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ignore this dumb-ass entry.
written: 5:14 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2007

Today was a dark, dark day for me. I finally mustered up the guts to ask the brilliant Public Law professor if I could crash his class and he said no. He said that he'd prefer it if I asked my own tutor first, which I obviously didn't think of doing, because he didn't want to be discourteous. Like, oh my god, and there I was, in front of his ENTIRE tutorial class, wishing for a hole to materialise so that I could disappear.

Well, still not giving up. Met Mag after and she was gushing over him which means I have to attend his classes or else I will die. I'm actually willing to subject myself to four straight hours of Public Law, therefore sacrificing the better half of my Tuesday afternoon, because I think he's that fantastic. I'm just bummed that I had a brownie at NYDC with my mom this afternoon instead of listening to him talk about the supremacy of the Constitution in his class. Bleah.

Was whining to Tris and Kel K about my woeful plight after. Yeah, I'm like, such a loser. Really. Seriously. Tris told me to stop whining. How nice, Thai Guy Who Randomly Announced in SLS Lecture That He Wasn't Gay. Deeply-entrenched sexuality issues much? Was fun arguing with Tris though, over an implicit suggestion I made about him being gay. Now I know why Mag needs her regular fixes. HAHA. Just kidding, you two.

Unfortunately, I didn't do any significant reading last night. Got bored after reading about Singapore's constitutional history and decided that sleeping was more interesting. Yeah. I'm way behind on my readings for everything and I really should just go die now or something 'cause I'm effectively dead anyway but well, what else is new? Story of my life. You know the drill.

Tuned out of Trusts after, like, fifteen minutes. Spent the rest of my time organising my 'entries' folder in my laptop. He ended at 11 a.m. today, a good forty-five minutes before the stipulated end-of-lecture time. Awesomeness. Had lunch with Tris, Kel and Aud. Fun times.

Still puzzled over something: Why the hell is it so bad to come right out and declare that Parliament is supreme and not the Constitution? It's like an open secret that no one dares to verbalise. I don't get it. The intelligent and therefore significant portion of this country's population more or less has an idea that the Constitution is only supreme in theory, and that our de facto grundnorm is parliamentary/legislative (sorry, haven't read anything to know the difference) supremacy. Maybe we're aspiring towards a constitutional supremacy, and if that's the case, isn't it easier to aspire towards something after admitting that we effectively (note I said effectively) do not have the barest semblance at all of that to which we aspire? Put another way, it's like aspiring towards becoming Einstein when your IQ is way below average. Why do we still pretend that the Constitution is supreme when it seems (note I said seems) to be too-frequently subject to alterations according to the whims and fancies of the government, such that it's been amended a grand total of forty-four times since...um, the 1960's?

I can't quite decide, either, if the Constitution should be sacrosanct and thus amended once every millennium, or if it should be a living creature. Because if the Constitution is to be the supreme law of the country as enshrined in Article 4 (I think? Like I said, haven't done any readings), what does it say about its purported supremacy if it's been amended as frequently as ours? And yet, at the same time, our Constitution is unlike India's, unlike the United States', very much like Malaysia's - it's a hand-me-down. If the piece of paper given to us by the British doesn't serve our needs, it should be amended. But why mend and alter repeatedly a pair of jeans that doesn't fit when you can just buy a new one?

I guess my point is this: What the fuck is the point of Singapore's Constitution? You assume the Constitution is supreme, but that's because of the social construct in which you've been brought up and therefore by which you've been indoctrinated. At the end of the day, you don't really understand why you believe the things you think you believe. Maybe it's not such a bad thing for Parliament to be supreme in Singapore if our Constitution wasn't even fought for, if no blood was shed over it, if it's more or less a relic of our colonial past.

And yet - there's something intrinsically repulsive about the idea of rex lex. Unchecked power, freedom to do whatever, whatever it says is law. Seriously? Who died and made them gods? Democracy ain't foolproof, people are generally stupid, and I feel extremely uneasy with the idea of effectively giving Parliament absolute power.

But then again, like I said earlier, our Constitution is...well, let's put it this way: There's a difference between finding a copy of the Constitution and finding the Constitution. Yes I leeched this off the brilliant professor. I didn't understand this last week when he said it but now, I totally get it. Isn't he brilliant? I think he is too.

Anyway, I've managed to confuse myself further so I'm going to stop typing this bullshit and I'll just retreat to my apathetic little corner in which I don't do my Public Law readings or any readings for that matter and go on being ignorant and everything. Awesome.

I need to go and pretend to care about LCS so I should go and stare at the problem. It's boring fuck though, needless to say. Oh fuck me upside down, seriously. At times like these, I just wanna break something. Ugh. What a pain in the ass.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010