“The Idiots — S’pore” keeps on promoting divisiveness?

Previously TISG was causing divisiveness between FTs and locals. OK, OK it was what many (including self) tot TISG was doing.

This time isn’t TISG using the Zika outbreak to cause divisiveness between the WP and a govt agency, the NEA, and between S’poreans and the NEA? What won’t some people do for eyeballs?

Seriously, what does the “I” in TISG stands for?

“I” in TISG stands for “Idiots” or  at the very least “Incompetents”. It surely can’t stand for “Indians” as there are many intelligent, responsible Indians and there are now two non Indians at Team TISG.

Here’s the latest humorously sordid episode from the series The Idiots — Singapore. Aljunied GRC issued the following statement on FB following two articles in The Idiots — Singapore

There are some divisive stories going around online that NEA has not been assisting the Town Council in the fight against Zika. This is not true. We have been highlighting that Town Council and NEA are working closely to implement various control measures at the Bedok North Ave 3 cluster.

One main allegation is about NEA not giving MP Faisal informational brochures for Operation Kaki Bukit on Thursday, 1st September. This is not true. Town Council ran out of NEA brochures on mosquito-control and the 5-step Mozzie Wipeout for HDB flats, and only had brochures for private properties. One of our volunteers contacted NEA for urgent assistance and, despite being stretched by the situation, NEA specially delivered 500 copies of the HDB brochures to the Kaki Bukit Town Council office in the afternoon for the outreach operation.

Why then did we print our own flyers? Because we had to cover some 1,500 households in that one evening and we were afraid that 500 copies would not be enough. Our volunteers scrambled to produce a flyer putting together information from MOH and NEA website with easy infographics to get the message across. We printed 500 copies of this flyer, not to replace the NEA brochures, but to distribute them if we run out of the NEA brochures.

Mosquitoes don’t differentiate between blue and white; we all bleed red. We fight Zika together as one Singapore.

The Idiots  — Singapore responded

The Aljunied-Hougang Town Council released a statement referring to some divisive stories going around online that NEA has not been assisting the Town Council in the fight against Zika (reference:https://www.facebook.com/aljuniedcommunity/posts/1166117166782829).

Two articles appeared on TISG on the topic. One is an inhouse report (http://theindependent.sg/nea-assists-pap-mp-to-reach-out-in…), and the other is an op-ed (http://theindependent.sg/zika-endemic-shines-spotlight-on-s…). The op-ed referenced the in-house report.

After the in-house report was published, a Workers’ Party volunteer who was involved in the outreach in the affected cluster on 1 Sep, private messaged us requesting that we credit the pictures used in the article accordingly, and also to credit an ex-NCMP in the story. We did as requested. At no point in time did the volunteer, raise any objections that the in-house report was inaccurate.

We assumed that the active volunteer represented the town council and therefore the report was accurate. We are therefore surprised that AHTC would raise the topic of ‘divisive politics’, when they did not do so when its volunteer got in touch with us when the first report was published.

TISG welcomes all parties who may feel aggrieved in one way or another by what we publish to contact us at news@theindependent.sg.

We will be happy to amend our pieces, publish updates, publish corrections, and even publish apologies.

We want to build awareness, not animosity. We will grant you the right of reply if we feel that you have unjustly suffered.

What a lot of bull from The Idiots — S’pore:

— Why was the in-house report worded in the way it was? So easy to have written about the issue as viewed from a WP volunteer without making it sound as though WP had issues with NEA.

— And this is really trying to be too clever by half (but maybe the eyeballs $ worth the BS even though it’s “peanuts”: $9,000 a month at best.)

We assumed that the active volunteer represented the town council and therefore the report was accurate. We are therefore surprised that AHTC would raise the topic of ‘divisive politics’, when they did not do so when its volunteer got in touch with us when the first report was published.

The publisher and two senior editors are experienced citizen editors with pretty decent track records at TOC before it became Terry’s Online Channel.

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A critical FB post

This is one of the most half-assed takebacks I’ve seen, and smacks of the “rush to publish”. Two points for the editors to consider. 1) Did you contact the Workers Party to seek their comments before you published the original in-house report, and if so, did you give them reasonable time to reply? I’m assuming the answer is no, because you took the WP quote in your piece straight from this Facebook post linked below. “happy to amend our pieces” is one thing; you should be confirming the facts of the piece /before/ you publish them. https://www.facebook.com/aljuniedcommunity/posts/11647457569199702) Just because a volunteer from the WP contacted you and didn’t correct the record fully doesn’t afford you the right to claim that as a defense against erroneous reporting. If an official spokesperson or senior MP from the party or its committee contacted you? Sure. But one volunteer? You could also have taken that contact as an opportunity to clarify the party’s official response/position on the matter – but I’m guessing you didn’t, either. It’s sloppy journalism all around, and the tone of your response’s last two paragraphs suggests you don’t think it’s sloppy at all.

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And here I was, on Saturday, commending The Idiots — S’pore

Waz strange is that TISG is not using these facts to “attack” FTs to attract eyeballs; something that it was perceived to be doing in the recent past. Whatever, good that it is not trying inadvertently “to  promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore”.

It’s getting very clear that The Idiots — S’pore is trying “to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore” so that it can attract eyeballs. And that the Zika outbreak is juz another opportunity “to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore”.

So The Idiots — S’pore should cut out the pretence: “We want to build awareness, not animosity. Juz say: “We want to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore so that we can make money.”

And seriously isn’t it time, given the allegations made by The Idiots — S’pore  against the NEA for the state to take action against The Idiots — S’pore? I mean Amos Yee was charged for a lot less.

But then remember this claim? P Ravi, while rowing with various people recently (mainly from TOC allied people) on journalistic and editorial standards of integrity said (boastingly?) on Facebook:“Government and related agencies see us as a useful loudhailer.” For the context in which he said this, scroll down to almost the bottom until you see his photo, the text is somewhere below: http://www.theonlinecitizen.com/2016/08/09/tisg-lashes-out-in-response-to-ncmp-daniel-gohs-remarks-on-its-article/.

 

 

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