The saga of the Barretto sisters had gripped the minds of Filipinos for weeks now. In a society obsessed more with people and less with ideas, this recent circus is a bonanza for eyeball-starved mainstream media. Stepping back from the noise and the brain-dead detail of this showbiz fracas it is easy to sse the textbook case microcosm of Philippine society that it is.
At the centre of this saga is the eyecandy mestiza spawn of a relic clan of colonial settlers. And at the core of this war of the roses is a rich oldish man.
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See the pattern yet?
This is essentially a battle for a source of resources. Without having to judge the nature of the relationship of the various parties with this singular source of resources, one can easily see what these resources are being exchanged for.
The Barretto sisters, popular celebrities that they are, aren’t exactly renowned for anything else other than their natural beauty. Without inherent abilities other than this, it is not surprising that the wherewithal to cling to a patron is characterised by the desperation on exhibit in living colour today.
See the pattern yet?
The trouble with natural beauty is that it fades. When this happens, increased competition happens. This competitive clambering for upmanship is what gives the Barretto circus such bloodsport appeal. Filipinos who flock to the spectacle are much like the bloodthirsty Romans who watched gladiators slaughter one another at the Coliseum.
See the pattern yet?
The manner with which the audience regard the Barretto catfight mirrors the Philippines’ political discourse — because Philippine political actors are essentially in the same sort of battle. They are not out to serve the Filipino people nor work with one another. They are out to secure hold over a diminishing source of resources. Like crabs.
If you haven’t seen the pattern yet, let me spell it out. The Barretto sisters collectively mirror the Philippines. They were once a source of natural beauty. Sustained chronic desperation, however, has since vastly degraded all that. Rich patrons will simply move on to their next fresher playground. Unfortunately desperation often becomes a permanent feature of people who offer nothing to humanity beyond the natural beauty upon which they bet their entire futures.
benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.com.
These kind of issues that gets the interests of most Filipinos makes me wonder how the Philippines continue to survive each day. West Philippine Sea, the local effects of global warming, water shortage, illegal drugs, unstable economy, reliance on foreign aid, national debt, overpopulation (or rather mismanaged population), road congestion problems, Dengue, African Swine Fever, … etc. are just some of the the more important issues each Filipinos attention must be occupied with. These are like bullets that are about to hit them (or are already hitting them, or has already hit them) and yet they can still afford to look into trivial matters that does not have anything to do with their individual lives!
I wish those national issues that I have mentioned are literal bullets so it can jolt the Filipinos into moving and paying attention to things that really matters, and making them act on it.
But sadly, most Filipinos are just plain dumb. Too dumb to give their precious attention on these showbiz personalities and these celebrities are profiting from it. What do these Filipinos get in return after that? Farts, what else!
What most Filipinos doesn’t seem to assume is that maybe when the press leaves and turn off their cameras, these celebrities are laughing off their asses because they just made a fool off these Filipinos.
I’d like the Filipinos to imagine that they are being laughed at by these people. See if they still give them their attention.
The saying that all men are created equal. Sorry to say that we, Filipinos belong to an inferior, f*ked up race and, as such, we are slowly but surely continue sinking into a cessful of irrelevance.
The Barretto family circus, is nothing but a diversion of the true issues, that are left unattended and taken for granted by our leaders.
Barretto family members, who are “beautiful people”….infidelities; being “kabits”; politicians having sexual relations with married “beautiful people” …politicians with showbiz people; showbiz people having illegitimate children with politicians.
The Barretto family story is like , a “dud Filipino movie story”. Anyway, these kinds of stories, are what the “bakya crowd” in us wants . Maybe it helps us deal with the : nagging traffic problems of Metro Manila; the leap and bound growth of Squatters in urban areas; the crooks and corrupt politicians; the incompetent leaders and government officials; the 2016 election frauds, that resulted to a fake Vice President Lugaw Robredo who is still clinging to her position; the corrupt and fraud prone COMELEC…
We always find ourselves something to amuse us in our miseries.. . No wonder showbiz people become politicians !
The one common thread here…POLITICIANS!!!
Can the Philippines achieve total salvation as a nation if we BAN politics and instead turn to God????
How about banning the accumulation of wealth, especially by individuals with monosyllabic last names with less than 5 letters?
Well, yeah. If you allow exploitation of that beauty, the value certainly goes down. And I don’t know if there is such a thing as artificial beauty. It would be a strange thing.
Filipino men want to be like Atong Ang, as he got siblings to fight over him. He must be feeling like a boss (and like a lord, the actual kind of “bayani” Filipinos want to be!). Much as many other Filipinos probably want to be like the Tizon family, who got a slave who they could abuse and compel to serve them while working for free. The Filipino Dream, right there.
And beauty, as I wrote in that recent article, is only skin deep. Once the inside is known, it turns out to be rotten, as demonstrated in the Barretto sisters case.
It would be nice if Filipinos finally poke fun at celebrities, like in the U.S., instead of look up to them.