i am taking down xiaxue's link
because i find that it hardly even entertains (nor educates) me. (The last time i read it, it was only a cursory glance. At pics, no doubt, so...)
but anyway, before i go - let's have a look at one particular entry in her blog (**warning - pretty long!!!), before we zoom in on one particular comment that a reader of her's left... (which i shall attempt to reproduce here, with emphasis (bold, italics, underline, whatever) mine)
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puksux said...
The air here reeks of bigotry. Does everyone here have something against so-called studious muggers in Jcs and Unis? The prevalent proclivity is to opine how suffocatingly boring and vapid the lives of JC students are - perhaps your image of a typical JC mugger is one who buries his head in pages and pages of Polarisation on the homeward bus and drifts off to sleep similarly in Time magazine in tireless preparation for his GP paper. Dare anyone assert, and prove accordingly, that one would feel happier if one deviates from the typical "scholar's route"? One may find oneself weltering in miscellaneous pleasures - anything remote from studies would probably qualify.
Is studying such a drudgery? Why is the slightest disposition towards mugging, studying and honest hard work such a repulsive and despised mindset? Why do people like to disparage and curse high academic achievers, and hope for such high-flyers to fall from grace and end up working for then-underachieving peers from secondary school? Is it the gratification of schadenfreude? So that you can snigger as you witness their pitifulness? Or perhaps its human nature, that competitive nature that warrants you to inwardly and secretly hope for others to fail because you're unable to match their achievement and diligence? I rest my questioning. Currently I'm anal retentive.
I admire Xiaxue for her ostensible candor in spilling her deepest pent-up emotions and regrets with such unbridled candidness. Especially since it's on the arguably most popular and widely read Singapore blog. How brave is that? What I detest are some of the comments that followed, but I shan't enumerate.
By definition from some of the comments I've seen:
"a good career = pays well but bores to hell"
"being a maverick of the education system = you rock!"
The thing here is one might detest studying because it's a duty, and thus makes it seem more of a painful chore. Everything seems brighter when you do something out of free will, rather than having the meritocratic academic bureaucracy breathing down your neck all the time. But just as it is one's right to enjoy a non-studious life, so is it another's right to be proud of what he or she is. You should not judge a person with a jaundiced eye that thinks that devoted academic achievers are losers that are obsessed with success. a PhD does not come cheap - it occasions years of endless toiling and sometimes brain-draining cognition, nor is it free of charge. Why else would one then embark on such a purportedly "useless" endeavour and waste their youth and half one's working life but for the love of the academics? Some people are just like that, and you can't say that they do it for the paper qualifications, for the chance to condescend, to look down on lesser peers. Just because they are more illustrious does not confer you the right to accuse them of these whimsical crimes. Maybe you just don't like the fact that they're more successful, and you think when they look at you, that look is always a patronising one. Not true. MNore often than not, it's just your self-induced inferiority complex at work.
2:53 PM
-----
Now go figure. "I am LARGE... and in CHARGE..." (this line comes from MIB) - and i have a THiCK thesaurus....
Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest, of them all.....
*(as a footnote (and to avoid unnecessary arguments), in case anybody thinks that my criticism here is merely a case of sour grapes, let me just say that i took the poly to university route... and that i am Mensa certified as well.)
but anyway, before i go - let's have a look at one particular entry in her blog (**warning - pretty long!!!), before we zoom in on one particular comment that a reader of her's left... (which i shall attempt to reproduce here, with emphasis (bold, italics, underline, whatever) mine)
-----
puksux said...
The air here reeks of bigotry. Does everyone here have something against so-called studious muggers in Jcs and Unis? The prevalent proclivity is to opine how suffocatingly boring and vapid the lives of JC students are - perhaps your image of a typical JC mugger is one who buries his head in pages and pages of Polarisation on the homeward bus and drifts off to sleep similarly in Time magazine in tireless preparation for his GP paper. Dare anyone assert, and prove accordingly, that one would feel happier if one deviates from the typical "scholar's route"? One may find oneself weltering in miscellaneous pleasures - anything remote from studies would probably qualify.
Is studying such a drudgery? Why is the slightest disposition towards mugging, studying and honest hard work such a repulsive and despised mindset? Why do people like to disparage and curse high academic achievers, and hope for such high-flyers to fall from grace and end up working for then-underachieving peers from secondary school? Is it the gratification of schadenfreude? So that you can snigger as you witness their pitifulness? Or perhaps its human nature, that competitive nature that warrants you to inwardly and secretly hope for others to fail because you're unable to match their achievement and diligence? I rest my questioning. Currently I'm anal retentive.
I admire Xiaxue for her ostensible candor in spilling her deepest pent-up emotions and regrets with such unbridled candidness. Especially since it's on the arguably most popular and widely read Singapore blog. How brave is that? What I detest are some of the comments that followed, but I shan't enumerate.
By definition from some of the comments I've seen:
"a good career = pays well but bores to hell"
"being a maverick of the education system = you rock!"
The thing here is one might detest studying because it's a duty, and thus makes it seem more of a painful chore. Everything seems brighter when you do something out of free will, rather than having the meritocratic academic bureaucracy breathing down your neck all the time. But just as it is one's right to enjoy a non-studious life, so is it another's right to be proud of what he or she is. You should not judge a person with a jaundiced eye that thinks that devoted academic achievers are losers that are obsessed with success. a PhD does not come cheap - it occasions years of endless toiling and sometimes brain-draining cognition, nor is it free of charge. Why else would one then embark on such a purportedly "useless" endeavour and waste their youth and half one's working life but for the love of the academics? Some people are just like that, and you can't say that they do it for the paper qualifications, for the chance to condescend, to look down on lesser peers. Just because they are more illustrious does not confer you the right to accuse them of these whimsical crimes. Maybe you just don't like the fact that they're more successful, and you think when they look at you, that look is always a patronising one. Not true. MNore often than not, it's just your self-induced inferiority complex at work.
2:53 PM
-----
Now go figure. "I am LARGE... and in CHARGE..." (this line comes from MIB) - and i have a THiCK thesaurus....
Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest, of them all.....
*(as a footnote (and to avoid unnecessary arguments), in case anybody thinks that my criticism here is merely a case of sour grapes, let me just say that i took the poly to university route... and that i am Mensa certified as well.)
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