Dear Singaporeans,
Please stop racially identifying people.
We are in a society where we are taught to respect 'other races' as oppose to respecting 'other people' in general. We subconsciously judge a person by their race as soon as we see them.
"Singapore is a multi-racial country". Yes, in terms of having a lot of races but not in terms of being a 'multi-racial country in harmony'. We can see this example being used in our society when we identify a person - "that chinese lady", "that indian boy", etc. Its something so small and harmless yet isn't classed as racism in our culture because of the common use of it.
You may say, "Its not racist because we're simply stating their obvious race and not doing them any harm", but by simply entitling a person to their racial categorisation, you are being inherently racist, regardless of your opinion being intentionally harmful or not. You have stereotyped a person's individual identity to group identity and thats something we should not do. Race does not define a person, just like how someones gender, job, car, house, appearance, education level etc does not. Although your race may be a big part of your life, it does not entitle you to be ethically stereotyped.
Just to make it clear,
Ethnic Stereotype: Beliefs about the typical characteristics of members of a given ethnic group or nationality, their status, society and cultural norms.
A very good example of this is right here on TRS. The article 'DEAR TRS, I AM A SECURITY GUARD AND THESE PINOY DID NOT LISTEN TO ME!', posted 20 Oct 2014 and an article response, which I'm sure was written with good intention, 'FILIPINO WORKING IN SINGAPORE: I FEEL LIKE TRS READERS SHOULD BE NICER TO US PINOYS', posed on 24 Oct 2014, has direct racial stereotypes and racial identity mentioned in the title itself.
So here I am writing to the people of Singapore: There are people who are going to offend you, its their fault, not their race (or gender, class, title, etc).
For the sake of Singapore's society, stop racially identifying people.
A Human
TRS Contributor