By this statement alone, I think she tried her best to reinforce the two values in the Pathlight School (Singapore's school for high-functioning autistic people), that is, compassion and competence.
In my opinion, Compassion and competence are not enough for the autism community in Singapore. Not even Character, Conviction and Contribution, the other values in Pathlight, can help the autism community.
We have to understand what the autism, and, eventually, the special needs community need - commitment. Commitment by both society and the individual people with autism and other special needs to create an inclusive community.
I assume, with wisdom, help and a common vision to better ourselves, that people with special needs have already done their best, to create a better community for all of us to live in. Society may have too many things to be preoccupied with - AIDS, Syria's turbulent situation, unemployment in most of the developed world due to our current financial crisis and its effect, and East Asia's territorial disputes over seabed in South China Sea. Why should it honestly care to work towards an inclusive Great Society, or one with no poverty, like the one Presidents Herbert Hoover or Lyndon B. Johnson of the United States wishes to work on?
It is because some people, in George Orwell's words, are more equal than others. Some suffer discrimination, others still coop all possible pre-existing advantages they already have.
In Singapore, Aspies and Auties are deemed to be incompetent for the current complex nature of the Civil Service (the only stable job in Singapore), either we prepare ourselves for the private sector and know what we are heading for, or we have to allow a few highly capable Aspies to leave for overseas, to have a shot of a better life, and possible fodder for accelerating positive societal change in Singapore, to enable Aspies to live better here in Singapore.
However, there is still validity in Ms Phua's statement.
Although there are some societal thought behind competence, there are some parts that we Aspies can control over our situations, within what we can do. We need to be somehow competent, though, to bring the changes that we really need in our society.
We have to be competent to realise, we have certain gifts that we have, and we can work on them, and we can do something to change the world, change our environment, with the good we have.
We should be competent enough to know we have some limits in our lives. In the case of Aspies, we may not function really well with other people, due to our limitations in social interactions. We need more social support than most other people, though with varying extents.
Overall, we may feel helpless over what we cannot do, that may keep discouraging us to contribute to our individual societies; we still have some solutions in our lives, though, that enable us to live the fullest lives that we can ever lead. We can then maximise our value in our world, through what we do.
