Are Singaporeans short fused?

Today, I've watched a man complained about two young ladies who were filling forms. He was not happy about them making too much "movement" to the high round counter table which he shared with them. They were filling forms for a free 2 years membership to Metro Singapore.

When he left, the two young ladies asked what was his problem? They asked each other if indeed they were making too much movement to the table.

I was thinking, why was the man so easily agitated by small matter such as this?

There are times when I have seen people blow their fuse out of nothing/something trivial. For example,

1. School girls were giggling, talking loudly, and moving freely in the MRT train. An old man with a cane wanted to hit one of the girl with his cane because the girl was too close to him. Fortunately, a terribly surprised Caucasian man stopped the cane from hitting the girl and calmed the old man. The old man muttered repeatedly how ill-mannered the bunch of girls were. Frightened, the girls move to the other carriage. Why the old man got so agitated?
2. MRT again, a lady was seated next to a sleeping man. The man was dozing and his body shifted towards the lady. Trying to avoid body contact, the lady placed her bag in between the man and her. This action woken the man. He was very angry and pushed the lady's bag away. They quarreled and the man pushed the lady, and threatened to slap her several times. Why was he so angry?
3. A man was cutting queue to a bus stop and a lady in front told him off. He got angry and started scolding the lady. It led to argument and the man spitted the lady. Other people who tried to calm the situation was scolded and spitted too. Is there anger management problem here?
4. Someone stared at another person. This made the other person uncomfortable and he got angry. He confronted the other person. A quarrel then led to fight. A similar "staring incident" led to a boy being stabbed and another well beaten.
5. A kid was doing something kids normally do, an agitated dad (and sometimes mom) without warning slapped the boy across the face. The frightened boy cried. Is that how a parent would want to raise a kid? No wonder some kids ended up ill-tempered too when they grew up. These parents should have been castrated earlier so that they couldn't destroy innocent lives.
6. There are many more and from what I gather, some people here in Singapore are really short fused.

Back to the question, are Singaporeans short fused? My answer would be that, not all Singaporeans are short fused. The above examples could be perpetrated by visitors or permanent residents in Singapore too (and no one will know or dare to ask, especially when these people are exploding). One thing is sure though, there are increasing number of people in Singapore who are likely to be short fused. This could probably be due to the stress caused by the inevitable high population problem in Singapore (especially if we aspire to be a megacity in the future), e.g. the sheer number of people on the MRT, supermarket, road (with constant jams and cars that ignore traffic rule), parks, residential places, condominiums and their facilities, and many more. The only overcrowded places in Singapore that don't induce anger (but causes happiness instead), are places of worships.

Most important I think is that short fuse is a character that can be shed away, and people should be more positive. Most people I have seen prefer to be made angry by useless news, insinuations, gossips, impertinent problems (e.g. problems of other countries), politics, sports (like football fanaticism), and many more. It is their choice that made people what they become. Media that provoke negative feelings are insinuating "news", bad news, hopeless news, nasty blogs, Yahoo commentators input, "alternative news" laced with biased perception and personal opinion to the so-called news, Singapore Stomp, etc. To spend significant amount of time in them is an indication of a PROBLEM. Spending sufficient time on these media is an addictive dose of anger and hatred inducement.


In my opinion, fill yourself with something positive if you can't really help staying away from bad news. If there is an earthquake in Japan that stroke the wrong nerve, look at a bright side and appreciate that nature has its nurturing side. If there is murder in town, appreciate that there is currently someone saving another people's life, e.g. policemen, firemen, surgeons, social workers, humanitarian workers, etc.

Just a thought.