Analysis and Opinion By Irineo B. R. Salazar The Philippines is an enigma to many. There is the “Heritage of Smallness” (Nick Joaquin) which doesn’t scale well, as I have written in “The National Village”. There is a certain insularity which I think is the result of having gone From the Edge to the Middle […]
Widening Philippine Horizons
Thanks for reblogging!
hi guys, hi Irineo, I did a double take po. widening philippine horizons, I thought at 1st whitening philippine horizons ito as in dumping tons of crushed dolomite to mimic white sand sa manila bay.
widening horizons, okay, got it. though I’d go for taut, trim and terrific horizons: responsive like good housekeeping well planned and orderly. regularly updated and reviewed and no dead wood.
i refuse to believe that we are mentally lazy.
The distance learning has further exposed the gap between public and private schools.
Our shortcuts in sms does not make us all jejemon.
on short memories.
All issues are flavor of the week, in best case.
good thing there are people to remind us of forgotten issues.
I agree Karl. I observed this in UP. The people who were from families with UP a Professor knew how to traverse the bureaucracy of the State U, families with Alumni were also at an advantage. The mentoring aspect is so important yet is hard to come by. The mentoring part is big in fraternities but that comes with all the toxic masculinity issues with those organizations.
Thanks for sharong your UP experience, Gian.
Add to this that all children of UP professors study for free at UP.
And a number of UP kids like me have married within the campus in addition to becoming professors at UP as well.
Re mentally lazy, the comment of a European on FB on Joe’s post:
“One thing that came to my mind is that it might not be so much willful ignorance but one based on a coping mechanism. My asawa keeps pointing out to me that it is all well for me coming from Europe that is so different to weorry about allthe imperfections anfd things but in places like the Phillippines this is just not odable as the problems are so many that you end up loco if youtry to tacke it all.
Knowing how people tick and understanding Maslows work, she might have a point. It is hard to self actualise while you worry about what will be on your plate for dinner or how you secure a roof over your head. This of course does not apply to people in the upper echelons of the country, where the leaders and people of power come from.”
Re jejemon not all of course, just some. Millenialspeak as opposed to jejemon seems to be a very clever way to describe modernity, but I know too little of it.
I also forgot to include the reference to “Barcelona”, “Hello Love Goodbye” and “Meet me at St. Gallen” in the article, as an indication of new experiences abroad reflecting in films. But as usual every big picture is never fully complete.
“. . . We need to recognize
our cognitive biases,
our moral narcissism of not accepting our wrong judgment,
our mental laziness,
our ignorance, our fact resistance,
our regional & tribal affinities,
our indifference,
our fatalism,
our addiction to persona,
our attraction to macho leadership,
our total dependence on our leaders to do all the dirty work for us and remove our sense of culpability,
our blind fanaticism, our unconditional loves, our blanket hates,
our rabid religiosity,
our bigotry,
the fallacies and cliches that cloud our thinking,
our inability to see real progress and achievements,
our lack of critical thinking,
our fascist tendencies,
our father issues,
the gaps in our souls we fill with idol worship,
our vested interests.“
We need to recognize first that all have biases.
This laundry-list makes us want to reflect.
Then we recognize if it is a problem need solving.
Religious tolerance is also a must, but there always has to be a threshold when it comes to tolerance.
on interests- no permanent friends, only permanent interests can apply to individuals or groups, and not just nations.
our short memories can be resolved by constant reminder and patience to remind and teach.
I like to see the statement in its entirety. The Reluctant Activists statement starts with the statement that the 2022 election may bring more of the same and that is her context. And another context could be issues like tokhang etc.
“We need to recognize first that all have biases.”
If the bias makes you deny important reality (like Marcos is not a hero) it is an issue.
“Religious tolerance is also a must, but there always has to be a threshold when it comes to tolerance.”
Theoretically the threshold should be what is defined by the Constitution. There is also Obama’s statement, for instance, that everyone is free to have religion as long as they do not impose stuff on others. For example “if you don’t believe in divorce, don’t have divorce”. Of course there should be some common values agreed upon, a lowest common denominator, or else society falls apart.
For me any form of religiousness that is about hating others is bad. It gets even worse when it leads to harming others.
“on interests- no permanent friends, only permanent interests can apply to individuals or groups, and not just nations.”
The moment people betray national interest or break the law for personal or group interest it becomes an issue for the nation of course.
A President who jails people for personal revenge, or destroys important companies like ABS/CBN for revenge, could be a national problem.
People who only care for human rights and injustice if their own rights are the one’s affected, but not if others are affected.
People who ignore the human rights and right to due process of drug users just because they want to be safe. Of course safety is important too so how does a state ensure public safety without sacrificing innocents.
At the same time, how do you prevent the nation from becoming a tyranny of the majority against minorities, or national from ignoring local interests?
“our short memories can be resolved by constant reminder and patience to remind and teach.”
That is true, but in general it looks like the attention span is very short and this is an issue because wrong priorities are set.
Maybe it is more of a thing to see why Dutz is forgiven for nearly everything while PNoy was castigated for small things.
As long as we cannot anthopomorphise problems like Climate Change we will fail to create the conditions that engender intense civic mindedness. The common enemy is still the best unifier, unfortunately we are going the way of a lot of fascist states declaring a small number of people as the enemy. Dilawan, activists.
Common enemy- Even in that we are divided.
Division is our expertise.
@Good points all.
“For Irineo.
oh, I love laundry list, Karl G, and top of my later day laundry list is the dolomite beach. been there and sang to meself the song sa bughaw na buhangin. 1stly po, sunglasses with highest UV protection is needed, the white sand is so glaring, the eyes hurt. so wear sunglasses po, and avoid having cataract later in life.
“sa bughaw na buhangin, duon ako maghihintay. abutin man ng takip silim, ang langit man ay magdilim . . . ”
methink, the previous black sand of manila bay was more poignant, I can almost imagine it being blue and desolate, perfect setting for a sad song. white dolomite sand just did not have the soul of the black sand.
manila bay is racist yata, prefers white sand. out with the black, in with the white.
Since Joe’s blog comment section is closed, nice of you to place Irineo’s piece herw.
I still think that there is a lot still to be said with half-Filipinos as a rich source of potential development. Thus far, most Filipinos only see their utility in beauty and entertainment.
Not just half-Filipinos but full Filipinos educated (preferably since elementary) in 1st world.
How to get them back to the Philippines is the trick. Sure, there’s a bit of eugenics in all this, DNA to better nutrition, plus good to excellent education, will push a nation’s populace towards critical mass
of which Ireneo has written about. That is the premise. There should be a national program, much like China’s designed to invite people (like the above) back to the Philippines.
(HI! everyone! glad gian’s blog is here!)