Manic Media

Filipinos seem to have a great fascination with the lives of the popular, the scandalous and of things that are blown out of proportions. If one is observant enough: lives of celebrities are seen everywhere in the newspaper. Even the lives of politicians and government officials are scrutinized rather than their work. It seems that the media is taking advantage of this phenomenon, which is why they keep on hyping up issues like these rather than put into the limelight economical, environmental and political issues among others. Issues that require the push of the people so that they would be urged to actually do accordingly.

I believe this stems from the misuse of the Freedom of Expression of people. They just randomly go out there and say whatever they want to say. News reports are not even objective anymore. And if people seem to have crossed the boundary, they use the Right as an escape goat: Freedom of Expression.

I believe the power of this right comes from its ambiguity and vagueness. Due to the fact that the provisions are not clearly stated it holds much power than we know of. Just a couple of hours of exposure to media, we seem to question our own views and change them accordingly. The media has the power to sway people's minds into their own benefit. The question now is: Where do we set the line?

I think that what we really need here in the Philippines for this matter is a Freedom of Responsible Expression. Though this may hold as vague and ambiguous as well, it tells us that there should be responsibility in what we say. It is just appropriate sometimes to hold back on information as soon as it is verified. Consequently, it is also considerate to hold back on information that would send the citizens panicking. Lastly, it is also just right to hold back on information that would not do any good to the interests of the country.

Some may say that this is a form of censorship or biased information. Some may say that this is controlling information dissemination. What I am trying to get at is that, we should be careful as to what we give to the audience. It is not about who gives the juiciest blow by blow account of the Hostage Taking in Luneta (which also led to the failure of the operation), but rather it is about responsibly holding back information until it is deemed appropriate to release it. As Cardinal Thomas Wosley would put it - "Be very, very careful what you put in that head because you will never, ever get it out." 

Death Cycle

I was waiting for a cab the other day in Greenhills at around 9pm , so everybody was on their way home which made it more challenging to get a cab back to Manila. I stood inside the Taxi Queue and it seems that the cabs are not getting inside the line. After a while I noticed that people are getting in the cabs at different places except the Taxi Queue. I was dumbfounded.

After a couple of failed attempts to hail a cab, I finally got one. Immediately I got into a conversation with the driver.

Me: Kuya, bakit ayaw mo magsakay dun sa may mga nakapila na?
Driver: Alam mo kasi, kapag umaga at walang tao, pinapa alis kami. Kaya kapag madaming tao bawi kami! HAHA, wala kasing pakisama yang mga yan e.

After a while, the driver continues to relay a story to me.

Driver: Nung isang araw nga e, nakita ko yung paborito kong security guard. Pinapunta ako sa isang tabi kala ko pinapa alis ako. Yun pala may pasahero siya dun na nagbigay sa kanya.
Me: Anong ginawa?
Driver: Binigyan na siya. Inabutan na siya ng isang daan para di na pumila. Ang okay dun sila pa nangontrata sa akin, panalo!

As I was sitting there, a lot of concepts were running in my mind. Am I being to idealistic of what is happening in the world? Is the Philippine Real World so messed up that even though that I know a lot of concepts, I could still not totally grasp what is really happening. It kinda seems that way.

This bribing thing is reminiscent of what is happening in the government. Everyone gets by with a fixer, a barker, lagay, kotong, and padulas among others. It seems that we have a good system but we lack rules, most especially enforcement. This is why corruption is so rampant. PNoy would say Walang Mahirap, Kung Walang Corrupt, but the people under him are not even open for scrutiny as to what they are doing with the money they get. It is as if that it is their own money already and that no one could touch or ask about it. Given the fact that they are lawmakers, they accept a lot of bribes from Trans National and even local companies, so that they would not create laws that would make these businesses' lives harder. Also, no rule or law could ever be done with regards to their transparency because no one would vote for it.

In Systems Thinking, this is a very powerful leverage point: Structure of Information Flow. If the people will be able to access a real-time live counter of what every government official is spending then there would be no corruption or if ever there is, then the people know the facts which is why they would have a stronger sense of urgency to stop the corruption from happening.

What is happening now is that these corrupt fools are keeping us in the dark. Any figure shown in the news by a whistleblower could be deemed correct or could be deemed false. It is in the ambiguity and the vagueness of what they do that is why they are so powerful. But if all information about them are totally disclosed, then I believe it would be an altogether different story.

One way or another, this sudden increase in corruption would lead to an implosion within the system, which would lead to a more rampant and out of this world corruption scheme, and then again the system will collapse. Again a call for more ridiculous ways of corruption techniques would be done by these fools.

This is a positive feedback loop wherein the more power it gets, the more powerful it would become in the future. If this goes on and on infinitely, it would be the beginning of the death of the Philippines.

Globalization: Nakakain ba yan?

Globalization is some kind of an "in" thing nowadays, together with corporate social responsibility, climate change and terrorism. Despite the massive influx of news and events about Globalization, what is it for the Filipino people?

I do not claim to speak in behalf of all the Filipino people but the sad reality is we ain't going nowhere with or without Globalization so to speak. The predicaments faced by the average Filipino does not dwell much on global issues, not even local issues. The vast majority of the Filipinos, have only one goal in life: to survive. People would say that understanding Globalization is like looking at the bigger picture in the grand scheme of things, but the fact of the matter is most Filipinos just want to get by with their poverty struck lives. Whatever bad news they arrive at, they instantaneously dismiss it and continue on to work, feed their kids, send them to school (if permissible) and hopefully by one magic moment get away from the impoverished status.

What has caused this mentality? I do not know for sure. Colonialization? The Cyclical Loop of Corrupt Government Officials? The low wage rate? The seemingly hopeless lives that they have been living for the most part in their lives? It may be one of these or even all. I believe that the Filipinos need to have an overhaul of mindset. This could be propelled by the government officials, if and only if, for the love of Christ they stop from being corrupt and for once show the people that they are doing things that really matter then the mindset of the People may be cynical but nonetheless, hope is still there. The vast majority of the Filipino People should start empowering themselves and go away with the "Lagi nalang akong Api" attitude. What numbers are we talking about here? If the millions and millions of poor Filipino people start on empowering themselves and changing their mindset on things then probably we could become a much developed country.

I believe that the crisis that we are facing is all internally generated. It seems that we have lost hope in ourselves which is why we get abused and exploited. We have succumbed into that dream of having to do that one thing that would propel us to the top of the world, but reality bites, we just got to do what we got to do.

The solution does not lie in the concept of Globalization, for whats its worth, it may be a detriment to our development but either way, the solution is in our hands, not even, its all in our heads; within our minds and our thoughts.

Just my two cents.