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Time we talked about our ‘different’ children

Even as the people of Singapore have been spewing anti-immigrant word-salad online, they have been marrying and having children with those same immigrants, new citizens and permanent residents.

Here is the funny thing: Even as the people of Singapore have been spewing anti-immigrant word-salad online, they have been marrying and having children with those same immigrants, new citizens and permanent residents. Reuters file photo

Here is the funny thing: Even as the people of Singapore have been spewing anti-immigrant word-salad online, they have been marrying and having children with those same immigrants, new citizens and permanent residents. Reuters file photo

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For many years now, there has been a kind of quiet revolution among the people of Singapore. Some might call it a generational and demographic sea-change. Some less charitable might call it a fifth column.

It is the children.

We do not talk about the children.

Those innocent, kind, golden children. Children from, say, one naturalised Singaporean parent and one Chinese Indonesian one. From two immigrant northern Chinese or Indian parents. From a Singaporean of Arab or Malay descent, and an Indonesian. From a Chinese Singaporean and a Vietnamese long-term visit pass holder. From a Singaporean and a Filipino-turned-citizen. From Singaporeans and Dutchmen, Americans, Australians, Germans, Britons, Belgians. All with those little red passports that so many view as a ticket to a better life.

Here is the funny thing: Even as the people of Singapore have been spewing anti-immigrant word-salad online, they have been marrying and having children with those same immigrants, new citizens and permanent residents.

More than a third — it hovers somewhere below 40 per cent — of marriages including at least one citizen involve a foreign spouse. As early as 2008, three in 10 children born as citizens of Singapore had at least one foreign parent. To say nothing of the Singaporeans who marry and have children overseas.

So far this seems pretty clear. “They” come to Singapore and steal “our” jobs, “our” resources, are a drain on “our” economy. Except “they” is “us”.

The last time a major politician talked about the children was in 2006, a year sparkling with optimism, when economic growth was still an astronomical 7 or 8 per cent.

That year, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spent several minutes during his National Day Rally speech extolling the virtues of immigration, and how future generations would be more and more integrated into Singapore: “We have to take a big-hearted approach. Our forefathers were immigrants, too. If they had been kept out of Singapore, we wouldn’t be here today.

“And to grow and flourish, we must invite people to come who can help us to achieve our goals. And if they come from China, or India or Russia, well, if they can integrate into our society, and make a contribution, I say they are Singaporean too. They may not do NS, but their sons will do NS and that is the way to build a Singapore for Singaporeans.”

Funny, then, that we do not talk about those CMIO (Chinese, Malay, India, Others) tick-boxes.

A multi-barreled pink IC is one thing, but we have not otherwise updated those well-meaning ethnic-integration policies in 50 years. In 2008, a Caucasian Singaporean lamented: “I am a Caucasian who has lived in Asia for the past 12 years. My wife is Malaysian of Indian descent and we have a two-year-old daughter who was born in Hong Kong. I have two older children whose mother is Chinese. We don’t fit a cookie-cutter definition of race and to simply categorise us as ‘Other’ overlooks our unique blend of race and culture. I am proud to call Singapore my home but feel it is time for Singapore to recognise that in today’s world the traditional definitions of race/ethnicity no longer exist.”

The “Other” catch-all has not stopped ethnic enclaves from forming, and the CMIO framework will shortly be desperately out of date. (If a “Chinese-Chinese”, as Mr Lee put it in the same speech, is different from a Chinese-Singaporean —why, then the framework is already out of date.)

Pretty soon, the President’s Scholarship will be awarded to a Singapore citizen with at least one parent of non-Chinese/Malay/Indian/“traditional” Eurasian origin. Perhaps two. (Remember: A third of new Singaporean babies.) Last year, the Democratic Progressive Party fielded Nadine Yap — half-Chinese, half-German — as a potential candidate in the General Election.

Singapore is no stranger to mixed marriages to begin with ... If these marriages constitute a trend, it is one that began centuries ago when the first traders began to make their way south to the Archipelago, intermarrying with local people to produce the Straits Chinese or Kristang Eurasians. The Little Nyonya cannot be part of our national mythology without new citizens, without Thai and Vietnamese migrant brides. We cannot claim one without the other simply because history has inflicted on the latecomers an arbitrary system of travel permits.

Nor do we talk about dual citizenship. We do talk about national security, about how Singapore’s dual citizens would flee in wartime like rats from a sinking ship. We do not talk about how Israel permits dual citizenship, has mandatory conscription, and yet immigrants come in from France, Russia and even the United States, and its national service rolls on.

And we do not talk about going really global.

You want economic opportunity? Do not place your bets on Europe or America; look closer to home at the vast untapped middle-income developing-country markets of South-east Asia.

If you wander to consider these multi-barreled many-hyphened children in an economic light — because let us face it, to a significant degree, that is the reality of their existence anyway — then could these children be tapped for their networks of regional business contacts in future, improve diplomatic ties and what-have-you?

They are literally Singapore’s next big thing, the children coming of age in the next 10, 15, 30 years. Ask them: Do you ever feel split between one heritage or another? How do you navigate having relatives in two (or more) places? How far along national, ethnic and cultural lines do you identify? How Singaporean do you feel, when the meaning of “Singaporean” is constantly shifting underfoot?

So: It is time to start talking about the children. And it is time to start listening to them.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Grace Chua is a journalist who covers science and the environment. Her interests include environmental sustainability, behavioural economics, and the role of technology in society. This piece first appeared in The Birthday Book 2016, a book of essays by 51 different authors on Singapore’s Next Big Thing. TODAY will be publishing other essays from the book in the coming weeks.

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