It's nothing new, trust me. Lee Kuan Yew is mythologized in High Liberal spaces as the dictator that did everything right - though they often don't mention all the ways in which he had to guard his country against American corruption. He's now being mythologized in Alternative Internet Spaces as one of the Elder Statesmen of the new age, who foresaw and influenced the rise of China and the kind which just 'no longer exists in The West'.

Brainworms may apply depending on the viewer. A liberal might see a sober steward of capitalism, while ignoring all the state driven or anti market things that conditioned Singapore's successes. A reactionary might just succumb to Great Man Theory and worship the guy like a fetish symbol for no reason other than the ways Singapore was/is repressive, while ignoring the whole 'forced multiculturalism angle' that defines its relationship with the public. I'd say that if leftists were to take anything from Singapore and Lee Kuan Yew it would have to be in contrast with how China does things today. Singapore is a city state. That's by definition not a normal country.

He was part of an old guard of capitalist managers. Think FDR style, the pre-neoliberal type that would do things like invest in infrastructure rather than reducing the tax on the rich.

I don't like LKW. But he had quite a far-reaching vision, as tends to come with the territory when there are long term limits or no term limits. I don't have much to praise him about aside from the fact that he wasn't most of the bad things that we see in today's western politicians, but that's like trying to sell a house based on the absence of murderers secretly living in the attic rather than having anything to say about why the house itself is good.

Speaking of housing, didn't he approach the housing market as a public good and less like an arena for speculation? That's the exact policy that makes him one of the old guard of capitalist managers who carefully tended to the economic system so that its excesses and contradictions wouldn't feed back on themselves and create rolling and cyclical economic crises.

Really the only good thing that LKW did was call Australia out for what it really is:

Yeah, it's classist because LKW is a capitalist through and through but he's not wrong about Australia being the poor white trash of Asia. I would have put it in different terms but where's the lie?

@Cowbee@hexbear.net Have you got any good stuff on Singapore?

Had to go on youtube to look for these, so now that algorithm is going to do the same I assume

I found YouTube links in your post. Here are links to the same videos on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:

Link 1:

• yewtu.be
• inv.nadeko.net
• yt.artemislena.eu
• piped.video

Link 2:

• yewtu.be
• inv.nadeko.net
• yt.artemislena.eu
• piped.video