Opinions on The IPS Survey on Religion, Morality, and Conservatism in Singapore (Part 1)

Recently, the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) in the National University of Singapore (NUS) published a report titled "Religion, Morality, and Conservatism in Singapore". The survey was conducted by Mathew Mathews, Leonard Lim, and Shanthini Selvarajan. All data and pictures in this post are all credited to their hard work. What was widely covered in the media was the respondent's views towards homosexual sex and homosexual marriage. One good example can be this piece from Channel NewsAsia. I was personally very intrigued by such a piece of news, and managed to find the time last weekend to read the report. The report can be accessed here.

Initially, after reading the CNA article, I thought that the report would only be about respondent's views towards homosexual sex and marriage. I could not be more wrong. I can summarize the long, 110 page, report into 2 categories - Singaporeans' opinion on various 'vices' (including but not only homosexual sex and marriage), and Singaporeans' conservative-liberal stances. I was hence tempted to name today's post "Are We Ready (Part 3)" as a follow up to my blog posts last year on Pink Dot and the petition to repeal Section 377A of the penal code, but I think it would be more appropriate to comment on the report as a whole.

Of course, given the sheer length on the entire report, I cannot cover the entire report in one post, hence I'll break the post into 2 parts. The first part will be on Singaporeans' views on various 'vices', with a particular focus on the homosexual sex and marriage issue. As usual, I will refrain from commenting on my personal views on whether Singapore should or should not repeal 377A or accept gay sex/marriage in general, and will be commenting based on the data and findings presented in the report.

While I will leave the reader to read most of the report on their own, this is a summary of findings for the first part of the study.

As seen, most 'vices' have seen an increase in tolerance towards the act, as noted with a decrease in 'Always wrong' and 'Almost Always Wrong'. The only outliers are on "Sexual relations with someone other than marriage partner", or in other words infidelity, and "Gambling". While I am glad and relieved that society has taken a tougher rejection of infidelity, with over 80% of respondents rejecting the notion, I am rather surprised that about 74% of respondents reject Gambling. This is because of my observations of long queues of gambling especially during big Toto draws, as well as very much online interest in the results of such draws. Yet again, this is only my personal experience, and I surely haven't seen at least 25% of the population gamble, so I'll accept the notion with a pinch of salt.

Back to the main topic today, it does seem that "Sexual Relations between two adults of the same sex" is more 'acceptable' in today's society, with 63.6% of respondents responding that it is more wrong than not, as compared to in 2013 when 80% respondent as such. "Gay Marriage" has also seen a significant change in support, with 60% responding negatively compared to 74.2% in 2013. In summary, we can see an approximate 14.2-16.4% swing towards acceptance from 2013 till 2018 (when the survey was conducted).

There are 2 other homosexual related questions in the survey, on the adoption of children and having children through surrogacy or artificial reproductive techniques, but I will refrain from commenting on them since the outcomes are similar to gay sex and marriage, but more importantly in my opinion it's a cause and effect issue. If people accept gay sex and marriage, they most probably will accept adoption by gay couples and having children through surrogacy.

I do view the rather surprising swing in support of gay sex and marriage a result of a few occurrences. The first being the rise of Pink Dot events in Singapore, and increased media coverage, including an interview of PM Lee and a British reporter Stephen Sachur back in 2017. The second being other countries starting to legalize gay sex and marriage, such as the UK, the US, closer to home in the Republic of China (Taiwan), and even recently in the case of India. This certainly raised awareness in many Singaporeans. Another contributing factor would be the post-Pink Dot 2018 saga on 377A, where there was a strong online debate on it. While I wouldn't conclude that the debate made people swing in favour of the issue, but it certainly raised awareness and had people take a more definitive and educated stance on the matter. Finally, since people are starting to "come out" as homosexual/bisexual/queer, more have since stepped out and raised awareness locally, and it is inevitable that more people will support such a notion.

But is it enough? For now, the definitive and straight answer is still no, which is a stance I have maintained since my initial blog post on the matter.

Simply put, the swing is definitely in the right direction for someone who supports the notion (speaking objectively and not referring to myself). And it should be encouraging to see such a big swing too. But just as how the swing doesn't lie, the overall numbers do not lie too. At least 60% of respondents reject the notion, and the numbers are simply too big for any changes at all to be made. I will go on later to explain later why even when the numbers drop slightly below 50% that change cannot take place immediately, but as of present the numbers are far too one-sided for any significant legal change to occur. It will even be political suicide and frankly foolish for any political party or individual to suggest a change at this stage. We can still safely conclude that Singaporeans remain generally conservative on the gay sex/marriage issue.

However, this is not to say that it is impossible for Singaporeans to accept gay sex/marriage. In fact, this is further from the truth. If in the next decade or two the pro-LGBT camp can influence more people from the neutral and anti-LGBT camp to join their cause, and the swing towards acceptance continues, fighting for gay acceptance in the form of legalization may not be a lost cause. It may take a long time, but I do suspect it is very much possible for Singapore to eventually reach the point of acceptance, where it is up to the government of the day to decide on the legal issues.

The report also analyzes the breakdown of responses through age and religion.

AGE

As seen in the above 2 result tables, there is significant evidence which states that age does correlate with acceptance of gay sex/marriage. And this is not surprising at all, given that the younger generation have greater and more access to the internet and technology and hence could be exposed to ideologies that span further than Singapore waters. 

In summary, for gay sex, about 35% of respondents lean towards rejecting, while 48.7% lean towards accepting for the age group of 18-25. For age group 26-35, it is 47.9% lean rejecting against 34.3% lean accepting. For gay marriage, it is 30.4% rejecting against 58.4% accepting for the younger ones, and 43.2% rejecting against 41.2% accepting for the slightly older group. The elder groups, aged 36 and up, a greater majority rejects both notions.

I do also acknowledge the swing for younger respondents, in particular for the youngest group of respondents, who swung from 66.4-19.1 (lean reject-lean accept) in 2013 to 35.9-48.7 in 2018 for gay sex, and 60.1-25.5 in 2013 to 30.4-58.4 in 2018 for gay marriage. For the age group of 26-35, it is 72.2-15.8 to 47.9-34.3 and 66.1-21.1 to 43.2-41.2 respectively. 

This shows that if Singapore was made of only people aged 18-25 today, the public will probably (though not certainly) back the legalization of gay sex and marriage, depending on how the swing voters (those who voted 'Only Wrong Sometimes') decide to swing on the matter. For the age group of 26-35, the issue of gay sex may still be in favour of opposition, but gay marriage could see acceptance triumph rejection, also depending on the swing voters.

However, we also cannot discredit the older respondents, which mostly voted soundly in rejection of both notions. And as seen earlier, overall the respondents still vote in rejection of gay sex/marriage instead of acceptance. This is why change cannot happen, and should not happen now. 

This also further reiterates my earlier point that while the legalization of gay sex/marriage will not happen now, it may happen in the future. When the elder generation passes on and the younger generation gets older and the influences continue to spread amongst the new younger generation, it won't be long before the population leans in favour of these notions. However, it is also not a bygone conclusion, and my words definitely cannot predict the future. But based on the trends, it is predictable, but not conclusive. 

RELIGION

The issue of religion and acceptance of these 2 notions tell us a different story about the acceptance of gay sex/marriage in our society.

Among all religions, only those with no religion have a lower than 50% rate of leaning towards rejection of both notions. And even then, the proportion of lean rejection is greater than lean acceptance for gay sex, and equal for both parties for gay marriage.

While some religions have seen a great swing towards acceptance, such as for the Buddhists and the Hindus, and Taoists to a slightly smaller extent, in general there is still more lean towards rejection than acceptance for these 3 religions.

For the other 3 religions, Islam, Catholicism, and Christianity, there was a small swing towards acceptance, but there is still a great disproportion towards rejection of the notions rather than accept. In fact, around 83-84% of respondents practicing Islam reject both notions, around 80% of Christians reject, and about 73-74% of Catholics reject. For these 3 religions, the swing towards acceptance is largely (but not fully) discredited in view of the present overwhelming majority rejecting instead of accepting the two notions.

Examining the issue by religious grounds shows a sadder reality for the pro-LGBT camp. While I do think the cause of difference between the results of age and religion is due to perhaps more younger Singaporeans adopting no religion instead of following their parents'/relatives' faith, there is no denying that on religious grounds there is still very much work to be done if the pro-LGBT camp wants to find headway into getting their agenda legalized. 

Singapore prides itself as secular, which means we are not a racial nor religious state. However, Singapore does still very much consider the views of racial and religious groups in view of social cohesion and racial-religious harmony. While the government will not, and should not, take action based on the views of religious groups, it is certainly imperative to take the latter's views into consideration. 

This further elaborates my point that even if 50% Singaporeans accept and another 50% reject the notion, or even in a case of 55-45 (accept to reject), Singapore is unlikely to legalize the 2 notions immediately. Legalization of the 2 notions while religious groups (Islam, Catholicism, and Christianity in particular) are still not accepting of such notions may cause disharmony and unhappiness amongst religious groups and the public, which may at worst lead to unwanted violence and casualty, which fractures the racial and religious harmony (or at least, tolerance) that has taken so much time to build in Singapore. Any move on the matter is expected to be calculated very carefully by the government, making sure to consult many sectors of our community.

COMBINING AGE AND RELIGION

The depiction of the above 2 tables is not to examine which factor matters more in the issue, but rather to see if more conclusions or findings can be drawn from the results of the survey.

Findings positive for Pro-LGBT Camps will include:

1. Across all religions, including no religion, the proportion rejecting the 2 notions are significantly less for the youths than the elders. As such, the journey towards legalization may not be that impossible after all.
2. More younger Hindus, Taoists, Buddhists, Catholics, and non-religious people accept gay marriage as compared to reject. For gay sex, for the same group a similar result does apply, except for Hindus which the numbers slightly inch towards reject rather than accept.

Findings positive for Anti-LGBT Camps will include:

1. Across all religions, the elders aged above 55 all soundly reject both notions. This even includes those who practice no religion, where the number disparity is quite huge, which is surprising given that practicing a religion seemed like quite a major factor in one's beliefs on these matters.
2. Youths who practice Christianity and Islam are also rejecting these 2 notions by quite a large disparity. The reject-accept ratios are 75.6-15.3 and 68.6-23.6 respectively for gay sex and 72.4-19.7 and 65.1-27.0 for gay marriage. As mentioned earlier, even if the other religions can accept these notions, the fact that Christians and Islamic individuals reject the notion can spell trouble for those who wish for gay sex and marriage to be legalized

CONCLUSION

While there is certainly a swing towards acceptance for gay sex and marriage in Singapore across all age and religious groups, it is evident among further analysis that Singapore is still rather far from accepting these notions legally. While analysis of age alone seems to point that in a few decades' time there should be sufficient support for LGBT rights to pass, detailed scrutiny of religion and age-religion findings seem to show that the journey towards acceptance will not be as easy as it seems. There will come a point where the pro-LGBT camp will have to successfully influence people who practice Christianity and Islam to change their views on LGBT issues, otherwise change may be a distant hope.

In Part 2 of my post, I will post about the other half of the report, which is on Singaporean's stances on conservatism issues.

Thank you all for reading this long post. I would appreciate any constructive feedback or questions.