rather than being nostalgic, the reconnection to these histories informs the larger discourse about our sense of place in time and our relationship to a time forgotten.

The writers of the Arts Festival brochure think that being engaged with the past is important because it "informs" us of our "place in time". The appeal in this is primitive: there's just something nice in knowing one's place in time. To me, envisioning a Singapore without the PAP has the same kind of force: there's just something nice in thinking of a Singapore that has gone beyond the PAP.

That's all I've got to say on national politics for the next 5 years. Back to an apathetic life.

I've been reading Theodore Sider's Four-Dimensionalism, among other things. Hopefully I will get to say some interesting things on that here.