Singaporean laws are extreme only where they need to be so. The result is significantly cleaner streets, crime-free neighbourhoods from end-to-end, and the such. The laws there are still much tamer than say, Old Testament laws that were derived from the earlier Hammurabi edicts.
If America really used to be as virtuous as you claim and believe, how do you explain the draconian laws that actually had been implemented and executed during its colonial times? A so-called virtuous society surely wouldn’t need heavy laws to tame it down now, would it? And Europe always, Christian or not, had heavy-handed laws as a hallmark of its existence, which later transferred onto the early colonial Americans as well.
For that matter, Australia was once Christian Britain’s continent-sized prison. Are such historical facts to be considered aspects of a supposedly virtuous society?
New York, for most of its early years, used to be a filthy place. It is so even today, only somewhat better than it was in the past. Some of the photos they have of the place from the mid-1800s have raw sewage flooding the city streets. This wasn’t atypical of New York - most American cities used to be like that. Singapore’s laws are “draconian” when it comes to littering, sure, but the result is you are far, far less likely to step on filth over there than you would be, elsewhere. Singapore is a democratic republic, and the people there overwhelmingly support the measures they take to keep their country pristine. Look at how crazy the drug situation has always been in America. Likewise with alcohol.
Ignoring the cultural differences which has lead to these divergent outcomes will do nothing to repair the damage that has trapped American cities in literal squalour and violence. Singapore is without doubt in a better position to lecture others on how to keep cities crime-free and drug-free than any other country, and best of all, they do it with the mandate of the people, and not through heavy-handed authoritarianism as you earlier implied. Even in the realm of running a business, Singapore certainly enjoys greater freedoms than America. To have done it all by what’s little more than a “pagan” Buddhist society, credit must be given where it’s due.
If it is British “Christianity” that got them these fruits, for Singapore to have done so without actually being Christian nullifies the claim that only Christianity produces such outcomes, and that was the point I had mentioned as the logical derivative of your implication earlier that Singapore is so-and-so because of the ‘Christian’ British. Singapore, in reality, is what it is because of its wisdom in taking the best out of others’ experience and implementing them on home soil.
Virtuous people—are never perfect. The Founders stated that if all men were angels then there is no need for government. Duh! But we had the most free and least government intrusion of all large societies in the history of the world....it is not even close...and we were extremely successful—especially when everyone was allowed gun ownership and we had a government with Just Laws. We were profoundly Christian. 20th century has led to repressive gun laws (unconstitutional) and private property confiscation which is unconstitutional. Socialism is now dominant with the destruction of Christian Ethics being forced by laws and welfare. As Mark Levine said we are a Post Constitutional Republic.
Singapore never had such freedom. That is the point. They have to have strict laws because personal virtue doesn’t exist. They need to be controlled by an oppressive government.
Our Founders believed in freedom and autonomy—guns and responsibility. Responsibility and individualism comes directly from Christianity which gave dignity to all people including children and women. (True Christianity’s goal.)
In other words, the Founders said that they did not want a nanny government. They did not want “masters” so that the people become slaves. We the People were sovereign. It was unprecedented—that concept which came only because of Christianity and The Age of Reason. The two converged before Atheism/Marxism took hold of Europe in the late 19th century and created Nazism/Fascism/Communism which forced out Christianity or perverted it to mean the opposite-—like what they are doing now in America—with homosexual “marriage” and “gun laws” and welfare (forced “charity”).