It wasn’t always this way. The media in Singapore wasn’t always state controlled. We didn’t always have the Newspaper and Printing Presses Act. Our newspapers were not always run by a behemoth, monopolistic publisher whose key senior appointments are government-approved people and biggest stakeholders are government linked.
My obstetrician-gynaecologist said me, when I was pregnant, in my early 30s, “The best age for a girl to have a baby is in her teens.” “My teenage patients,” the doctor continued matter-of-factly, “have their babies with no complications and bounce back into their jeans just days after giving birth.”
When Edgar de Souza decided in the early 1960s, at the tender age of 16, that he wanted to become a Catholic priest, little did he foresee that some 20-odd years later he would get caught up in a web of arrests that resulted in some of his most respected colleagues being detained without trial and he being suspended from the Church he so dearly loved.
INTERVIEW
"I Have Always Loved the Catholic Church"
The ABCs of Sex Education
Singapore Once Had a Free Press
Issues
Over dinner with some friends one evening, the subject of studying literature cropped up. People amusedly recalled their O level and A level texts, with a combination of delight and disdain. Then a lady at the table said, “I used to teach literature in a ‘neighbourhood’ secondary school, even though I was not at qualified to do so.” That lady at the table has since left the teaching service to pursue a postgraduate degree.
Dealing with the demands of the education system and keeping to personal ideals of parenting is not easy
Who Cares About Literature?
Low Grades in High Stakes Education
Most of the sexy images we see around us—in advertising and the media—are, of women. Pretty, made up, well dressed, or skimpily dressed, women placed somewhere to sell something, which could be anything from a dress to lipstick to a car or a brand of beer. All this is eye candy for men (and women who like women) and might leave other women envious, in awe, or just bored, but certainly not turned on.
Bring Out the Studs
