In a recent poll, 71% of Singaporeans rated Artists as non-essential services. This triggered a large majority of folks on social media and there was much gnashing of teeth. Interestingly, we are not seeing the same amount of unhappiness from telemarketers, social media specialists and business consultants. For a start, let me just say that my job as an investment trainer is also a non-essential one. I can sense where the unhappiness comes from, and it is not targetted at artists per se, I think we have been discounting social scientists, humanities scholars and performance artists for the past 50 years. Folks who identify with the Arts go through the process in Sec 3 where the so-called "smarter kids" get shunted into the science stream, leaving the rest for the horrifically named Sub-Science and Arts streams. Then on Chinese New Year, they have to keep defending their career and academic decisions from nosy relatives....