AWARE Singapore Goes Too Far with Its Survey. Here’s Why.

AWARE Singapore’s Survey on Men’s Attitudes in August made serious claims about men. How well do they hold up?

“From the late-19th century to now, women are experiencing mass feminist liberation. Men have not yet had that moment … Men are stuck with the expectations of a much more patriarchal era.”

That is how AWARE’s executive director Shoon Lim launched its survey findings of 1,084 Singaporean men in August 2026, in partnership with YouGov. “The first step toward liberation from these gender expectations, is to acknowledge the prevalence of unhealthy attitudes that men have toward women and themselves,” she declared.

Consider the numbers AWARE cites:

• More than a third believe men cannot control themselves when sexually aroused.
• 67% believe a woman who flirts “bears at least some responsibility for what ‘follows'”.
• 37% of men “believe men cannot be expected to stop sexual activity if a partner changes her mind”.

By October, AWARE’s campaigning had taken a more confrontational turn. One graphic challenged men with the words: “‘Not all men?’ Prove it.”

Encouraging men to challenge sexual misconduct is commendable. But why should men have to prove themselves innocent of wrongdoing simply because they are male?

And does the survey actually warrant the conclusions AWARE is drawing about Singaporean men? Do its findings establish a problem requiring the “feminist and intersectional” intervention AWARE recommends?

The Questions Don’t Match the Headlines

Credit: AWARE Singapore

The chief weakness is in the wording of the questions. Several allow materially different interpretations, but AWARE treats agreement as evidence of the particular belief it wants to challenge.

Without distinguishing those interpretations, the survey cannot establish how many respondents hold the belief AWARE attributes to them. Consider these statements from the survey:

1.         “A man cannot control himself when sexually aroused.”

Does this mean he cannot stop wanting sex, or that he cannot stop acting on that desire? Desire and conduct are different. The wording does not establish which a respondent means.

The combined figure of over 33% also groups “slightly agree” with “strongly agree”, obscuring how firmly respondents endorsed an already ambiguous statement.

2.         “In a marriage, a man is entitled to sex from his spouse.”

This drew 72% agreement, the highest in the section. But ‘entitled’ could mean anything from “sex is a reasonable expectation within marriage” to “a wife has no right to refuse”.

This statement does not establish whether respondents believe a wife has the right to refuse. Agreement with marital ‘entitlement’ cannot automatically be treated as rejection of that right.

3.         “After a woman consents to sexual activity, a man cannot be expected to stop if she changes her mind.”

One of AWARE’s most troubling findings concerns consent. Asked whether a man can be expected to stop sexual activity if a woman changes her mind, 37% of respondents agreed. This deserves serious attention. A man must respect withdrawn consent, even after intercourse has begun.

But what does that 37% actually represent?

The figure combines 19% who “slightly agree”, 13% who “agree” and 5% who “strongly agree”. Another 9% preferred not to answer. More than half of those counted as agreeing therefore selected the weakest level of agreement.

In footnote 8 on page 6, AWARE itself acknowledges that grouping responses obscures differences in conviction. Its regression models preserve those distinctions; its headline, which implies uniformity among almost 40% of male respondents, does not.

There is also an important ambiguity. Stopping intercourse at the height of arousal can be difficult, but difficulty does not excuse disregarding consent. A respondent might recognise that difficulty, or believe men are entitled to continue. These are morally different positions that the questionnaire does not distinguish between.

Yet AWARE’s press release categorises such responses as “sexually entitled attitudes”. On social media, it goes further, declaring that “Local men in SG hold beliefs that excuse sexual assault”, citing the same 37% finding as evidence.

That is precisely the leap we are questioning. The 37% figure cannot tell us which interpretation respondents had in mind, much less how they would behave in an actual sexual encounter. Before using these findings to justify changes to sexuality education, AWARE needs to establish what attitudes require correction, why they exist and whether its proposed remedies would work.

4.         “If a woman flirts with a man, she is partly to blame if she is harassed.”

This statement on victim-blaming uses the word ‘harassed’. Yet the press release discussion says she bears responsibility “for what ‘follows'”.

The survey uses the already ambiguous harassment, but the release leads the reader to imagine any circumstance that follows. That broadens the claim beyond what respondents were asked.

Do AWARE’s Conclusions Really Follow from the Data?

Problems with AWARE’s questionnaire are only half the story. There is also the question of what AWARE does with the answers.

Throughout its report and public communications, AWARE uses its findings to explain men’s attitudes through feminist theories about patriarchy and masculinity. But do those explanations follow from the evidence? Three problems deserve closer examination.

Credit: AWARE Singapore

1. Are these attitudes uniquely male?

AWARE presents its findings as evidence of troubling attitudes among Singaporean men. On social media, it draws attention to “so many men” holding objectionable views about sexual responsibility and victim-blaming.

But AWARE surveyed only men. Its data cannot establish whether these attitudes are more prevalent among men than women, or whether they reflect beliefs shared more widely across society.

Why is this important? Because AWARE interprets its findings through theories of patriarchal masculinity, suggesting that masculine socialisation helps explain these attitudes. But if comparable numbers of women hold the same beliefs, explanations focused specifically on how men are socialised would require serious reconsideration.

AWARE is entitled to investigate men’s attitudes specifically. But without asking women comparable questions, it cannot establish whether the attitudes it identifies are distinctively masculine.

2. Does wealth make men more patriarchal?

AWARE finds that high-income men were more likely than middle-income men to say wives should shoulder more housework and childcare. It interprets this as supporting feminist theory that men who acquire wealth and power begin adopting patriarchal views. But its data show something much narrower: men in different income groups expressed different household preferences.

The survey did not observe men becoming wealthier and subsequently changing their attitudes. It captured their answers at one point in time.

AWARE has therefore supplied a feminist explanation for an observed association without establishing that the proposed process actually occurred. Other explanations remain unexplored. Higher-income men might work longer hours, have spouses with different employment arrangements, or negotiate household responsibilities differently.

None of these possibilities establishes that their arrangements are fair. But neither does the survey establish that “patriarchal thinking” caused their preferences. AWARE’s preferred explanation, therefore, remains a theory, not a demonstrated finding.

3. Why are the study’s positive findings treated… differently?

AWARE’s own data complicate its bleak portrayal of men. Some 78% believe childcare should be shared equally, 74% say the same of housework, and 70% take pride in providing financially for their families. These findings suggest that most respondents value shared domestic responsibilities alongside their traditional provider role.

Yet AWARE’s press release gives these encouraging results considerably less prominence than its findings about victim-blaming and sexual entitlement. When the positive statistics finally appear, AWARE immediately qualifies them.

“While there is overwhelming egalitarian sentiment, the survey did not explore if this truly occurs within Singaporean households.”

That shifts the goalposts. Of course, men and women alike do not always live up to their values. But that hardly makes those values insincere. It just means that human behaviour doesn’t reflect AWARE’s statistical utopianism.

More revealing, though, is AWARE’s apparent double standard: When men express positive attitudes, AWARE questions whether they actually live by them. But when men express troubling attitudes, AWARE readily treats those answers as evidence of problematic masculinity, without applying comparable caution about whether those beliefs translate into behaviour.

Why the difference? If favourable responses require verification against actual behaviour, unfavourable responses deserve the same scrutiny. Men should receive credit for their professed virtues without being excused for their professed vices.

The Emotional Questions Are Too Broad

Credit: AWARE Singapore

AWARE’s treatment of male emotions raises similar concerns. On social media, it claims that over 70% of men hide emotions such as sadness, fear, anxiety or stress, concluding that men equate masculinity with toughness and suppression.

But its questionnaire measures these things differently. It asks about concealing fear, sadness and stress, while its anxiety question concerns distress from meeting masculine expectations. Combining them into a single claim about emotional suppression obscures what respondents actually reported.

Consider the statement, “I often feel the need to hide emotions like fear.” A father remaining composed before a frightened child might agree, as might a man who feels he has nobody to confide in. The former may reflect healthy self-command; the latter could indicate harmful isolation. Yet both produce the same response.

AWARE also finds an association between emotional suppression and psychological distress. That deserves attention, but correlation does not establish causation. Nor does the survey adequately distinguish emotional restraint from unhealthy repression.

AWARE’s interpretation assumes that concealing emotions reflects problematic masculine expectations. Yet the same behaviour may sometimes reflect maturity, discretion or responsibility. Its framework risks treating an ordinary masculine virtue as evidence of psychological dysfunction.

Its finding that some men avoid discussing feelings because doing so seems weak is concerning. But before prescribing greater emotional expression as the remedy, we need to understand why men feel this way, whether they have trusted confidants, and whether their restraint is deliberate or imposed.

The Jump from Survey Answers to a National Curriculum

The report says the patterns “indicate that current approaches to gender and sexuality education in Singapore do not adequately equip young people”. It then calls on MOE to replace the abstinence focus with a consent-based approach aligned with UNESCO.

But the survey links no answer to what respondents learned—or did not learn—in a classroom. It establishes neither that the current curriculum produced the beliefs AWARE criticises nor that its proposed alternative would change them. AWARE must justify that change, including its likely effects on premarital sexual activity and young people’s physical and psychological wellbeing.

AWARE itself says evidence-based curriculum design “depends on an accurate understanding of how young people learn about sex, relationships, and gender norms”. The organisation must explain what students would be taught, how the lessons would differ from current teaching and what evidence suggests they would change the beliefs surveyed. (For a closer examination of what UNESCO’s comprehensive sexuality education guidance contains, see Regardless’ coverage here.)

AWARE explicitly interprets its findings through feminist and intersectional frameworks. Its explanations repeatedly invoke patriarchal expectations, masculine norms and unequal power relations. But these are explanations that require evidence, not established facts simply because they fit feminist theory. Other influences, including family upbringing, pornography, peer behaviour and individual moral convictions, also deserve investigation.

Why should Singapore’s national sexuality education be redesigned around one ideological interpretation when the survey has not established that it explains the attitudes being measured?

Reading Data at Its Worst

AWARE’s survey has uncovered some genuinely troubling attitudes. But other findings raise questions about what respondents meant, how firmly they held their views, and whether the questionnaire captured the distinctions needed to interpret them fairly.

The greater problem is AWARE’s repeated tendency to interpret ambiguous findings through feminist assumptions, treat those interpretations as explanations of male behaviour, and then recommend changes to Singapore’s national sexuality education. Its survey cannot establish the causal explanations on which those recommendations depend.

Policymakers should distinguish what AWARE has measured from what it has inferred. Until its explanations and recommendations are independently substantiated, this remains ideologically interpreted advocacy research, not a sufficient evidential basis for reshaping national policy.