Moral Myopia: The Source Of All Bigotry

July 6, 2015

by Grimwald

There have been many ideas and accusations being thrown around because of the word “bigotry”. In my latest article about my stance on gay marriage, there have been a disappointing number of commenters who not only failed to understand what was being said, but also failed to even think about what was being said. It has occurred to me that the problem with many issues about discrimination is the simple notion of “moral myopia”. Also of note, this isn’t just about the issue of the LGBT community and same-sex marriage, either. This includes many aspects of society of the Philippines and beyond. So just what is moral myopia?

Well, to put it simply, it’s the idea that when something bad happens to you, it’s bad, but when it happens to someone else, it is not only good, it is to be desired. So really, we like to talk about equality and fairness but there are still so many of us who are probably firmly locked in a morally myopic mindset. We like to shout “bully” and “bigot” to others when the same accusation can be easily leveled at us. See, the problem with a lot of people today isn’t a lack of intelligence or sympathy, but a lack of empathy.

So what is empathy?

Empathy is just putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. It’s like you seeing someone and asking yourself: “What if that was me?” It’s different from sympathy in that it’s not about pitying the other person. It’s essentially just thinking how you would actually feel or react when something that happens to someone else happens to you.

Well, being a nursing graduate, I can tell you that empathy is very important, not just for hospital staff but for people everywhere. The central core of empathy is the Golden Rule that just about every religion (and non-religion for that matter) espouses. “Don’t do to others what you don’t want others to do to you.” That’s mostly what it’s about.

What is even more painful is that moral myopia is all too often the most common cause of many problems in the Philippines. We get mad when we are ostracized or made fun of but we tend to do the same thing to others. We like to accuse others of racism when we ourselves tend to be fond of ridiculing people who have dark skin or do not conform to our standards of beauty. We like to point fingers at people who don’t agree with us and call them “bigots” when we ourselves are being bigots and bullies by forcing our ideas unto them.

We like to go on and on about personal freedom, tolerance and acceptance yet we deny this to others. What’s more painful is that while some of us might talk about promoting equality, we never really apply it in the way we see others. Many of us want to put an end to the hate yet they too hate others nonetheless and with a passion too. We make hate speeches at others but when similar speeches are aimed at us, we scream: “Discrimination!”

Listen people, if you don’t want to agree with my opinions, that’s fine with me. You’re welcome to your own opinion. Please don’t get it in your heads that everything you say or do is right.

Philippine society is living off unearned pride bought with false achievement

July 6, 2015

by benign0

Groupthink for the sake of “stability”? That might work if you are a Germany or Japan — or even a China or South Korea. But this is the Philippines. Filipinos got groupthink all wrong. Whereas the other successful collectivist societies groupthought their way to scientific, technical, and economic achievement, the Philippines degenerated into a sad orgy of obsessive mutual assurance that their delusions of greatness reflected reality.

Thus, people who insist that agreeing to get on a partisan bandwagon for the sake of creating some sort of perception that Philippine society is “stable” and that its politics is one that fosters “unity” are nuts. Investors don’t kiss just because the lipstick is glossy red (or classily matte-finished). They take a peek under the hood before they buy dinner for two. Only fools fall for the come on of loud empty promises and primary-coloured one-coat paint jobs. Those are the types who raise the bonnet too late to discover the reconditioned diesel engine clanking away underneath leaking buckets of oil.

The trouble with the Philippines is its fatal embrace of civilised history’s worst sort of thinking — unearned pride bought with false achievement. This is a society suffering from a virtually-intractable condition. Despite the latest social media technology at their disposal, Filipinos have failed to mount enough intelligent challenge against that thinking. Worse, the cancer of celebrity culture had hijacked the minds of even the most educated members of Philippine society. It does not help that Filipinos routinely confuse showbiz creds with thinking chops. Most baffling of all, they also confuse education creds with wisdom creds.

This describes the dangerous situation Filipinos find themselves in. An abject inability to produce original thought and innovative ideas leads to a habitual latching on to comfy symbols and notions. Indeed, the idea that elections are always about “good versus evil”, for example, has stuck in the minds of Filipinos since the early 1980s so much so that this false dichotomy has become entrenched as the core of Philippine society’s bipolar mental condition. When the national political “debate” has degenerated to this stone-age level of reasoning, there is no room to enrich the political discourse any further — which is why empty administrations devoid of clear vision and direction routinely follow Philippine presidential elections nowadays.

In that empty culture, people who beg us to simply get along with one another just as emptily cry out.

Groupthink surrounding a fatal kernel of infantile reasoning has doomed the Philippines even as groupthink around a rich core of innovative reasoning has turned other societies into high-achieving collectives. On that bit of historical insight, Filipinos once saw democracy and the freedom to “debate” as their salvation — a means to break the monopoly of centuries-old inbred ideas that infest their society. Alas, rather than come out enlightened by a flood of new notions, Filipinos merely came out even more confused. Open debate, free inquiry, secularism, critical thinking, even gay marriage are notions that routinely paralyse Filipino minds today. No surprise there considering that this same paralysis has all but created the perverted form of democracy Filipinos practice today.

In the same way, simply opening up an economy that failed to prosper on the back of domestic industry will only further crush its industrial spirit, so too will giving “freedom” to a society that failed to prosper under the more traditional authoritarianism that’s been tested over millenia. The cultural cores of Japan, South Korea, and Western Europe were shaped by many centuries of absolute rule before they became the “open” societies that they are today. They succeeded under one system then transformed into another to continue that track record of success.

The Philippines, on the other hand, embraced “freedom” and “democracy” jumping off a Zero track record of greatness forged under more traditional pre-democratic approaches to governance that are no longer politically-correct today. Much the same way, it embraced economic “globalisation” after failing to develop a robust and indigenous capability to create and grow domestic capital. Both cases are cases in point of the results of the classic folly of building a house on a sand dune. Freedom without discipline and an abundance of options without imagination are poor foundations for a productive adulthood — which is why the Philippines, despite being an independent country since 1946, remains the same stunted adolescent society toddling along wailing about its victimhood while the adults towering above it discuss the nuances of their technological future. It is because Filipinos lack both essential ingredients — discipline and imagination.

When you cannot apply a bit of restraint in the face of desire and habitually fail to conceptualise a better future despite your wretched state, you end up leading a life of repeatedly entering into commitments you are inherently incapable of honouring. In short, the Philippines is a vast embodiment of the classic poverty equation. Filipinos need to abandon that comfy equation and start adopting the still mysterious wealth equation that transformed other societies into the great ones Filipinos can only longingly look to with pained admiration.

Critical thinking can save the Philippines

July 4, 2015

by Ilda

University of the Philippines (UP) Professor Gerry Lanuza recently caused an uproar on social media when he was accused of attacking UP summa cum laude biology graduate Tiffany Uy on his Facebook post as being merely a “puppy of her parents” after she was lauded for achieving the highest weighted grade average obtained in the school’s history since World II with her score 1.004.

UP Professor Gerry Lanuza is upset over Filipinos’ obsession with grades.

After receiving his share of bashings from Netizens who thought he was suffering from a bad case of tall poppy syndrome, Lanuza has since clarified in a full article that his short Facebook post was not intended to put down or mock Uy’s achievements but rather, to raise what he thought was a concern – Philippine society’s obsession with grades and credentials.

While the timing of Lanuza’s Facebook post was quite suspect (he didn’t state the “real” intention of his post immediately after Uy’s defenders started posting their outrage) and a hint of arrogance can also be detected in his tone (he was unapologetic for causing useless anxiety – stating “it is not his problem”), we can’t ignore the fact that he has a point about the way some parents are pushing their kids, sometimes over the edge, just to get the perfect score or grade at school. To be fair, it’s not just a phenomenon unique to Filipinos. Asian parents in general have been known to push their kids too hard just to excel at school.

The problem is, it seems despite the number of students who excel with their grades in Philippine schools, we have yet to find a Filipino student who can inspire innovation or defy conventional wisdom in Philippine society. As I have pointed out in my previous articles in the past, despite the many brilliant students produced each year by Philippine universities, the country has yet to produce someone who can inspire “greatness”.

Where can we find the great Filipino inventor? Where is our own Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg? Where is the next Jose Rizal who is going to wake the majority of Filipinos from their long stupor? They are not in the Philippines because the society does not encourage individuals to stand out from the crowd and be unique. Everyone has to put their head down lest they get ostracized for being too “different” or in the local vernacular “walang pakisama”.

UP professor Lanuza forgot to mention that Philippine society also discourages individuals from expressing their dissenting opinion. I know this because I get accused of being a “paid hack” for criticizing Filipino politicians. It would be hard to find a teacher or professor who doesn’t limit freedom of expression in the class. As a matter of fact, students are taught to show deference to older people or people who are in authority and that can include the teachers or professors. Young kids are discouraged from questioning authority. This is precisely the reason why timid behavior is especially prevalent in Philippine society. This is also the reason why a lot of Filipinos are too sensitive to criticism and people who have differing opinions.

The Philippines’ premiere state university may be failing to produce innovative thinkers.

Filipinos’ obsession with grades and credentials is an issue that I have encountered as a political blogger so many times while engaging in discussions with people who cannot take my opinion seriously because they are what I call “credentialists” – people who tend to focus more on the person and not what the person is saying.

Lanuza prides himself in how he encourages his students to “protest, dissent and criticize” Philippine society. He wants the students to ask the hard questions. However, as his profile on social media seems to reveal, he has his own set of beliefs that have been known to produce sheep behavior. Lanuza is a proud communist. That’s quite ironic considering he is desperately trying to encourage his students to break out of the mold and to be different. This contradiction was evident in what he wrote, “Why do our schools foster fierce competition? Why define our schools as jungles rather than as crucibles for creating cooperation and collective solidarity?” He should realize that competition is part of the process of producing innovative and unique individuals. Without it, individuals will lack the motivation to strive harder to succeed.

Lanuza’s concern about parents dictating what course their children should take in university is valid, indeed. There must be hundreds of parents who forced their children to take up nursing just because it is in “demand”. At least it used to be. The parents should realize that even if their kids pass the marks or get good grades, if their kids are not passionate about their jobs, they will not be good employees and will not excel in their work. Worse, they will be unhappy with their lives.

My conclusion is, Lanuza and many others like him do not really understand that in the Philippines, students are told what to think and not how to think. He should not be surprised that the use of critical thinking is not so common in the country. Unfortunately, the issue he raised flew over most people’s head because of his approach – it was too authoritative. I do hope he will welcome this criticism.

The Philippines is an idiocracy, not a democracy: Happy Independence Day!

July 3, 2015

by benign0

What?? Good-versus-evil again?? Is this the only way Filipinos will ever regard their elections?

It’s no wonder then that the Philippines never gets anywhere. There is no roadmap forward. It’s always just a “fight” of some sort where the “winner” is seen to be continuing a struggle against an imaginary “tyrant” still lurking in the shadows ready to pounce on the Philippines’ hapless “democracy”. In a sense there are no “winners” in Philippine politics of the sort that Filipinos can look to for a plan on how to tackle the future.

The Philippines’ political “debate” remains the same tired old lump of noise consisting of the shrill chatter of girly indignation over politicians’ bad behaviour and the same old melodramatic appeal to populist sentimentality. There are no realplatforms that articulate a structured and systematic approach to transforming the Philippines from a society forever chasing its tail to one squarely on a trajectory to enlightenment and progress.

No, not now in particular. Whereas there used to at least be some pretense of looking out prospectively to the horizon in previous elections, today the notion of what happens from 2016 to 2022 under the watch of whoever wins in the coming elections is notably absent from the conversation.

It is a vast failure of imagination on a national scale.

Filipinos seem to have lost the ability to imagine the future. It is easy to blame this sad condition on the quality of the politicians vying for that lucrative seat in Malacanang in 2016. The bar for what it means to be a good Philippine president has been set so low that it is now a contest between an alleged crook and an inept administrator. Any hope of a fine statesman and leader to whom ordinary folk could look up to and feel inspired and motivated has dried up.

But, really, Filipino politicians merely reflect the character of the people that created them. The discussion around the appalling political cast of characters today is so devoid of inspiring ideas about a better Philippines tomorrow that it is easy to compare Philippine politics with the decline of Philippine cinema and television. It is one thing to be fed the same plot year in and year out. But it is another to behold a people who are happy to lap up progressively inferior productions.

Is the answer to curing Philippine politics of its abject retardation a simple matter of getting the nation’s thought leaders to “focus more on platforms than on personalities”? Of course it is. It’s so easy — easy said than done, that is. We tried that back in the 2009 to 2010 campaign. Platform plez. The idea there was that if we took stock of the ideas that each of the presidential candidates stood for and laid these out in such a way that one can easily compare the substanceof each candidate, we’d be armed with a great tool to apply intelligence to deciding who to vote for.

Alas, the lesson coming out of that exercise is quite clear. Filipinos will not change the way they think simply because someone tells them to do so. Indeed, they will not think at all even when they are served ample opportunity and material to do so. Despite the ubiquity of 21st Century social media technology permeating Philippine society today, the quality and substance of the political debate has not improved. It is still the same trash talk, the same focus on irrelevancies and championing of all the wrong arguments.

If only Filipinos can step back from the fray and outside of the tiny square that frames their thinking and appreciate the utter perversion that is today’s “democracy” in their country. Nakakahiya sa mga kano.

Happy Independence Day, the real one: 4th of July 1946.

The Binay Debacle: Another Pathetic Attempt at Public Sympathy

July 2, 2015

by Grimwald

“If you have to look along the shaft of an arrow from the wrong end, if a man has you entirely at his mercy, then hope like hell that man is an evil man. Because the evil like power, power over people, and they want to see you in fear. They want you to know you’re going to die. So they’ll talk. They’ll gloat. They’ll watch you squirm. They’ll put off the moment of murder like another man will put off a good cigar. So hope like hell your captor is an evil man. A good man will kill you with hardly a word.”

~Men at Arms, on Carrot Ironfoundersson

When I was a kid, one of the things I noticed wrong with common Pinoy action flicks was that their plots and dialogue weren’t at all that different from the kind of thing you’d find in a Saturday-morning cartoon aimed at younger audiences. One of the things you’d see in just about all of them was that somewhere during a heated firefight with fully automatic weapons blazing away, the hero and villain would actually stop to talk to one another. As in stop, both at the same time like lovers speaking sweetly to each other. They would then deliver a series of cheesy and cliched lines to one another with the formula usually following the sequence of the hero asking for the villain’s motives, the villain gloating to the hero and, finally, the hero swearing at the villain on how evil the latter is.

Philippine politics, as it turns out, isn’t at all that different from Pinoy action flicks, cheesy lines and all. Heck, Lito Lapid and Bong Revilla Jr., two of the Philippines’ most renowned action stars, have even made into politics despite not being too big on competence when off-camera. The latest fiasco regarding Jejomar Binay and his army of rowdy goons as well as his brief but appalling dialogue with a distraught but at least professional police officer shows just how utterly low our politicians can get just so they can garner attention and sympathy for themselves.

One can note how Binay’s sudden abandonment of the Aquino administration is similar to how Chavit Singson betrayed Erap when the latter’s impeachment was inevitable. Trust me people, these two did not turn against their masters because their consciences finally won them over. They turned because it was convenient for them at the time and because it would grant them more benefits in the long run. See, even if Binay did step down from being vice president and call out the Aquino administration on its corruption, it’s still apparent that he and the rest of his clan (especially Junjun and Nancy) will continue to live their glamorous lives while everyone else lives in abject poverty and misery just as the deeply corrupt nobles of Medieval Europe or Japan did. Binay’s unprofessional and confrontational attitude towards the police officer who stepped forward to negotiate with him is evidence enough of his grandiose sense of self-entitlement.

Of course, as is often the case with the Pinoy politics, Binay and his lackeys are trying to paint a different picture of what was actually going on. Look, I’m not siding with the PNP either. To be honest, I’m not too impressed with the actions of most police officers in the Philippines with the exception of the Fallen 44’s brave sacrifice. However, I must still commend the officers for their professional attitude during the whole debacle. Jejomar Binay was clearly attempting to impress the media and the countless dumb masses watching the whole fiasco by acting like the typical defiant hero in a cliche-ridden Pinoy action movie, complete with crummy dialogue and a tasteless plot that involved making his goons look like oppressed victims fighting back against a corrupt police force.

Before you side with Binay regarding the whole issue, here are three points in the article that I can elaborate on on why you should rethink that idea very carefully:

Binay Didn’t Abandon Aquino Because Of His Conscience

Of course not. He was already quite happy siphoning his share of public funds while vice president. The only real reason he’s choosing to jump ship is because the Aquino administration is losing favor with the more astute population of the Philippines and that President Aquino is reaching the end of his term. Like a rat abandoning a ship, Jejomar Binay is simply choosing to go to the winning side now that it seems the yellow ship is headed for Davy Jones’ Locker.

Binay Is Merely Playing With People’s Sympathies

From his lines to the almost comical way he spoke to the police is just his attempt in making himself look like some kind of hero in the eyes of the people. If he was really serious about standing up for what was right, where was he when the fighting finally did break out? Why needlessly risk the lives of others when he could’ve ended the whole issue fairly quickly by turning himself in quietly and with a sense of dignity? I mean after all, aren’t the Binays one of the wealthier families in Philippine society? He can easily afford a good lawyer even if he does get incarcerated, allowing him to prevent any violent confrontations with the police and getting his people hurt.

The Binay Clan Will Be The Same Self-Entitled Scoundrels

While Jejomar Binay is busy trying to paint himself as the hero in opposition of the corrupt Aquino government, it’s quite obvious that people like Junjun and Nancy will continue to live their arrogant and self-important lives. Junjun will continue to rule Makati and treat employees who’re just trying to do their jobs like dirt all the while shouting stuff like: “Don’t you know me?” As for Nancy, we all know how much she supports political dynasties in the Philippines even though this kind of system, time and time again, has proven to be one of the root causes of the country’s continued deterioration.

***

As in the quote above, one reason why I think that Western action films will always be more superior to Filipino ones is that the heroes in the former are often much more realistic and efficient. As any soldier or police officer will tell you, real combat has little time for idle banter. If you waste time to talk, you’ll just get a bullet for your troubles. If you stand for what you believe in, then don’t waste time whining or make speeches on how righteous you are. Actions, my friends, will always speak louder than words. And while Binay might claim to be a hero, his actions so far has only proven that he is anything but.

So please, let’s not fall for Jejomar Binay’s drama. It’s obvious who the bad guy was in the whole incident and they’re most certainly NOT the cops who were just trying to do their jobs. Remember, this isn’t an action film or a teleserye, this is real life.

Get real!

Everyone is fighting the Binay versus Aquino war except Binay and Aquino

July 2, 2015

by benign0

Shhh… we shouldn’t criticise Vice President Jejomar Binay because he’s got the goods on us.

Perhaps this is what’s in the minds of the Philippines’ leaders, even as Netizens and ordinary folk alike, many of whom are rabid fans of President Benigno Simeon ‘BS’ Aquino III, mount a “full-court press” to slam Binay on social media.

All that noise on social media ironically highlights the deafening silence coming from President BS Aquino himself. To be fair, Aquino had seemingly given the green light to his mouthpieces to release the hounds, so to speak. But as far as the famously blamey horse’s mouth we ask of Aquino: Why the notable silence yet again?

To be sure, nothing in the damning statements let loose by Binay against President BS Aquino is news to most Filipinos. Aquino suffers from a string of political scandals erupting under his watch. The emergence of vast pork barrel thievery at an unprecedented scale had a money train on tracks that lead squarely back to Malacanang. The jewel of Manila’s public transport system, the MRT, was reduced to a junk heap under the current administration’s management. And a criminally-insane law that seeks carve out a chunk of Mindanao and serve it to a terrorist group was drafted under a Philippine President in cahoots with Kuala Lumpur.

Oh yeah, and then there is that small matter of the Hacienda Luisita and its seeming immunity to subjection to agrarian reform.

There are no good guys or bad guys here — only dynastic interests. Whether one is pro-BSA or pro-Binay, Binay-aran or Noytard-ic by motivation, all these politicians have red underwear to hide under their skirts. A frenzy of skirt-lifting will do the entire oligarchy no good because everyone’s got skeletons in their closets. It’s the reason why, despite the Philippines’ stone-age bank secrecy laws being highlighted as a hindrance to fact-finding during the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona in 2012, politicians still manage to grossly misdeclare their personal wealth to the public.

For that matter, it is quite funny the way people get so worked up about how an allegedly crooked family like the Binays managed to grab so many offices and stay in power for so long, considering that at the centre of the whole demonisation campaign against the Vice President is “senator” Antonio Trillanes who became a member of Congress despite being a convicted rebel leader who endangered thousands of Filipino lives and destroyed millions of pesos worth of property on account of his little military adventure back in the mid-2000s.

Pinoy nga naman talaga.

As always, the wrong arguments win in this intellectually-bankrupt society. And I’m not talking about arguments for or against any of these bozos. I’m talking about arguments that properly frame, the issue of why Philippine politics is the way it is — an ostentatious national ornament worn to buttress the pretense that is Philippine “democracy” at immense cost to the ordinary Filipino schmoe.

In the hit HBO series Game of Thrones, one will note that the story is spun mainly around the tribulations of the nobility. There is not much about the plight of ordinary peasants that punctuates the GoT world. Too boring. Who gives a flying frig about peasants’ petty lives anyway when bloody feuds between rich folk make better entertainment?

That’s kind of what the Philippines is like today. It’s really a circus of the elites with the concerns of ordinary Filipinos fitting in as nothing more than the inconsequential dust on the grounds upon which gallop the mounts of jousting knights.

Philippine VP Jejomar Binay arguing with the police: What is wrong with this scene?

July 1, 2015

by benign0

There is something fundamentally wrong about an argument between a police officer and the Vice President of the Philippines. It’s bad form. But it is a familiar and normal sight to Filipinos now who have been encouraged since the early 1980s to see policemen as someone to distrust and defy.

So quite funny, indeed, how people are now waxing indignation about the spectacular drama unfolding at the Makati City Hall and the way no less than Vice President Jejomar Binay butts heads with members of the police trying to diffuse the sitution…

It is funny because the precedent for this sort of behaviour was set way back in the old days by the very sorts of people who are now outraged by this scene. Filipino police officers, you see, are members of the Evil Establishment. That was the guidance given to Filipinos by leaders of the parties who are in power today. If you’ve got a grievance against the government, take to the streets!And if police officers get in your way, defy them.

Unfortunately, the lesson stuck fast in Filipinos’ psyches.

And what is now on display reflects the Filipino character shaped by that quaint old “street parliamentarian” thinking embedded in the Filipino mind over the last several decades of Yellow “people power” indoctrination.

It’s time Filipinos grow up.

First of all, the Vice President is a top-ranking government official. He should not be seen arguing with the police who, in the bigger scheme of things, are hiscolleagues in government.

Second, police officers should not be arguing either. They have orders and, if they have the proper warrants or authorisations, should simply carry out their orders to arrest people. The place to argue one’s case is in court. It is not an officer’s place to argue once the imperative to take action is clear.

If Filipinos weren’t all a bunch of Drama Queens, clarity of thinking and conviction in actions would reign supreme in this country — not media circuses like this.