Some quick thoughts on “the psychological man” and Singapore education

[I wrote this on 9 April 2021. It was first published on wongyann.medium.com ]

I’m currently working my way through Carl Trueman’s The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self (which is part of a larger project about Conservatism vs Liberalism contextualized to Singapore) and I just want to drop a few thoughts on (Trueman’s understanding of) Philip Rieff’s work on “culture”, and in particular Rieff’s portrayal of “the psychological man”.

Rieff argues that “culture” is primarily about institutions instructing and educating individuals what is desirable and what is forbidden within a particular situated society, thus equipping them to function within that society. He further describes 4 rough phases which (western) civilization has evolved through - the political man (the era of Plato and Aristotle), the religious man (medieval ages, and Christianity’s dominance), the economic man (the rise of capitalism) and finally the psychological man and the era of “expressive individualism” (i.e. that each of us finds our meaning by giving expression to our own feelings and desires, pp 46). Or (in my own words), the era where we preach “bring true to ourselves” as a universal good, and “denying ourselves to please/suit others” as a universal bad. Trueman also uses the term “the age of authenticity” to describe this era.

What is interesting about this era is that while institutions are still the ones gatekeeping morality — telling us what is desirable and what is forbidden, but there is an important reversal taking place. In Trueman’s words:

Institutions cease to be places for the formation of individuals via their schooling in the various practices and disciplines that allow them to take their place in society. Instead, they become platforms for performance, where individuals are allowed to be their authentic selves precisely because they are able to give expression to who they are “inside” (pp 49).

Back to education and schooling. Schooling (and parenting) are institutions which we get the strongest sense of “equipping individuals to function and fit into society”, especially so if the individual is still a child. I remember when I was still in secondary school in the late 90s, our teacher struggled to explain to us about “norms in society” when we asked her why homosexual sex between men was illegal even though we were being taught to not exercise discrimination against people different from us. She eventually just gave up and stopped trying. Fast forward 2 decades, I was observed by my year head and my vice-principal in a civics and citizenship education class for 17 year-olds. The prescribed lesson I needed to deliver involved denying that premarital sex was a common phenomenon and we needed to deconstruct western media’s portrayals of premarital sex and question whether they were an accurate representation of reality (but without having to similarly deconstruct what was advocated by the school’s prescribed syllabus).

Without jumping into a full blown discussion on how whole-of-society values are being contested in Singapore (the bulk of my above-mentioned project will probably be devoted to this), I do want to apply Rieff’s framework to suggest what was happening in the Ashlee situation in MI. The educator opposed to Ashlee’s transitioning (likely the principal, but possibly a superintendent or higher) probably framed her decision on the basis of her obligation as an educator to “equip” students with the “proper” norms to function in society. The norms in question could plainly just be about heteronormativity, but it could also be about not receiving “special treatment” with regards to exceptions to school rules, obedience and submission to authority, or some combination of the above. Upon facing resistance from Ashlee, the educator interpreted the situation to be one of “more equipping/education required” (instead of say, the educator’s own self-reflexivity) leading to a doubling down on positions, and intensifying of conflict.

The problem is not just that the educator had (arguably) tried to imbibe the wrong ideology to the student, but to Ashlee (and perhaps most teenagers), educators shouldn’t be trying to imbibe any ideology at all. In my decade of teaching teenagers in Singapore, very few of them ever ask me to instruct them where their character is poor and how they can learn from me to change or improve to be a better person. Instead, the implicit understanding is that teachers shouldn’t try to “change me for who I am”, but instead nurture me to “fulfill my potential” (I find this phrase fascinating, and probably worthy of deeper exploration at a later time). In some ways what is being contested is not just moral norms and ideological dominance, but the purpose and roles of institutions themselves (particularly schooling and parenting).