SINGAPORE: In yet another attempt by the government to promote more sexual activity from its female population, a new online website hopes to get women to start getting busy with their husbands and have babies. It comes after numerous ads last year to promote pregnancy in the Southeast Asian city-state, where birth rates are declining. “You can have it all, if you only choose to,” asserts the newly-launched website entitled The Singaporean Fairytale, which has once again sparked controversy for its use of illustrated rewritten classic fairy tales to encourage Singaporeans to carry out what its creators believe is a national duty: to have many children, and have them now. “My aunt is a maiden some suspect past forty, with a knack for keeping suitors at bay. ‘Ten cats in her apartment, she's surely dotty!' But my aunt cared less what they say,” one rhyme ominously states, as a warning to twenty-somethings about what could become of them if they don't focus on settling down and starting a family early. The site, created by four undergraduate students with a grant from an organization called the National Family Council, supports the Singaporean government's campaign to increase the birthrate among its citizens. Additional “fairy tales” contain messages that discourage young Singaporeans from waiting too long to marry and conceive a child at the risk of the ticking “biological clock,” which they say should be a concern for both women and men. The ongoing campaigns for women to start getting pregnant have angered Singapore women. They have told Bikyanews.com repeatedly and across ethnic and class lines that it is “insulting" and “angering" that women are being viewed as “baby-making" machines. “For a country that is prosperous and really well-off, I find these campaigns the ultimate slap in the face as if we women are not individuals but simply machines to push out babies to help the government," Anna, a 22-year-old recent university student, told Bikyanews.com. “How many campaigns can they have to force us to get pregnant. It is ridiculous," one of the few young professionals in her early twenties who is already married. “But I don't want to have kids now. It's my life, not the government's." This is not the first time the Singapore government has tried to entice couples and women to have children. Late January, the government announced it would give married fathers at least one week paid vacation to be with their newborns. Currently only dads working for companies that offer paid paternity leave get such a benefit. But such leave will soon become mandatory, and will extend to fathers who are self-employed. Announcing the change, which comes after years of lobbying by pro-family groups, Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean said it sends a signal that fathers should be more involved in raising their children. The leave will be given to fathers of children born on or after May 1 this year. Its value is capped at $2,500, including Central Provident Fund contributions. Singapore citizens are not having children. According to the United States intelligence agency, the CIA, the country ranks dead last across the world in fertility rates. The result, the government here fears, is that it could threaten the economic stability built up over the past few decades. With the economic growth rate to drop to near one percent this year, the government is worried that if Singaporeans don't start having more babies, the city-state could face a downturn that might last more than a year or two. The government has already begun discussing means of boosting marriage rates and couples having babies in an effort to grow. BN
