Not too long ago, the government has passed the decision to build in integrated resort (IR) in Singapore, based on the reasons that tourism is on the decline and Singapore's only way to survive in the globalised economy is through tourism. This is because Singapore does not have the advantage of manpower like China does, nor the resources that Indonesia has due to Singapore's infertile soil, leaving Singapore with the sole tourism resource. However, I oppose to this decision to build an IR.

I feel that the Integrated Resort would result in as much problems as a casino would do. In the IR, the government has stressed that the integrated resort should not be stereotyped as a casino, but rather like Genting Highlands, or an NTUC resort, except with the presence of a casino which could occupy a small percentage of the area. However, 'Integrated Resort' is just another flowery and fluffy name for the word casino. Even though the casino would occupy a small area, it would not minimize the impact of the casino based on its physical state by occupying a relatively small area. People have the ability to head towards the casino and not towards the other attractions, even if the casino is very small. It is illogical to reason that people would head towards the theme park over the casino if the theme park occupies the majority of the land area than the casino. If the minds of these people are conditioned to gamble and win big money, they would automatically head to the casino regardless. Therefore, a small area does not equate to less impact, neither does a large area increase the popularity of a place. If a large area solely leads to increased popularity, all stores would rent the largest store area possible to maximise its popularity. But in reality, this is not seen.

Referring to the casino as small and thus minimizing its problems also indirectly means that its problems would be of less importance. However, this is not parallel to the political ideology of the Singapore society. The governing philosophy of Singapore is democracy and not utilitarianism. Consider an slum estate in a society where everyone in that estate lives in poverty and many social problems arise such as theft and murder. Although this estate is very small and makes up to less than 1% of the total land area, does that mean we can neglect this estate and let the problems continue to worsen without intervention? If we were to turn a blind eye to this estate, it would be utilitarian since we are merely maximising the happiness of the majority in teh society by focusing on their needs rather than the critical and pressing problems in this estate. Similarly, the problems that the casino causes may only affect a small number of habitual gamblers, but the Singapore society which strays far from utilitarianism, should place these of higher priority even though it affects a small percentage of Singapore citizens. Therefore, I oppose to the government's rationale of minimizing the casino size in order to minimize problems because these two entities are utterly unrelated.

Some stalwart supporters of the integrated resort would argue that integrated resorts are a neccesary evil, because it is the best way to maintain Singapore's competitiveness in the globalised world and its benefits outweigh the social impacts of such a decision. They opine that in the financial crisis that the world is experiencing now, building integrated resorts can increase availbility of jobs and thus minimize the percentage of jobless people. Generating massive revenues from the casino can in turn benefit the majority of Singaporeans too. However, this argument is again sinking into the depths of utilitarianism once again. While more jobs are available and this benefits a number of freshmen who just entered into the workforce, we are neglecting the needs of a small number of people whose family members are habitual gamblers. The problems in these families would take a dive for the worse when the IR opens but this issue has not been a concern for the Parliament at all. Is casino the only solution to the current economic crisis? To me, it is not the best solution, since there are still a number of drawbacks to it. As an elaboration to the social impacts of casinoes, they include an increased crime rate and suffering of family members of habitual gamblers.

Due to gambling being a game of chance, some gambling addicts would go into the casino hoping to earn big money. The sense of greed is so strong that these gamblers would crave for more and more cash when they already win gambles. In this group of people, 10 out of 10 people walk out of the casino owing loan sharks an immense amount of cash. To make up for this loss, they go into the casino once again, yearning for a strike to pay back the loan. Instead they owe even more money. Loan sharks, in retaliation, would commit crimes to harass the victim. These include examples like spraying paint over their homes, physically harming the victim to intimidate him such that he would return the money on time, or even kidnapping the victim's child for ransom as payback! Crimes rates would increase as a result, compromising the security of the country. The implications of this is intricate. Just to name a few, investors would think twice before investing into Singapore and foreign talents would leave Singapore since it is unsafe to live in such an unstable country. To counter this problem, the government could step up measures such that it ahieves 'prevention over cure'. Right now, only people who have proof that they are financially secure are allowed entry. Even so, these people are banned access to ATM machines. Nevertheless, there is still a threat because these people may head to the nearest ATM machine or even bring in lots of cash into the casino. Hence, we could step up measures such as imposing restrictions on the amount they can gamble per month. This can allow for a fixed amount of cash that can be gambled thus shielding the gambler from debt.

Family members of gamble addicts would be affected too. Family members can be affected in 2 ways. Firstly, when parents gamble, children are disadvantaged. Parents who are gamble addicts would drain their money in the casino, in turn depriving their chidren of their basic needs such as education and even enough pocket money to buy food and drinks. Such children would be disdvantaged in the competitive society since they lack a good education thus undermining their potential to succeed in the globalised society. Simultaneouly, parents who are gamble addicts spend more time in the casino than at home. Even if they are at home, the children would continue to be neglected as their parents are mourning over their losses at the casino and the prospects of being harassed by the loan sharks. These children tend to grow up abnormally in terms of emotion and they would be at the losing end in years to come. Besides, when their friends know if their situation, they would be a stigma at school. Competitive parents would instruct their child to stray away from these children for fear that their children would be disadvantaged in any way. As such, children of gamble addicts would feel neglected. Secondly, when adults gamble, their aged parents who depend on them for wonderful golden years would be deprived of such opportunity. When all the money has been lost in the casino, these adults would not chip in any money for their parents basic expenses. These aged parents would then reenter the workforce, but with their weak and frail bodies, they would suffer in the workforce and shorten their life span as a result; with their obselete skills in the knowledge based economy, they would not stand a good chance to find a better-paying job, taking the roles of cleaners, sweepers or construction workers. The method to counter this is to educate the young generations of harmful drawbacks of entering the casino. This achieve a double-pronged effect. The most direct and short term impact is when children persuade their parents to stop gambling by reminding them of the dire consequences of gambling habitually. The indirect and long term impact is when these younger generation grow up to be strong in their resistance towards the devil of gambling and truly minimizing social problems in the generations to come, since less people gamble.

In conclusion, crimes rates would not fall if the casino is built over a small area, since they are separate ideas and entities. This would lead to social problems such as an increased crime rate which would backfire on Singapore in the long run instead of benefitting the country, and family members suffering as a result. Prevention is better than cure, hence educating the younger generation and to augment restrictions on the criteria for entry would help to prevent such problems from arising so we do not need to solve them in the first place. Moreover, such measures would truly minimize the crime rate, rather than minimizing casino area.