Ho-o-oly shit, this guy. This guy.
Background: I lived in Singapore for a few years, and I left right before the shitstorm went down--a lot of my facebook friends are either Singaporeans or expats living in Singapore. So this guy flooded my facebook feed when he pulled that shit.
Background: Lee Kuan Yew modernized Singapore after World War II, and made it a nation independent from Great Britain, and was its first Prime Minister. But despite that, not every Singaporean worships him--he's no the most progressive when it comes to LGBT stuff (gay sex is still illegal there, despite Singapore having a really awesome gay club scene), and the way Singapore is run is they want everyone to see how clean and modern they are and they are afraid of offending people so that's why some of the laws are a bit like elementary school. Still, even if you disagreed with Lee Kuan Yew, him dying was a big moment for Singaporeans.
Then this kid came along and he pissed people off. Amos Yee is one of those "gifted" children who decided he was above school, so because mommy loves him and sees how special he is, he doesn't have to go to school. He was in a movie when he was younger, so he's "talented". He thinks because he's above everyone he's allowed to say this kind of shit. He's a gadfly, he wants attention. As well, Singapore is a city-state, it's a small country, picture a small high school where rumors spread like wildfire. This kid posts his video, pulls out all stops, gleefully insults Lee Kuan Yew and Jesus. But it's not funny, it's not intelligent, it's just some annoying gadfly kid who wants to be "edgy".
So either people who are a) annoyed with this kid because of his fake American accent and his Urkel-y voice complain or b) Singaporeans who were upset that Lee Kuan Yew died and were disturbed and upset with the shit he pulled reported him. And at first he takes it in stride, and acts like an ugrateful little shit. But then he breaks the terms of his bail, and then that's when it stops getting funny. He gets treated like shit, people feel sorry for him. So they relent, he's learned his lesson--Nope, he hasn't.
I feel really sorry for his family, his poor mother. Family is a big thing in Singapore, as is a lot of Asian countries (a lot of people don't leave their family home when they hit their 20s or 30s). It's instilled in you there to respect your parents, to raise your children to be respectable. The amount of shit she has to deal with, both from her son and and her neighbors.
I can't wait for him to turn 18, though, because that means: NATIONAL SERVICE! He's going to get his ass kicked, majorly, but maybe he'd end up a respectable adult.
For those of you who are worried about Singapore's free speech thing--yeah, there is censorship, but there are ways around it. One of the places where you can say whatever the fuck you want is the stand-up scene, done by Singaporeans and expats alike. I've performed some of the most raunchiest stand-up in my life there, and have listened to some hilarious acts that, "deliberately wound religious feelings" or "disrupting public harmony".
