Being a Volunteer Engagement Intern of the Humanist Society
Tackling Anti-Vaccine Sentiments in a Time of COVID-19
Singapore has just received its first shipment of the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine,. This is the second Covid-19 vaccine to be approved for local use, following the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. These vaccines have been described to be instrumental in the global effort to combat the pandemic. Yet despite strong evidence of vaccine efficacy, ‘anti-vaccine influencers’ still lurk online, feeding fears and stirring up misinformation. DJ speaks to Siti to better understand her work in countering such anti-vax narratives.
Response to The Straits Times Op-Ed
A recent op-ed written by Chua Mui Hoong and published in The Straits Times, ‘S’pore teen detained under ISA: Wake-up call for Christian community’ (5 Feb 2021), has piqued some interest and stirred emotive discussions within the non-religious community. This is particularly because Archbishop William Goh, of the Catholic Church, was quoted that he ‘believes that the greatest risk of religious fanaticism comes from a hostile and extreme form of secularism’. He argued that an overly secular society would push religion into marginalised, private areas, diminishing the scope for open, public sharing and discussions of commonalities and differences. Some of us may remember Archbishop Goh’s previous misinformed comments on atheism and secularism.
This bears repeating.
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