Justice vs Mercy

"The quality of mercy is not strain'd,

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice"

 - Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

There has been an ongoing debate between justice and mercy. True, the mercy is an important and divine attribute, but what is it exactly? And what is justice which is the opposite of mercy?

Mercy - Mercy is a word used to describe compassion shown by one person to another, or a request from one person to another to be shown such leniency or unwarranted compassion for a crime or wrongdoing. (adapted from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercy)

Justice - Justice is the concept of moral rightness based on ethics, rationality, law, natural law, religion, fairness, or equity. (adapted from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice)

So, which side are you on? I personally feel that while one should always show mercy, it is best mixed with justice. As the quote says, mercy is an attribute that benefits both parties, unlike justice, so why do I support a mix? I could refer to many incidents in the real world. On example would be the Oliver Fricker case here in Singapore. In case you do not know what happened, Oliver Fricker trespassed into an MRT depot and "vandalized" on one of the train carriages. He was sentenced to 5 months jail and 3 strokes of the cane. This is justice at work. Oliver Fricker did something wrong (in terms of the Singapore law) and thus is punished for his actions. Many would say that this is fair to Oliver; he committed a crime, but he did no harm to others, why is he harmed (3 strokes) in return? In this case, mercy should of course be shown. While it is stated in the law that it is fair to be caned for vandalism, compassion should also be shown, as everyone deserves a second chance, or even a third. But, if mercy is shown, and not justice, then criminals can go and do what they want and get away with it. Therefore, while justice is important, one should not forget mercy, as it is after all, "an attribute to God himself".

Mugging.

Hi all, it's been a long while (a month?).

Well, today, my topic will be on well, as mentioned above, mugging! Firstly, what is mugging? First, from dictionary.com -- an assault or threat of violence upon a person, esp. with intent to rob. Well, not what I was looking for. How about another online dictionary, like yourdictionary.com? To study hard and hurriedly, as in preparation for an examination. Yep. To study hard due to well, procrastination. So, mugging means to do last minute studying.

Now for my understanding of the word "mugging", based on experience, of course. Mugging refers to memorizing of tested material (of a test/examination) so as to pass or do well in it. It's my definition, you may disagree, but I believe that the material is memorized, and while it may be understood at that moment, it will eventually be forgotten once the examination is over. And thus I am strongly against it.

In my opinion, the knowledge one learns should already be in one's memory and he should understand it completely (how it works, why, etc.) and not memorized for a period of time. What is the purpose of examinations? To test your knowledge. If you just memorize what is tested and then forget it after, then is it considered "your knowledge"? I doubt so. As such, I believe that one should not "mug", but instead revise. My definition of revise? To go through all your past works and test yourself; if you do not understand it, do some research, ask questions, etc. After all, one might forget what he mugged and... you know.

Personally, I believe more in ability than in luck, which is why I feel guilty whenever I put in a random answer so as to have a chance of getting it correct. Sometimes, that one mark might be the difference between a grade, or even between passing and failing. So, in this competitive world, sometimes, we must do things we do not think so highly of, in order to do better, and that is probably the main reason why people mug in the first place. Of course, I would say that I do not mug, but while it may be the truth, it isn't reliable coming from me, so never mind.


Well. to mug or not to mug - that is the question. To me, the answer is no, I would rather revise and understand what I was taught, but you are still free to make a choice. You decide.

STOMP Article

Well, I guess you should know what I'm talking about. The STOMP Article. Okay fine you might not, so I shall just mention it. THE STOMP article regarding a rant on a teacher for taking his valuables to teach him a lesson.

The incident: Students left their classrooms unlocked and went for flag raising, teacher patrolling saw laptops and wallets on tables and thus went in to take them and teach the students never to leave their valuables unattended. And one of the students complained on STOMP.

My take: First on what he did. Why did he have to complain on a STOMP article? That ruins that image of the school completely! If the audience does not think that the teacher's actions are justified, the teachers in the school will look bad. If not, they will think that the students are spoilt brats.

Now on what the students did. Sure, the students should not have left their valuables in plain sight and "providing the opportunity" for theft (quoted from Mr Tan in a previous incident with my class, just without the online rant). It is their responsibility to take care of their own items.

Now on what the teacher did. His intention was to teach the students a lesson by scaring them. Of course, it probably wouldn't work, as my class still leaves their laptops on their tables, just with the doors locked. But nevertheless, I feel that the teacher should have respected the student's rights and not taken without permission. If he were caught, he might have been mistaken for a thief. Of course one learns from experience, so this might have been an effective method to him, instead of just talking to the students.

I shall just leave the topic as it is as I feel both sides have done wrong, but the student who posted this online should not have done so as this affects the school's images.

Racial Harmony Day

Yesterday was Racial Harmony Day. Quite entertaining I guess. For the non-CMC members. Unlike me. Actually, it was quite entertaining for me. Well, let's go into detail and not beat around the bush.

Okay. For the non-CMC members, they were supposed (*ahem*) to go around the cultural bazaar and buy food, watch a play (if I remember correctly - I wasn't there) and go for some Indian mass dance. So the day was pretty packed. But I guess most of them just stayed in class to DotA (*cough*).

As for us CMC members, we were participating in the cultural bazaar full-time, selling our foodstuff. It went well, with us selling some traditional delicacies, and we managed to earn more than twice our budget! While it seemed like it would fail and it was going to be boring waiting for customers, we kept ourselves busy, with customers coming and going.

Well, how I/we spent the day is not the point, the main point is the importance of racial harmony. You probably know why Racial Harmony Day is a day of celebration commemoration. Just in case you don't, you can google here is a brief overview. After the merger with Malaysia, many racial riots started between the Malays and Chinese. After these incidents, Singapore took racial harmony and religious freedom seriously. There you have it.

Now that we know the story, let's talk about my views. This day of commemoration is a great idea, as it's another holiday for us! it prevents racial and religious prejudice to a large extent (*cough* TKAM, TMOV). Well, erm. That's about it from me. My thoughts on prejudice then. Prejudice is what it is pre-judging. It's unfair to those prejudiced against. It's just unfair. So I feel that racial harmony is important. =D

Projects' Day Results

Hi all,

As expected, things did not turn our well. Basically, we did not get through. And we did not get a good mark either. Well, 'good' is subjective, but to us, 17/30 is not good at all. Now my best possible grade for Independent Studies is A2. Disappointed, of course, but then again, I did not think we would have gone through in the first place.

Firstly, if I remember correctly, we were the only group with a script, and that pretty much says a lot about our preparation to the judges. Also, we did not contact our mentor often and did most of the work ourselves, so while we may think that we did our best, it may not have been the required content or format. Such a pity. Well, I can't push all the blame to my group leader; it isn't entirely his fault, it's all of our faults. Well, better luck next time. If there's a next time.

Projects Day Finals

Hi all, Project's Day is just over. And I think my group did pretty well. Overall, my group's performance, as compared to a few other groups, was good, and things went smoothly. Anyways, we put a lot of effort into our project, so we hope we'll get in!

However, there may have been a slight problem regarding our Projects' Day. One of our judges said that our attitude was not up to standard. While meaning no offense to him, but I would like to point out: If our attitude was not there, then why would we be standing here presenting our project? If our attitude was bad, we should not have even got through into the semis! But then again, if he said that our attitude was bad, then we might not even get through to the finals even though our content was very good! Hopefully that's not the case.

At least we did our best - one of my beliefs - to do things to the best you can, regardless of what and how people treat you.

My Holiday - A Summary

Woah, that was fast.

Hi all, it's the last day of the holidays. (DD=)

As the title says, this will be a summary of my holidays. (week by week, I suppose)

Okay, let's begin. On the first week, it was pretty boring (:|), as only went out on Tuesday and Friday for my CCA (Chinese Orchestra). Anyways, I spent the rest of the time doing homework gaming. (*cough*) The first week passes without me doing anything constructive. (...)

On to my second week. My family had planned to visit my grandmother all the way up north in Malaysia, Alor Star, Kedah, to be specific. We set off on Saturday, my father driving a whole 10 hours non-stop. Then, for the next few days, my uncle and aunts took me out to visit museums, shopping malls, etc. Of course, I had my daily dose of gaming, but I also did some of my homework. (procrastination did NOT help)

The third week was homework spam week. In other words, I spammed homework. In other words, I tried to spam homework. In other words, I tried to finish up as much homework as possible. Enough of other words. The computer and other forms of entertainment was distracting, but I managed to finish up most of my Chinese and LA homework. (with the help of no CCA =D)

The fourth week. It went by very quickly. Like, very quickly. I was finishing up most of my homework on the first day (Monday). Then, I went for the iLTC (iLeaders Training Camp) for 3D2N at Aloha Changi Resorts. It was fun. Really fun. I spent 3hours sleeping for those 2 nights. On the first day we had an Amazing Race Around Singapore, during which I learnt that there was a difference between Botanical Gardens and Singapore Botanical Gardens. The next day, we planned a mini-game for other groups to play, had a barbeque and a "campfire" without the fire. Throughout the two nights, I was either watching the World Cup (GO South Africa! [they got kicked out anyways]), playing card games, or sleeping (that was the first night). Then, it was over. Less than 72 hours passed so quickly. I went back home, finished up the rest of my homework, and here I am, typing this blog post.

So, I enjoyed my holidays (pretty much). Did you?