The Real Rabbit out of Gopalan’s Hat

Two days ago, Gopalan Nair published an entry on his blog stating that MM Lee suffered ‘a massive heart attack’ and was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit of the Singapore General Hospital.

The blog entry, citing  ambiguous ‘reports’ as its source, contained not only the exact timing of the supposed heart attack that MM Lee had suffered, but also detailed accounts of democracy protests following the event, occurring at the junctions of Orchard and Patterson Road.

The Internet community was soon abuzz with Gopalan’s entry, with it quickly becoming one of the most active threads on popular discussion boards such as the Hardwarezone, and the Sammyboy Forums.

Numerous Facebook profiles begun linking to Gopalan’s blog, The Singapore Dissident. Site traffic aggregator Alexa reported that 47% of total visits to the blog was preceded by Facebook as an upstream website.

All eyes were on internet as an alternative media, with most believing that the mainstream news sources would be the last to report this breaking news.

Gopalan was to admit that his entry on MM Lee’s heart attack was a hoax a day later.

According to Gopalan, this was a “deliberate attempt to highlight how tenuous Singapore really is,” and to show the “dire consequences to the island of his parting.”

But did Gopalan give us a glimpse of the ‘dire consequences’ with his hoax?

Surely not — for the stories of protests happening along the junctions of Orchard and Patterson Road were conjured up by nothing but his imagination.

And this is the same too for his account of top officials ready to leave the island following the event.

The overwhelming reaction following his hoax should certainly not be seen in the same light as the fear or pandemonium that might ensue should the dictator Kim Jong II of North Korea suffer a sudden passing, as Gopalan claims.

For the news of the passing of a very if not most influential figure in Singapore’s history would come to be a significant news to many, and this is not saying anything about the nature of the news, whether good or bad.

The Real Rabbit out of Gopalan’s Hat
Gopalan’s hoax has shown us, however, two very important points.

Firstly, Singaporeans do not seem to trust the mainstream media to break such important news, not unless until careful deliberation is exercised on their part on how to best tactfully put the news across to the general public. And this is surely done only after filtering the reports through many official channels.

Despite the lack of mainstream media reports both on the event and the supposed protests happening in the streets of Singapore, many continue to believe in the story, with some citing eye-witness accounts of ministers visiting the Singapore General Hospital in Facebook to corroborate Gopalan’s account.

Secondly, the internet community in Singapore has taken a life on its own. Meaning to speak, the role of netizens in Singapore cannot be doubted anymore.

If the aforementioned event did truly take place, then there is no way one can hide the news from Singaporeans who are increasingly reliant on the internet as a source of information.

Even if one controls the official channels of communication, there will be solitary eye-witness accounts, discussions and reports that will surface and find a plane of existence on the internet, even if they are not given a chance at life by the mainstream media.

Of course, now that a hoax of this magnitude has happened, the netizen community has also been taught an important lesson not in believing everything they hear or read, even if there are supposed empirical evidences supporting the case.

Of a lesser point would definitely be the credibility of Gopalan Nair.

Whereas many would have come to give him the benefit of the doubt previously, Gopalan has definitely given reason for people to take his words with a pinch of salt, or maybe even a huge pinch, if we could add.

If the internet community in Singapore is to establish itself as a trustworthy source of news or opinion, it must distance itself from the actions of Gopalan, whose intention is to record the reaction from, rather than the substance of, the news itself.

As Gopalan would himself come to say, there is no reason that his blog should be taken too seriously.