"Salad Bar" Radicalisation in Singapore and Beyond
By Anna Toso | 20 October 2025
Summary
A 14-year-old Singaporean received a restriction order due to radicalisation based on a mixed “salad bar” set of multiple ideologies, a first time in Singapore, but a rising trend globally.
Violent extremism is becoming increasingly ideologically fluid, digital, and globalised, posing novel challenges to fragmented and outdated counterterrorism practices globally.
The responses to these new forms of violent extremism are unlikely to achieve international cooperation in the immediate future, but rather prompt diverse national responses, such as the tightening of media freedom in Singapore.
Context of Singapore
On 9 September 2025, a 14-year-old Singaporean student received a restriction order due to extremist behaviours under Singapore’s Internal Security Act (ISA), a legislation applied since 1963 and revised in 2020. Since late 2023, the youth had self-radicalised, espousing a “salad bar of ideologies” with one common trait – violence. The 14-year-old pledged allegiance to ISIS, supported Al-Qaeda, anti-semitism and far-right nationalist ideologies, while also embracing far-left concepts, such as anti-Zionism and anti-capitalism. The Singaporean student interacted online with foreign extremists and endorsed the idea of conducting violent attacks, although he had not made tangible plans. Additionally, he identified as an “involuntary celibate” (Incel). Incels are usually men who develop hatred towards women and society because they are unable to find a romantic or sexual partner. This extremist circle falls within the broader “manosphere” movement, a collection of online communities advocating for masculinity and misogyny.
Implications in Singapore
This instance represents the first case of mixed ideologies self-radicalisation under Singapore’s ISA. However, it is part of an increasing number of youth investigated for extremist behaviours in the country: of 17 young individuals since 2015, 12 have been investigated in the last five years. Historically, Singapore’s dominant party, the People’s Action Party (PAP), ruling uninterrupted since 1959, has established a monopoly within the country’s ideological space. These recent instances of young radicalised individuals through online platforms highlight new challenges associated with the rise in Internet and social media usage. This trend contributed to justifying the PAP-led government’s tightening of regulations for online platforms. These restrictive countermeasures not only control extremist content but also censor ordinary users, negatively impacting Singapore’s press freedom. Specifically, the 2019 Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA) authorises the government to curtail the constitutional freedom of expression for reasons of public order. POFMA has been used to legally prosecute several opposition members and intimidate or silence independent media. Moreover, the 2021 Foreign Interference Countermeasures Act (FICA) allows the government to restrict online content arbitrarily on suspicion of relations between politically relevant individuals with foreign entities.
International Context
Beyond domestic developments, the Singaporean case mirrors a global trend of increasingly fluid extremist ideologies. Examples of “salad bar” radicalisation have been reported in multiple countries, such as the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. These forms of “mixed, unclear, and unstable” (MUU), also known as “conflicted” or “fringe,” ideologies lead to violent radicalisation that eschews the conventional boundaries. Rather, individuals develop shallow adherence to multiple cherry-picked, possibly contradictory, beliefs. MUU extremism can include a blend of religious extremism, such as militant Islamism, far-right nationalism and neo-Nazism, anti-government sentiments, disinformation, conspiracy theories, such as QAnon and anti-globalism, and loose online communities, such as Incel. Individual-level radicalisation pathways are fluid, heterogeneous, and often unpredictable. Thus, existing counterterrorism frameworks and fragmented national approaches are becoming insufficient and unfit to detect and counter these new forms of extremism, with hybrid, globalised, digital dimensions. In contrast, international counter-terrorism frameworks have mostly developed based on Islamist, offline, and organisation-led violent extremism.
International Implications
In this context, the strategies of terrorist organisations are also changing at a fast pace, increasingly relying on Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) tools to produce online content for propaganda and recruitment. With GenAI, extremist groups efficiently reach large audiences at low costs and in anonymity. The Internet, social media, and online gaming platforms are employed to radicalise, inspire, and promote violence. Statistically, the youth rely on social media and online gaming more than other age categories. For instance, in Singapore, the 18-39 age group has the highest internet usage rate. Thus, their significant exposure to the net’s eco chamber interplays with heightened psychological vulnerability to ideological manipulation due to their young age. These risks surge in fragile states and conflict zones. There, youth are exposed to hybrid radicalisation strategies of extremist groups, who capitalise on their sense of disenfranchisement, economic hardships, and lack of education. Firstly, these organisations promise security and empowerment through narratives spread online. Later, the gained loyalty morphs into active mobilisation. Created with GenAI tools, deepfakes and customised radicalisation narratives are tailored to appeal to vulnerable demographics through microprofiling and microtargeting. Recommending analogous content, the “algorithmic amplifiers” of social media enable individuals’ exposure to a mix of different extremisms, causing “salad bar” radicalisation.
Such ideological hybridisation goes hand in hand with the phenomenon of cognitive warfare. Beyond non-state actors, statal entities also employ targeted propaganda and disinformation to deceive targeted groups, degrading public opinion’s rationality and trust in information sources. Most notably, Russia and China widely implemented these tactics with respect to the war in Ukraine and the extension of influence over Taiwan.
Voice of America/Wikimedia Commons
Forecast
Medium-term (3-12 months)
The PAP government in Singapore is highly likely to strengthen its crackdown on media freedom, employing tangible cases of radicalisation as evidence to justify increasingly restrictive measures.
Long-term (>1 year)
Since POFMA and FICA also represent tools to silence opposition and critical voices against the PAP, the application of these legislative acts and restrictions will likely intensify closer to Singapore’s next general elections in 2030.
The surge in the number of cases of hybridised and cross-ideological violent extremism is a realistic possibility worldwide in the upcoming years, especially among the youth.
The multi-stakeholder cooperation required to reform international counter-terrorism norms is unlikely to be achieved in the near future, also due to its intersection with the functioning of social media algorithms and the legitimacy issue of restricting content shared on the platforms.
