Php 70.00 Vol. 45 No. 5 • MAY 2011 - IMPACT Magazine Online!

FROM THE
BLOGS
EDITORIAL
Gross default
in the RH Bill
SEX. METHODS. NUMBER. This is the shameful
tripod of the infamous RH Bill that continues to
divide Filipinos—irrespective of their beliefs or
religious affiliations. Whether the division is in effect
the Machiavellian intention behind the Bill in order to
weaken the progressive popular dissatisfaction against
the Malacañang occupant—this is another question,
another story. But the fact stands that for its incompetence,
insensitivity and confusion, the national leadership
is slowly but surely losing more and more of its once
faithful followers.
The gross default of the RH Bill is the marked absence
of the human person in its long litany of envisioned
big benefits to Philippine society. It is good to ask: In the
last analysis, without the human person justly considered
and rightfully attended to in any social venture, what is
there really worthwhile bothering about—in truth and in
fact? And this is exactly the reality behind the RH Bill
when denuded of its pretentious concern for the good
and welfare of the People of the Philippines.
Sex divorced from the human person becomes but a
piece of meat. It is then made to stand as but the carnal
means to enjoy and delight on—without relevance to
the dignity of the human person and to the fundamental
ethics that governs human acts. Withdrawn from its
human premise, sex becomes but an instrument of instinctive
satisfaction proper of irrational beings devoid
of responsibility and beyond accountability.
Methods on how to enjoy and delight in sexual
acts without its inherent significance and import—this
is the central concern and main preoccupation of the
Bill. What to wear and to drink as well as what will be
subjected to surgical intervention—these are the main
means forwarded by the Bill in order to separate the right
to copulate from the obligation appended to copulation
in terms of possible conception.
Number specifically resorted to in the sense that
less is definitely better than more, that less people is
infallibly better than more people, and that less people
automatically means the disappearance of poverty and
the emergence of social development and economic
prosperity as a matter of course—this is core content
of the thesis of the Bill. Never mind the root cause of
poverty and misery in the country. Simply make the
number of people less and less, and there will be more
and more prosperity—ipso facto.
The nature and dignity of the human person, the
ethical norms that regulate his or her conduct or behavior
for responsible actions, plus the moral parameters that
rule his or her actuations for principled living—these
are irrelevant to the RH BILL.
www.ovc.blogspot.com
Band-aid solutions
Band-aids are little strips of tapes with a little gauge placed
on little wounds hopefully to cause some cure. Needless
to say, their key reality feature is “little”. It is little in size
and coverage, little in scoop and finality. Band-aids wherefore
are irrelevant and futile for big wounds with big bad implications
and big ill consequences. In the day-to-day life of a people
wrestling with so many and immense socio-economic problems,
“Band-Aid Solutions” thereto are not simply vanity but downright
inanity. Even elementary reason says that solutions should
be at par with the nature and import of the problems crying for
pursuant attention and action.
The Philippines is facing the national predicament of well
regulated salaries and somehow regulated basic commodity
prices vis-à-vis actually deregulated oil prices. The Filipinos
find it harder to find work and/or employment but infallibly
pay indirect taxes from birth to death. There are more and more
hungry and desperate people in the country. There are wherefore
more and more dissatisfaction and anger that make them march
in the streets, hold rallies, show their dismay and shout their
protests. There are wherefore understandably more and more
spirited groups of citizens with different vision-missions but
with one and the same cause, viz., alienation from the present
national leadership and bed-fellows.
Faced with such immense and intense national predicaments,
the incumbent administration came up with “Band-Aid
Solutions” in term of the so called “Conditional Cash Transfer”.
Translation: On proviso that certain families meet certain conditions,
a certain amount of money is periodically handed to
them for certain months. The multi-million other poor families
excluded from the scheme, never mind. Furthermore, the same
administration thought of gimmick for those chosen groups of
gasoline consumers, in terms of gas coupons or smart cards or
whatever. Translation: On condition that these or those drivers
are given the chips or something, they get discounts. And again,
the multi-million of other gas consumers, never mind. Add hereto
the fact that absolutely no one of the said chosen families and
lucky drivers are exempted from paying their individual Value
Added Tax. This can be anything but funny!
Recently, there are these or those TV programs censured for
promoting mendicancy in the country. Reason: They freely hand
out many cash prizes to the winners of many different game shows.
Though unnoted and unsaid, Malacañang is now the biggest promoter
of mendicancy in the country for its “Band-Aid Solutions”.
www.ovc.blogspot.com
www.sodahead.com
Aristocracy and democracy
This is simply meant to reflect on the incongruous
pairing of aristocracy and democracy—without
necessarily thinking of some families vis-à-vis
people in general, without automatically making reference
to certain highly favored and distinct individuals
holding high and sensitive offices in government in
relation to the populace in general.
This is intended to point out that there is definitely
something queer, strange and/or suspicious when aristocrats
assume governance over commoners, i.e., when
wealthy and influential dynasties rule over the poor
and miserable. And the reservation with the pairing
rests on the empirical fact that aristocracy does not or
cannot understand—much less realistically accept—the
fundamental equality of human persons which is the
anchorage of real and living democracy.
This country is proud to claim that it has a democratic
form of government long since. And in essence,
democracy is government from the people, by the
people and for the people. Where then is aristocracy
in democracy?
The Philippines proudly proclaims that its people
as a whole is sovereign in their decision making and
the pursuant enactment of laws for their own common
good and public welfare. Where then is aristocracy in
democracy?
The democratic people of the Philippines are already
poor and hungry, and are in fact becoming even poorer
and hungrier. There is now a seeping spirit of mendicancy
among them. Where then is aristocracy in democracy?
Saying it more clearly, the multi-million common
Filipino people have been long since big losers in their
governance by aristocrats, i.e., very rich and powerful
families, distinctly educated and favored dynasties,
individuals with their feet above ground reality, with
their heads in Cloud 9. These are aristocratic clan
members who are basically insensitive to the plight of
the hungry, the lot of the homeless, the misfortune of
the weak and ignorant.
And stating it more bluntly, Filipinos in general
better stay quiet and stay still when they continue to
“elect” aristocrats in their supposedly democratic
country—when they allow themselves to be mesmerized
by aristocratic figures during “election”. The two key
words are deliberately quoted when the Filipino electorate
allow themselves to be duped by candidates from
the aristocracy making popular campaign declamations,
shouting populist electoral platforms. They are fun to
hear, pleasant to behold. But sorry! They do not know
what they are saying. Please think deep and well—and
conclude for yourselves what the truth is about the so
called “Philippine Democracy”.
Illustration by Bladimer Usi
26 IMPACT • May 2011
Volume 45 • Number 5 27