Dear TRS,
I happened to come across S Lim's views on 'My personal experience with elitism' through a friend's sharing on Facebook. After reading it, I felt his views tend to be tilted towards the negative aspects of elitism which result in flawed arguments complete with generalizations.
Just a brief introduction about myself, I am currently studying as a full time student in NUS as a Year 2.
S Lim used deductive reasoning to arrive at his conclusions about elitism, which may appear logical at first glance, but certainly fallacious if you apply a deeper thought of thinking. A question I'd like to ask my dear readers as well as the writer is 'How do you define elitism?' If you conveniently define elitism as people who are from RI/HCI or people who look down on nursing courses in Poly, then you're definitely wrong.
Those people who look down on such courses are purely arrogant and shallow minded without a slightest sense of maturity in them. I suggest you try asking them about their opinions on the geocentric universe proposed by many Greek philosophers and I am certain they'll be left stunned, ashamed and unable to answer. Nevertheless, an elitist definitely knows a thing or two about philosophy as it is the fundamental blocks of all learning and knowledge.
The dictionary's definition of elitism is 'the advocacy or existence of an elite as a dominating element in a system or society'. My definition of an elitist is 'A person who is fully aware of his intellectual capabilities and solely prefers to interact with people who could match up to his standards and qualities, which is unfortunately often mistaken as arrogance by many.'
To sidetrack a little, perhaps if you overheard your 'elitist' friends making derogatory remarks about nursing again, you could discuss with them about the founder of modern nursing, Florence Nightingale and the legacy she left behind which continues to live on even up till today. I could rest assure they'll never look at Nursing in the same way again.
Some sound advices from me and a few fallacious arguments I'd like to point out:
It is important even as a student to be able to adapt well to the ever changing environment around us. From what I've read, you seemed to be unable to handle the 'elitism' you experienced in school. To put it bluntly, you're just encapsulated into a world that only revolves around you. Come on, it shouldn't be that hard to deal with such people, right? Just some tact and they'll be treating you with respect and awe. I'd like to share a real life example about being adaptable to you. During my tutorials in NUS, we are expected to express our opinions about global issues, partly to earn class participation marks. My class has many China students and they are not able to articulate properly and often mispronounce many words. However, they still continued to participate actively in class and learn from the local students the right way of pronouncing words.
Similarly, if you could adjust to the new environment which happened to have many 'elitists', you wouldn't be so biter about it. If you could not fully comprehend what I mean, I could give you another example. If you are talking to a REAL elitist, be aware that you should step out of your comfort zone, bring yourself higher by a few levels, and engage in some conversations that would broadly extend your knowledge shared by the elitist. I have experienced this many times while talking to my law friends at NUS and I felt that I could gain many deep insights from them which are very applicable to my own modules. On the other hand, if you are talking to an auntie, perhaps in Koufu, (have been frequenting Utown a lot lately), then you could relax a little and engage in some light-hearted conversations about her delicious bowl of fish soup noodles.
Secondly, I do agree with you that your teachers shouldn't make insensitive remarks about ITE students. However, I believe not every word you said matches the exact words of your teachers and you should be mindful of how you structured your sentences. I understand that you're strongly against the casual use of the word 'ITE' as a scare to many, but perhaps you could phrase your sentences in a less sensitive manner if you really felt the intense urge to express such opinions about the institute on social media.
As a student, you should in fact exercise self responsibility to contain such comments within the four walls of the classroom, as everything that your teachers said may not be totally true. They are human beings as well and you must start LEARNING how to sieve useful information from the irrelevant ones from your teachers in order to gain the most benefit for yourself. In other words, grow up. If you still could not tolerate such harsh words from your teachers, then perhaps Singapore's education system is not suitable for you.
Thirdly, you still seemed to be rather confused and haphazardly mixed up the two terms 'arrogance' and 'elitism' even at your last few points. You also used the phrase 'epidemic of elitism' to sum up your perception about our society. Epidemic is defined as a widespread occurrence of an INFECTIOUS disease in a community at a particular time. Of course I understand you do not mean it literally but relating elitism akin to an infectious disease is definitely illogical.
You have to bear this in mind that we need elitists in our society in order to be sustainable and from your use of strong words, you seemed to advocate the eradication of our society's intellectuals. This could only possibly happen in the Qin Dynasty where the Emperor wanted to suppress the country's great thinkers and scholars so no one could threaten his rule of the country. This is both sadistic and ultimate cruelty which we definitely hope it would remain in history.
In a nutshell, the world is not going to change for you but you have to change for the world. From my experience, learning from both the laymen as well as the elitists indeed benefit you greatly in terms of acquiring valuable knowledge needed in your studies or work. I have to admit it requires more effort when socializing with the elitists, but if you could benefit from their deeper level of thought and ideologies, why not?
M
TRS Contributor