We beg to differ.
It does not take much to attract media attention in the Philippines. You just need to do something “special”. Fortunately for Filipinos, their society had set a low bar for specialness. For many politicians, simply taking a bus or a train along with the peasants makes them special enough to be elected to government posts…
Read More “Why Senator Bongbong Marcos should read the Holy Bible” »
Super Typhoon Hagupit (locally code-named “Ruby”) has come and gone, and many lessons have been learned. But the most important insight following this experience is quite tragic: that the thousands upon thousands of lives lost in previous years to typhoons were all preventable. The death toll in the aftermath of Hagupit’s visit to the most…
The latest “viral” photo of a politician being portrayed as “simple” and doing something “out of the usual” is of widow and congresswoman Leni Robredo of Camarines Sur. The photo supposedly shows her waiting for public transport along a major highway, instead of having a special ride. Some might be reminded of another “simple” politician,…
Read More “Why “Simple People” Photo-Ops Reflect a Problem in our Society” »
It’s Blue vs. Blue. On the blue corner, it’s MMDA enforcer Jorvy Adriatico. On the other blue corner, it’s businessman and flauntatious Maserati owner Joseph Russel Ingco. It’s a stupid way to put it, right? Filipinos love rivalries, though. And it’s perhaps annoying to see both trying to gain sympathy through media. However, my opinion…
Read More “Why Support for A Violent Erring Driver is Troubling” »
Coming in the heels of the recent street riots that erupted over the failure to indict of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson who gunned down Michael Brown, an unarmed teenager who happened to be black, another grand jury voted not to indict Daniel Pantaleo, a New York Police Department (NYPD) police officer accused of fatally…
Read More “Race Card on the table as America reels from consecutive police ‘brutality’ cases” »
The trouble with Filipinos is that they don’t see any meaning in their lives that is bigger than themselves. At best there is, like most warm-blooded mammals with bulges in their heads wider than their brainstems, that instinctive altruism for his own immediate family. But even that one is often brought to question on account…
“Hindi kaunlaran ng nakararami. Kaunlaran lang ng iilan.” This is what Marlon Angara, a fisherfolk from Casiguran, said when asked about what he thinks of Aurora Pacific Economic Zone or APECO. He is one of the locals who are at risk of losing their land and livelihood to give way for the construction of a…
Ultimately this is really the only question that really matters. There is no disputing the fact that the Philippines must change. The alternative? Well, that’s really up to Filipinos. If the Philippines does not change, it will continue along its current path. It would be a matter of being content with that course and the…
Read More “Why is it so exceedingly difficult for the Philippines to change for the better?” »