Culture of impunity is practiced by idiot peryodistas.

Thanks guys.

@ Stefan Suarez:
Perhaps not seeing “less action” but seeing more of the “right action”; i.e., action that anticipates rather than simply reacts. If, for example, much of the energy was directed towards putting in and maintaining routine measures that helped mitigate the risk of such disasters to begin with, we’d be seeing a bit less destruction and waste today.

@ Filipino culture
That’s right. “Hope” should be substantiated. A hope of one day becoming a lawyer needs to be substantiated by a plan to study Law in a university. In the same way it is a ludicrous proposition to be encouraging people to have “hope” without any evidence of a clear roadmap to achieving whatever it is one hopes for will happen in the future.

Great blog post. I’d like to focus on the point behind “hope in what, exactly?”. Hope needs a clear plan of action and actual action to produce tangible results. Unfortunately, many people just stop at having hope. Hope in of itself, without the requisite action and planning, leads nowhere. It is like a can of gasoline. It has the potential to create movement but if it isn’t poured into a properly configured engine and without the willpower to turn on the ignition switch, it remains mere potential.

HOPE, in this proper context, still produces personal advancement in the Philippines: http://www.dailyrandomsites.com/is-there-hope-for-filipinos-in-the-philippines/

1. Great job on diagnosing the problem. How about solutions?

2. On [perversion of volunteerism] I do believe that some are motivated by wrong motives, but I prefer not to judge. What people call “self promotion on Facebook” keeps the fire burning a little bit longer.. long enough to keep people interested in blogs like this, when otherwise they’d be busy playing with their quizzes and whatnot.

As long as we keep on pinning motives onto people’s actions, we’ll be seeing less action.

Love the blog post, and the blog. Especially the diagram.

citizen perry,

yes you are correct. it really seems like the prevalent understanding here is that faith is enough and that god will provide. you might want to check out the anti-pinoy logo. it’s a person just waiting for the fruit of the tree to fall into his mouth. perhaps, that person’s waiting for god to do something to make the fruit conveniently drop into his gaping mouth.

Thanks for your reply.

May we are enlightened in clarifying this “bahala na” issue because it fuels the Filipinos’ deep connection with the Almighty and to cope with the impossible.

You are right in saying “bahala na” without action or initiative is useless. Even the Bible says faith without works is dead.

Am I right on this sirs ?

Yeah, I think initiative and accountability should always be emphasized FIRST among virtues/values that we want to impart upon the next generation of Pinoys.

@citizenperry

i think the prevailing context for bahala na is no longer “bathala na” but really “bahala na” as in “bahala na si batman.” how it got that way, i don’t know. anyway, this brings to mind a proverb often brought up during times of calamity: “nasa diyos ang awa, nasa tao ang gawa.” i have a problem with this proverb and i think it should not be taught to very young children unless if it is rephrased as “nasa tao ang gawa, nasa diyos ang awa.” even then there is always the possibility that some people (if not most) will only absorb the part about god’s mercy.