Political parties are supposed to nominate candidates who radiate hope and embody change, but that is not the case in the Taipei mayoral election.
When former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmaker Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) finally secured the party’s nomination in May after four failed attempts since 1994, he positioned himself as the candidate who knows Taipei best.
He can recite statistic after statistic to show Taipei voters how there is more room for improvement, but his down-to-earth approach lacks aggressiveness, which many believe is what makes him less likely to stand out in the nation’s fast-paced capital.
However, he had distanced himself somewhat from the negative stereotypes that many people usually attach to KMT candidates.
That was until Ting revealed a tendency to make generalizations about people and discriminate against certain groups based on stereotypes.
Speaking at a news conference on Monday, Ting laid out six traits that he said increase the likelihood of a person becoming a murderer or a child abuser: being male, unmarried, unemployed, living alone, lacking an intimate partner and having poor relationships.
He said that if the government wants to crack down on gruesome crimes, of which the nation has seen too many, the authorities should subject people who fit the profile — who he called “ticking time bombs” — to preventive supervision.
When you go through police records, abusers and murderers might share one or two of the traits, but correlation does not imply causation.
Such rhetoric only sows fear and distrust among people, while reinforcing the long-standing social stigma that single people already have to deal with.
The mindset behind Ting’s comments is responsible for rampant discrimination at schools against children of single parents, who are often labeled as “more prone to developing psychological problems” and shunned by some classmates as a result.
Fear-based discrimination should be avoided at all cost, especially by public figures, whose words carry more weight, because it is a dangerous catalyst for bias and mistreatment of people.
Then there is Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Pasuya Yao (姚文智). Yao has almost no support among younger voters, an unthinkable phenomenon for a DPP candidate, given that young people to lean toward the pan-green camp.
Some people have attributed the phenomenon to Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je’s (柯文哲) perceived unshakable popularity among younger voters — some of them have even been voluntarily defending Ko, and quite vehemently, in the online arena — but Yao’s behavior shows that he might have himself to blame.
In an apparent attempt to appeal to animal lovers, Yao late last month made a public appearance with his cat, Togi.
Unfortunately, what was initially designed to boost his popularity ended up being a publicity disaster after netizens questioned the way he held the cat and said that his affection was staged.
Yao’s pledge to quit politics if he loses the race might be another reason that he has been struggling.
Such a pledge might have been common among politicians in the early 2000s, but so few honored their words that such a vow has become synonymous with empty slogans. Also, Yao resorting to an outdated campaign tactic hardly presents a youthful image.
This might explain why he has had such a difficult time striking a chord with young people.
It might be too late for the KMT and DPP candidates to revamp their images with a little over three months to go to the Nov. 24 election, but it would not hurt to try — if they are thinking long-term.
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