ST Online Forum: Dictating to university students what views they should take insults their intelligence (Nov 6)

Nov 6, 2007
Dictating to university students what views they should take insults their intelligence

MISS Low Xiang Jun, in her online letter, had condemned SMU's decision to allow their students to publish a booklet and hold an event on gays.

I take particular exception to her view on how SMU should treat its students. She appears to imply that universities should impart 'right values' and 'wholesome ideals' and suppress those to the contrary, and that being 'socially responsible' implies conforming with the views of the majority of society.

Universities are institutions that should first and foremost emphasise intellectual and moral integrity. To dictate to university students what views they should take and what values they should hold not only undermines the process of intellectual and moral discovery, but also insults the maturity and the intelligence of the top 25 per
cent of our school cohort.

I have no doubt that the SMU students in this case are acting on their intellectual and moral conscience, which is the responsibility of citizens in a democracy. Singapore is a democracy and students, like all citizens, have the right to express their views, regardless of what the opinion of the majority may be. Going by her flawed argument, the unpopular but necessary policies of the Government such as CPF reform would be 'socially irresponsible'.

Indeed, instead of dismissing divergent viewpoints from our own, we should critically consider their merits and demerits and seek to question our own assumptions, and through that process form more enlightened and considered conclusions. And the ability to do so is exactly what a university education should impart.

Matthias Yong Peng Chew
Cambridge, UK