4 ms·

I once knew a penpal who grew up in Singapore. They shared with me how frustrating the repressive cultural norms and strict speech / sexuality laws were. It int

• notahacker 4y ago
  I think one also has to be wary about conflating fear of the government and fear of reaction from their family in a socially conservative society (and Singapore is, whilst certainly less conservative than much of Asia and rarely overt in its homophobia like large minorities in much of the West, a country where more than half the population disapprove of homosexuality). I certainly heard no shortage of worries about outing from people growing up in certain parts of the USA. The Singaporean government's position is illiberal and weirdly contorted on homosexuality (the longstanding and repeatedly reaffirmed policy has been don't remove or enforce the old colonial ban on it, and permit pride events in specific areas) but ironically the reason it hasn't liberalised it yet is because it's afraid of public backlash rather than out of desire to impose behavioural rules on the population.