Chen Hanwei and Zoe Tay complaint

In the story of the Emperor's new clothes, a favorite of those in financial circles, it was a child who finally pointed out that the emperor was naked.

My neighbors except one other and ourselves made their children greet their elders in the Chinese or Confucian way. If convenient I always respond that it wasn't necessary. I know from my own up bringing and what I saw growing up around me it was mostly form and no substance. Children under the power of their parents had no choice but once they are older, stronger, more independent and confident, they will show their true colours. Now Zoe Tay and Chen Hanwei are complaining about it. They are not getting the respect they feel veterans deserve from the younger artistes.

Confucius vs Success is no contest. Success wins nearly all the time. We are just living down the success and money culture in our head long pursuit of growing the economy. You can't have your cake and eat it.

Chen Hanwei and Zoe Tay straddle the generations. They respected their seniors but they are not getting their dues from the juniors. Money and commercial success didn't feature much in the generation prior to these two. Money feature much more prominently now. Isn't the quarrel Michelle Chong has with Mediacorp essentially over money? The culture on the hill is changing. A bastion of telling the Singapore Story has past. There will not be any more "Awakening" shows which succeeded at unifying all races even. It is all about $$$ now. You can't cohere a people this way.

Pawning our intangibles, we have sold ourselves for a song.


Update: 7:55pm

So Jack Neo has entered the fray.

Confucius never anticipated the fast changing and expanding world which are living in today. It is up to us to adapt his ideas to serve our times.

For much of the history of civilization, the older person indeed know far more than the young. The world was a static place more or less and the elder  has much useful experience to share.

It is completely different now. The young often have fresh and useful ideas for all of us. They might be brash but no one is born humble and they are usually too young to learn humility. They need the time and humbling opportunities and the pace cannot be forced. The best approach is mutual respect and learning from each other. I think Confucius have a lot to advise how the elder can be magnanimous toward the young as the wise ancients always had for the rare young talent that occasionally appear on the scene.  Didn't Lui Bei make three trips to seek Zhuge Liang who was barely half the aristocrat's age.

Closer to our time Albert Einstein show scant respect to his elders and received wisdom. It didn't served him well but he was lucky to have good and gifted friends especially Marcel Grossmann. Not every future Einstein will have a friend like Grossmann. In his old age, Einstein was wiser than most including those he showed little respect as a youth. I think it is best to cut the young talents some slack but also not deny them to opportunities to eat humble pie too.

Update: June 17 7:40pm

How does this 24 min movie I happened to come across because of ViddSee compares with Ah Boys to Men? If I am not wrong these are by the young folks from NTU. The young vs the old; the new vs the familar...




Update: June 30 9:00am

This article reminds us that norms change with time and bring us up to date what's happening today in the light of what used to be.

There is a trend away from form to substance. That's good.