Words Of The Day

Listening to: Darkness' I Believe In A Thing Called Love

grad ceremony came and went. so did all of you turn up? :)
thurs' sked for various members of s3a: 0900-1000, 1030-1130, 1130-1230

New question: Has the fuss over blogging in S'pore come to a rest? Me thinks it's only the beginning..

But read what the judge said when he decided to jail those fellas. I found some useful vocab words! :) read till the end to see these words.

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Section 4 of the Sedition Act makes it an offence to, among other things, promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of population here. The Act was last used in 1966 against two Socialist MPs, who accused the People's Action Party government of plotting to murder a political detainee. In his landmark ruling, Senior District Judge Richard Magnus explained why the Act was used, for the first time in nearly 40 years, in the case against Benjamin Koh Song Huat and Nicholas Lim Yew. Here are the key points of his ruling.

'WHILE an offence under section 4(1a) of the Sedition Act is rare, it is necessary for this court to make it clear that such an offence will be met, upon conviction, with a sentence of general deterrence.

Racial and religious hostility feeds on itself. This sentencing approach of general deterrence is because of three main reasons:

The section 4(1a) offence is mala per se (heinous in or of itself);

The especial sensitivity of racial and religious issues in our multicultural society, particularly given our history of the Maria Hertogh incident in the 1950s and the July and September 1964 race riots;

The current domestic and international security climate. The court will therefore be generally inclined towards a custodial sentence for such an offence.

Young Singaporeans, like the accused persons before this court, may have short memories that race and religion are sensitive issues. They must realise that callous and reckless remarks on racial or religious subjects have the potential to cause social disorder, in whatever medium or forum they are expressed. In this case, it is the medium of the Internet and with it, its ubiquitous reach.

The virtual reality of cyberspace is generally unrefereed. But one cannot hide behind the anonymity of cyberspace, as each of the accused has done, to pen diatribes against another race or religion.

The right to propagate an opinion on the Internet is not, and cannot be, an unfettered right. The right of one person's freedom of expression must always be balanced by the right of another's freedom from offence, and tampered by wider public interest considerations.

It is only appropriate social behaviour, independent of any legal duty, of every Singapore citizen and resident to respect the other races in view of our multiracial society.

Each individual living here, irrespective of his racial origin, owes it to himself and to the country to see that nothing is said or done which might incite the people and plunge the country into racial strife and violence. These are basic ground rules...the Sedition Act delineates this red line on the ground.

The two accused persons have crossed the red line by wantonly breaching these ground rules.

Having said that, the court notes that the offending acts by the accused persons were nipped early and contained. The accused took action to reduce the offensiveness of their acts.

On June 19, Benjamin Koh decided to issue an apology and removed the offending material from public access. Nicholas Lim tendered his written apology on Sept 25 and reiterated this apology this afternoon. These are mitigating factors.

Bloggers who still have similar offending remarks are well advised to remove them immediately.

The court however notes that the remarks posted by Benjamin Koh on his blog were particularly vile, to use the words of the learned Deputy Public Prosecutors. Paragraph 10 of the learned DPPs' submission on sentence said: 'He...spewed vulgarities at the Muslim Malay community, derided and mocked their customs and beliefs and profaned their religion. He even compared their religion to Satanism.'

His remarks provoked a widespread and virulent response. They sparked off more than 200 comments, some of which involved the slinging of racial slurs at Chinese and Malays. This is an aggravating factor.

In the case of Nicholas Lim, the learned DPPs say that his comments are less serious than those by Benjamin Koh. This is borne out by a comparison of the offending materials.

The quantum of sentence on each of the accused persons, therefore, varies according to their level of blameworthiness.

The court will not hesitate to impose appropriate salutary and stiffer sentences in future cases.'

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Words of the Day:

1. sedition: Conduct or language inciting rebellion against the authority of a state

2. callous: unfeeling

3. diatribes: bitter, abusive criticism

4. unfettered: not bound by restrictions

5. delineates: draws, traces, marks out

6. wantonly: unrestrained

7. vile: loathsome, disgusting

8. derided: insulted

9. profaned: violated

10. virulent: bitterly hostile or antagonistic

11. quantum: quantity, amount

12. salutary: remedial, designed to have an improvement