Hello.
What should have been a weekend of celebration ended in tragedy for hundreds.
Heartbreaking pictures and stories have been coming out of South Korea, where Halloween partygoers were killed in crowd crush, and India, where religious revellers died when an overloaded bridge collapsed. The tragic events close a month already marked by another crowd-related disaster – the deadly football stadium stampede in Indonesia.
How did the Seoul crowd crush happen? Social psychology professor John Drury says such incidents are preventable if organisers consider basic crowd psychology. But the poor preparation and response show that, eight years after the Sewol ferry disaster, South Korea still disregards basic safety, says Seoul-based journalist Steven Borowiec.
Meanwhile, the US Federal Reserve has delivered its fourth consecutive 0.75 percentage point interest rate hike in a bid to tame soaring inflation. The rising cost of living has raised political pressures in many countries. As American voters head to the mid-term polls on Nov 8, how they vote sends a signal to the rest of the world, says Yale-NUS College’s Trisha Craig.
Economic uncertainty takes a toll on our mental health. In Singapore, many say they’re feeling burnt out. Career strategist Adrian Choo says we should perhaps consider “having enough” instead of “having it all”.
Some use smoking as a way of coping with life’s stresses. Should vaping be accepted as a cessation aid? Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health’s Yvette van der Eijk says teen vaping is too big a collateral damage.
We hope you enjoy the selection of commentaries this week.
Charlene Tan
Editor, Commentary
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