After reading and re-reading the new general studies worksheet that went viral, I came to the conclusion that the "racial harmony" chapter is no sillier than any other chapter in the textbook. Or any other element of the curriculum for that matter. I for one would not take it seriously. In fact nobody but primary school students should be reading it and that is precisely why there is no need for suspicious adults to read anything Machiavellian into a child's world.

In the controversial exercise, Primary Three pupils are asked to complete word bubbles for five cartoon figures. A bubble next to a white man carried the words "I am [blank]. I am an English teacher", while the text next to a woman with darker skin reads, "I am [blank]. I am a domestic helper in Hong Kong". Choices for the blanks include British, Filipino, Indian, Japanese, Chinese and Korean.

Some people find the exercise discriminatory and offensive. If anything, the exercise shows that the fill-in-the-blanks format has remained the same since I last encountered it two decades ago. Students are given six choices, must choose the appropriate response to fill the five blanks, and they must match the choices with the blanks as best as they can using all the cues available.

Returning to the "racial harmony" exercise, the statement that "I am Chinese. Shanghai is my home town" is a correct answer in the context of the exercise, but it certainly does not suggest Shanghai is the home town of all Chinese. The context also suggests "I am Indian. I study at an international school" to be the best match, not only because the associated cartoon figure looks, on the balance of probabilities, like an Indian, but also because other available choices correspond better to other blanks.

For adults the real issue here is beyond pedagogy. Race and ethnic relations exist not on paper, but in society. We could conjure up a textbook image of perfect harmony and equality between the races, but that would be a gross misrepresentation of reality.

A Filipina working in Hong Kong is more likely than not a domestic worker. This is a fact. It does not make the situation any less embarrassing to say that Filipinas account for only half the population of Hong Kong's domestic helpers, and the other half are Indonesians; or that Filipinos also work locally as drivers or club singers; or that a number of them work in high finance.

The North-South divide is not a stereotype; it is inequality in its most concrete form. There are many cases where a Filipina worked here her whole life, only to send her daughter here again as a maid. This cross-border inequality is transmitted from generation to generation as a result of not only global inequality between countries, but also local laws and regulations governing the employment of domestic workers.

Filipinos usually hold low-end jobs in Hong Kong not because the invisible hand of the market decides their talents are best suited to such jobs, but as a result of our government's agreements with a number of Asian governments, which secure imported labor at less than minimum wages. Unlike the textbook, this is real discrimination, and it is institutional.

From direct interactions with them, I am fully aware that educated Filipinos are as sophisticated and capable as people of any nationality. This fact makes it even more unfair that our laws prevent them from competing with others on a level playing field and work here as, for example, English teachers.

The stark reality is that Filipino domestic helpers would have been able to move on to better jobs in Hong Kong had we granted them the right to permanent residence after seven years, thereby granting them the same privileges as we offer other foreign workers. But according to our law, foreign domestic workers are deemed not ordinary resident in Hong Kong, and therefore ineligible for consideration as permanent residents no matter how long they have worked here.

It is always easy to pick on a textbook publisher. Such cheap shots convey a sense of moral superiority. To me, a textbook that portrays relationships between the races as being equal will be far more disturbing and offensive. Give me an example of a British citizen working here as domestic worker for a Filipino, and I will swallow the paper upon which this article is published.

The author is a current affairs commentator.

(HK Edition 06/23/2014 page9)