Social Commentary: Filial Piety

English Commentary

THE STRAITS TIMES

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Aug 20, 2009

Couple chased out by son

AN ELDERLY couple in Singapore who gave up their duplex to their son ended up homeless after he chased them out of the house, Sin Chew Daily reported on Thursday.

The couple now call the staircase of a school their home.

The man, who gave his surname as Lim, was a manager before he retired. He has a son and a daughter who live in Jurong.

Relating his ordeal to a secretary of the school, Mr Lim said he and his wife decided to give their duplex home to their son as a wedding gift about two years ago.

The couple thought that they could live in the house with their son. He, however, decided to sell the property for RM960,000 to buy another condominium. Mr Lim and his wife were then sent off to live with their daughter.

After a year, the daughter decided that they were no longer welcome and banned them from touching her children.

The couple could not enter the house after their daughter changed the locks to the house. -- THE STAR/ANN

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If you look up the term ‘filial piety’ on Wikipedia, you will realise that entire article heavily links filial piety to Chinese culture. Without a doubt, filial piety is given high priority by the Chinese. However, filial piety should not just be a virtue for the Chinese to uphold, but rather it should be universally practiced.

The great Chinese philosopher, Confucious, believed that filial piety was a virtue which was to be respected above all else. Despite the rootedness of filial piety in Chinese blood, I still see various cases of rebelliousness, rudeness and disrespect by children to their parents. The incident mentioned in the article might seem extreme, but I believe that it accurately reflects the worsening situation in Singapore.

Many believe that it is solely the child’s responsibility to exhibit filial piety. However, I believe that filial piety can only be cultivated in the child with the cooperation of two parties: the child himself, and his parents. The parents first have the responsibility to educate the child about filial piety. Failure to do this might cause defects in the child’s moral values in the future. Likewise, the child has a responsibility to respect his parents. Of course, there are some cases where parents dutifully teach children the right values but the children stay rebellious far into their adulthood. However, this is not an excuse for the parents to shirk their responsibility to teach their children.

The Bible states that parents are to ‘Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he shall not depart from it’ (Pro 22:6). It is, first and foremost, the responsibility of parents to train up their child. What does training up a child involve? The phrase ‘train up’ was originally used to describe the shaping of trees through the use of bending, lopping or pruning. This was done to achieve a desired shape. Likewise, parents should ‘bend’, ‘lop’ and ‘prune’ their child to eventually grow up to be in good moral shape. Training up naturally involves instruction and punishment, and parents should not be overly cautious in meting out either. In modern society, many parents do not believe in beating children or scolding them. However, especially for younger children, such forms of instruction and punishment are needed. As the saying goes, “spoil the rod and spare the child”. Indeed, if parents are too relaxed on their children, they will go wayward and the consequences might be dire for both parties.

On the other hand, the child has the responsibility to obey and respect their parents. Parents play the biggest role not just in providing for their child, but in shaping the character of the child. Their many sacrifices are testaments to this. Respecting their parents is the best way to show gratitude for their parents. Furthermore, if children respect their parents, this will show that they are able to respect authority. This has a large impact on society. If children are not even able to obey the most natural of authorities, how will they be able to obey authority on a societal level? This leaves them open to defy authority in school, at work, and even the government. Society is suffering from a bad case of moral decay, and if children are not well trained, I scarcely dare to think of what society will be like in the future.

We can see that both parents and their children have a part to play in the moral decay of society. To parents, I hope that you will train your children well. To children, I hope that you will give your parents the respect they deserve.

Scrap the CCTs

CCTs are notorious for pulling down the GPA of students. CCTs have the ability to make even the most brilliant of students feel utterly inadequate. CCTs cause sleepless nights, the eruption of pimples and even the sprouting of white hair. While these might not be the most convincing of reasons to justify why CCTs should be scrapped, I do have some valid reasons which will help you realize this.

In my years as a student, I have realized one undeniable fact – the information which I have crammed into my head overnight in order to sit for a test the next day have hardly been retained for more than a week. This is precisely what countless students do the night before they sit for their CCTs. There is just too much cluttering the lives of many students that it becomes difficult for them to have enough time to thoroughly study for tests. As a result, the information just cannot find ways to sink into the “long-term memory” file in the brain.

This method of learning obviously takes a huge toll on students and many publicly proclaim that they “hate” certain subjects without explicitly citing a reason. I believe that the stress that they undergo and the difficulty they encounter when they study subjects might just be the reason behind this phenomenon. Ultimately, CCTs might destroy the joy and love of learning which should rightly reside in the hearts of each and every student. In the future, these students might not actively continue to learn because of these experiences as students.

Of course, we must not overlook the good points of CCTs. CCTs give students a goal to work for and a direction for learning. Without them, students might not have the drive to work hard and might not find anything to work towards.

However, with regard to good points, CCTs stop there. If we think about it, the main reason why tests are carried out is that it should be a good gauge of the standard of students. However, after careful examination, I have realized that CCTs might not be a good gauge of the standard after all. The CCTs are just a 1-off test and the results of the test are based solely on that one performance. Brilliant students who might not be functioning optimally on a particular day might not do as well as other students even though they might far surpass them in ability. Furthermore, it is also possible that students with low ability might happen to have encountered a similar question and therefore was able to answer the question at the test. This surely is not a true reflection of the student’s ability!

Think about how much school material you have forgotten. Think of the times you stayed up till 4am to study for the test the next day. Think of the people who were worse than you at maths and beat you by a single mark. So let me ask you - should the CCTs be scrapped?