SDU's role as Cupid comes to an end

In today's ST:

SDU's role as Cupid comes to an end

Govt matchmaker to hand reins to private agencies; it will accredit them

TWENTY two years, 42,400 successfully hitched singles - and a heap of scorn and bad jokes along the way.

Now, the Government's Cupid for graduate singles, the Social Development Unit (SDU), is hanging up its quiver and leaving matchmaking to the private sector.

It will not, however, quit the scene totally.

In an about-face from its early days - when the mere mention of it elicited a nudge and a wink, and when wags said its acronym stood for Single, Desperate and Ugly - the SDU brand now has cachet.

So its new focus will be on giving its stamp of approval to dating agencies and professional matchmakers, and on funding private-sector agencies and projects which promote dating.

The change in direction is perhaps a result of the national icon's acknowledgement that it has been unable to shake off its image as a state-controlled dating agency, and that private businesses will be better at helping the nation's singles pair up.

Yesterday, Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports, under which SDU falls, said: 'We believe that the private sector is more creative and innovative. We hope it will play a bigger role in organising social interaction activities and offering dating services for singles.'

While SDU and its sister Social Development Service (SDS) for non-graduates had done well, 'there will always be singles who prefer a private set-up', she added. For the SDS, specially selected grassroots leaders will be appointed to take over the organisation of matchmaking activities.

Hahaha! Guess what! This news confirms what we all knew all along: the government cannot make it when it comes to match make couples!!!

This is an explicit admission that the govt's social engineering policies and attempts at getting Singaporeans to make love have been a failure.

Well, I'm glad I threw away all those SDU packets that they've annoyingly sent into my mailbox for the past couple of years... I don't need you stupid govt to tell me to date and to find a mate.

Expect to see more failed government initiatives being outsourced to the private sector. Why? Because the government cannot make it when it comes to things like this! Social engineering is a deluded policy set up by LKY and that is bound to fail, because the forces of nature are more powerful than any state administrator.

Seriously, isn't this obvious?

'there will always be singles who prefer a private set-up'

Anybody who has ever had any date knows that they don't like to have Daddy and Mummy watching over their shoulder. Except perhaps Lee Hsien Loong who has had Daddy to tell him who to date and who not to date - he and his wife Ho Ching are the ultimate engineered couple. But they don't seem very lovey dovey do they?

Well, most Singaporeans are not like him and are able to make their own decisions when it comes to choosing a mate. And I think they're a lot more romantic in their approach to love than the Lee family 'marry a woman who's more capable than you' utilitarian-logic approach.

Singapore does not need the Lee philosophy to dating. And this move by SDU proves it!