Youths Share Insights and Aspirations For Racial Harmony After Month-Long Conversations

The recent call-out of some racist incidents in social media sparked outrage amongst Singaporeans, especially the youths. This has mooted the necessity of dialogues at different levels and among various segments of the community. As a result, Singapore has experienced a wave of discourse that helped us reflect on our race relations. This collective journey was timely and changed the way Racial Harmony Day is commemorated on 21st July 2021 to remember and learn from the racial riots in 1964. 

hash.peace, a youth-led civil society organisation, contributed to the nationwide discourse by organising a series of conversations that looked at the multi-faceted ways inter-racial relations can affect people in Singapore. Through the lens of three differently themed events, the inaugural hash.peace Conversation Series explored essential questions like how racial issues affect our mental well-being or how businesses can enable racial/religious diversity initiatives in their workplaces. This month-long effort was concluded today through a Closing Dialogue with Dr Janil Puthucheary, Senior Minister of State for Ministry of Communications & Information and Ministry of Health, and Chairman, OnePeople.sg, and Mr Alvin Tan, Minister of State for Ministry of Culture, Community & Youth and the Ministry of Trade & Industry. 

Participants composed of hash.peace members and people of different backgrounds from the general public attended this virtual dialogue to discuss the insights and ideas that surfaced from the four conversations conducted by hash.peace from the 10th to 25th July 2021 with the support of Ministry of Culture, Community & Youth, OnePeople.Sg, Singapore International Chamber of Commerce, and Mental ACT. Participants also posed questions that touched upon various entangling issues concerning our race relations. 

hash.peace ExCo member and Co-Chair of the Conversation Series, Didi Amzar, said:

"Our team recognised that conversations on racial and religious harmony have to be expanded into mental health and workplace dynamics. However, we also noted that these conversations need to happen across various sectors/segments of society if we truly want to get the whole community involved and gather ground-up insights. This prompted us to initiate the hash.peace Conversation Series. We plan for this to be an annual event that engages different stakeholders who have a role in strengthening our social cohesion." Didi, 23 years old, is a Year 2 Political Science and English Literature student at the National University of Singapore. 

In the coming months, hash.peace aims to study into the findings and proposed solutions gathered from the various conversations. It has already begun exploring the setting up of a care group for people who are affected by situations of racism or racial/religious prejudice. The team is also hoping to develop resources for Singaporean parents who find it challenging to speak to youths.

LIST OF HASH.PEACE CONVERSATION SERIES 2021 EVENTS

  • Living with Racism #1 : Our Mental Wellness
    Saturday, 10 July 2021 via Zoom Video Meeting
    A peer sharing of lived experiences of microaggressions, implicit bias, racist speech and behaviour. The conversation explored how these day-to-day realities affect all of us in more ways than we think.

  • Living with Racism #2 : The Hard Realities
    Sunday, 18 July 2021 via Zoom Video Meeting
    A peer sharing uncovering the painful truths and uncomfortable realities of racial tolerance and harmony in Singapore, which have especially been thrown into question recently due to the recent spike in public racist incidents.

  • The Role of the Business Sector in Maintaining Social Harmony
    Wednesday, 21 July 2021 via Zoom Video Meeting
    A conversation with business thought leaders looking deeper into commitment from business owners, HR professionals, D&I leaders and investors towards social harmony, workplaces and their policies and practices on racial/religious diversities in the workplace.

  • Intra-Ethnic Conversations #2: Our Diverse Indian Community
    Sunday, 25 July 2021 via Zoom Video Meeting
    A coffee-chat conversation that explores the diversity of the ethnic communities that would conventionally be viewed as “Indian” or “South Asian”. Guest speakers from different Indian communities such as Malayalee, Tamil, Sikh, Indian Muslim communities will share about the commonalities and differences in Language, Food & Festive Celebrations.



Nazhath FaheemaComment