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Category: Global Perspective

Goodbye GPERs (Apr 23 2019)
Hello TOK (TBC date)

Should Human Rights be Universal or Culturally Relative?

Published by liew48863@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg on May 3, 2018

Through the case study of The Girl in the River, we can see the evidence of the ongoing debate about whether human rights should be universal or culturally relative.

Although I do agree that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) should be universal as its name suggest, it can never be. Why do I say so? Because everybody’s interpretation of the UDHR is subjective.

Here’s an example: A farmer’s land was decided to be used to build a facility, but the farmer refused. Naturally, if we look at this from the farmer’s perspective, we may think the man behind the project is in the wrong. But what if it was a public recreational facility for the people of the area to enjoy. What if the person was genuinely wanting to help the community.

 

But if we were to follow the UDHR strictly, this man has just violated Article 17.2, (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Another one is Article 18 and 19, which is about the freedom of speech. It just can’t help, that everybody is not only unique but has their own thoughts and opinions. Everyone can get hurt from what the other’s are saying. Not only that, because of the usage of the term ‘freedom of speech’, unnecessary conflicts can occur. For example, nowadays, young people all around the globe connect with each other using the power of the Internet and social media to spread reverse racism. Now this has become quite a huge topic, with no one knowing which party is in the right and which is not. A recent news article about the issue would be about the Starbucks incident. Perhaps I am wrong, but I feel that the two victimised men were glorified for their accusation to Starbucks of their arrest for idling around the cafe without buying anything as an act of racism.

 

 

Universal Declaration of Human Rights is idealistic, but it has yet to prove whether its violations are right or wrong in some cases. After all, we would still need to check and balance it.

In conclusion, the UDHR should be culturally relative.

I know about ‘taste setters’, ‘cool hunters’ and ‘filter bubbles’ but still believe that I control what’s cool.

Published by liew48863@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg on February 5, 2018

I am aware that there are such things as ‘filter bubbles’ and ‘cool hunting’, but I still think I am in control of what I believe to be ‘cool’. After all, people still have different preferences in what they like or not.

For example, there was the fidget spin craze. There were advertisements everywhere at one point and people ‘battling’ with their fidget spinners. There were people out there who have like a zillion fidget spinners, but there are also people out there who believes that it was not a necessity, thus not buying it.

If I have searched up the hunger games trilogy in my search engines, there would definitely be advertisements on it due to the existence of filter bubbles, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I would be interested in buying them, after all, I might have just wanted a look at what it’s all about.

I believe that each person’s likes and dislikes are unique and that no two people are the same. And even if they are, they have them in a different ranking. I think that the ‘cool hunters’ are just a survey which gathers what majority of, in this case, teenagers’ believe is cool and would like to buy. So there is bound to be a minority that does not fall into the ‘category’

In conclusion, I still believe that I am in control what’s cool to me.

After the documentary

Published by liew48863@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg on September 6, 2017

After watching the documentary and reflecting on your personal views, to what extent do you think gender identity is determined by the environment?  The questions below may help with your thinking.

Before I had watched the documentary, I believed that our gender has already been pre-determined psychologically. But I never knew that there is an actual reason why we are what our gender is.

After watching the documentary, I have little faith that the environment we are growing up in is affecting our gender identity. Though one thing I believe that the environment had affected was that whether or not we can accept our gender and open up.

A very good example of this would be when Brenda/David was socially excluded due to enjoying what boys like and acting like one. She/He was feeling confused and didn’t want to worry his parents, thus not opening up to them about his identity. Only when his parents had finally revealed to him that he was actually a boy then only he had open up to them and live as a boy.

I believe that gender is a really important aspect of our identity. It allows people to identify whether you are a female or a male, allows people to have a vague targeted audience.

But as I have hinted before, it is normally used as a barrier or restriction. Like saying girls are meant to be acting fragile and like a princess, that they should be liking pink. Excuse me! I only said that gender allows people to have a vague targeted audience, so don’t go around twisting my words!

Gender is only one of the aspects of our life. We are all meant to be different, to be unique. So it’s alright if girls like blue and likes climbing trees!

People can only be open about their gender identity when they are in a environment that accepts them. Being in an environment that doesn’t will just restrict access to what they actually enjoy and wants to live as.

Although I do say that a open community is great, it sometimes confuses you on your own identity upon learning that there are other ‘types’ of people. I remember that when they were talking about the LGBTQ+ community, I was falling into the Q part of the name and had kept asking myself: am I one of them?

It does get confusing, but I guess when you look at your interactions and interests, you will find your answer.

Is gender identity physical or mental?

Published by liew48863@gapps.uwcsea.edu.sg on September 2, 2017

Gender is the state of being a man or a female. The term can be used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than the biological ones, I prefer to call that as sex.

Personally, from what I have read and have been surrounded by, I believe that gender identity is something we are born with. But by that, I mean that from the very young age, we are already the gender we are meant to be, psychologically. I believe it is just a matter of realizing, accepting and coming out as what you are. Though we may be influenced by what we are exposed to from a young age, like how girls like pink and boys like cars, we are still what we are.

I believe that gender can affect our identity in many ways: how society sees us and how they would treat us, the way that we would react, and the way we would see ourselves. For example, in the past, women are seen to be weak in society, and because of that, we act fragile and see ourselves also as a weakling. But personally, I believe that even if we have different genders, we are meant to be different from each other. Besides interest and personality, gender is just one of the aspect of that.

 

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