TNP: Totally Nonsence Publishing

NTU students stage protest over unpublished article They claim report was harmless, but are they 'unwitting pawns'? By Genevieve Jiang and Ho Lian-Yi October 07, 2008 IT was an article meant for a student newspaper and described as 'dull, sanitised, totally harmless'. SPEAKING UP: Protest organiser Scott Teng giving a speech at Speakers' Corner in Hong Lim Park. TNP PICTURE: KELVIN CHNG Yet it led to a protest over censorship, and left one political observer wondering whether the students were 'unwitting pawns' in a 'little disagreement'. The report? A piece on Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) chief Chee Soon Juan's unsolicited visit to Nanyang Technological University (NTU) on 26 and 28 Aug. Slated to run in the campus newspaper The Nanyang Chronicle, it was removed by the administration. Dr Chee's visit was also captured on video for the student-run campus television network Nanyang Spectrum. In an e-mail reply to The New Paper, NTU explained that it had acted as it did not want the university to be used to further a political agenda. In protest, final-year NTU student Scott Teng, 24, a former Chronicle writer, organised a demonstration yesterday at the Speakers' Corner. About 70 people, mostly media workers or media students, turned up at Hong Lim Park to listen to Mr Teng and three other speakers argue against censorship behind a banner that read: 'Responsible press for students.' At the event, 66 people signed a petition supporting the students' stand. But to hear Mr Teng, 24, describe the story - about Dr Chee visiting NTU to distribute flyers and interact with students - one wonders why they bothered. He told The New Paper: '(The axing) was unwarranted because the article did not take any sides. It was neutral to the point of being bland. One of our professors even described the print report as 'totally harmless'.' The other speakers took a different tack, with former Chronicle managing editor Lim Yan Wen, 22, saying it was newsworthy going by the usual standards of proximity and timeliness. Isn't it contradictory to claim an article is 'bland' but insist it is valuable to its readers? Mr Teng argued that an article doesn't have to be interesting to generate discourse. 'It could be a boring article, but the issue may not be boring,' he said. The article's writer, Cheong Kah Shin, 21, a third-year student with NTU's Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, also 'spoke', through a speech read out by Mr Teng, because she was 'too shy'. In it, she described her piece as a 'whimper that became a whirlwind', thanks to the university's actions. She told The New Paper she had written the piece to be 'neutral and non-partisan, because it was clear the school newspaper was not a political tool for any party'. But don't the students think they may have been politically naive to think so? Mr Teng took a minute to ponder the question, before skirting it by saying: 'The irony of the situation is if they had run the article, there would be no news at all.' He said the issue is censorship of media. They would have been 'equally disappointed' no matter what the subject was. Among those at yesterday's demonstration were Dr Chee and his sister Chee Siok Chin. Mr Teng distanced himself from their presence, saying that it was a 'public place' and that anyone was free to come and go. What did political observers make of the incident? Institute of Policy Studies' senior research fellow Tan Tarn How, who did not go to the protest, said that while the school has the right to block the publication, he didn't think it was right of it to do so. The NTU students can judge for themselves, he said. But Singapore Management University law professor Eugene Tan felt it was a bit 'far-fetched' to call the issue censorship. 'Censorship means the students have no alternate platforms to air their views,' he said. This, he felt, was clearly not the case with so many online opportunities. He felt the students need not have gone as far as to hold a demonstration even if it was within their rights. As for NTU, he reckoned that someone was 'trying to second-guess how the powers that be may view the student newspaper', funded and run by NTU. It was 'futile' in any case, he said, though he added one should be mindful that the university authorities were trying to protect the students. He felt both the administration and the students had lost out. For NTU, it failed to prevent politicisation and now it is seen as being overbearing. For the students, he did not believe the demonstration enhanced the administration's understanding of the matter. He said that while the students demonstrated to protest their unhappiness, he hopes they are 'not unwittingly made pawns in this little disagreement, this controversy'. He worried that foreign media may 'sensationalise' the story. Then, no one wins, whether it's NTU, the students or Singapore itself, he said. ----- My email feedback (to which they have yet to call or email me back about) I am sorely disappointed by some parts of your TNP article, really. For the worst of it, you editorialised one essential part: the perception towards the demonstration on the ground. "But to hear Mr Teng, 24, describe the story -- about Dr Chee visiting NTU to distribute flyers and interact with students -- one wonders why they bothered." Who is this 'one'? Did anyone present yesterday say they wondered why they bothered? Or was it either of you? Worse, you mistakenly built this premise on the article being not newsworthy. Scott Teng said that it was "neutral to the point of being bland... totally harmless." Like he pointed out, "it could be boring, but the issue may not be boring". So the verdict is out about whether it is truly boring. Yet you used an invented claim -- and editorialised that. This really compromised the neutrality of the article. In a later para, you described Scott taking a "minute to ponder the question". Did Scott really take 60 whole seconds to reply? That's a really long time. If he did, fine, but if he did not, you suceeded in making him look like a fool. In the fourth leg, you described Eugene Tan commenting on censorship, and how it is far-fetched given that there are "so many online opportunities". That implies that the speaker's (our) claims are far-fetched. Sorry to say, you either were not listening to the speeches, or missed the point of the petition and indeed the whole event. NTU has disallowed the article from being published. They say it is the copyright of The Chronicle, and have disallowed Kash, the writer, from releasing it. I said this in my speech. So it is redundant that the Internet is available. Then, you wrote how Eugene Tan made a point about the administration and the students losing out. Your point about NTU losing out is legitimate. But the point after -- "For the students, he did not believe the demonstration enhanced the university's understanding of the matter" -- does not make any sense. In no way is the university's lack of understanding of the matter got to do with the students losing out because of the process. Throughout the article you asked rhetorical questions about the demonstraters intentions, but failed to quiz this non-sequiter. This mistakenly causes us to be seen as fratricidal. Finally, your lead and your closing is disjunctive. Lead: "Yet it led to a protest over censorship, and left one political observer wondering whether the students were "unwitting pawns in a little disagreement". Closing: "he hopes they are not unwitting pawns in this little disagreement, this controversy." So... is this a "little disagreement", or a "controversy"? I guess he meant somewhere in-between. So why belittle the matter at the very front of your article by choosing only the term "a little disagreement"? I hope you can answer these -- pardon my candour -- gross mistakes. It has cast the demonstraters in a really bad light. -------------------------- And it's ironic how the journalists wrote that Eugene Tan said 'He worried that foreign media may 'sensationalise' the story.' Eugene Tan should instead worry about how The New Paper IS already expertly doing that.