Theft, Destruction, Deceit. Wash, rinse, repeat. Sadly, this is the way we do things here in the Philippines.
Yes... I stress the WE part. It is common place for the common tao or the alleged victim of injustice to blame our government, yet we fail to realize that WE aren't less responsible for the fetid state of our mother country than those we so often blame.
Today it seems we're all about “who's to blame”. We point our fingers at our neighbors, our fellow countrymen, and more often than most, our elected officials. From garbage to massacres our government has been blamed. They now seem to be the source of this vile affliction that now plagues our once beautiful and bountiful country. Little do we know, the disease spreads deeper and holds tighter on us as well. Sad as it may, we: the common tao, the working man and woman, the mother, the father, the teacher, the student, the councilor, the jeepney driver, the commuter, the passerby, the doctor, the patient, the me, the you, the everyone, is more responsible for the sorry state of our nation now than those who we so eagerly judge as “at-fault”. Whenever we spit outside our window, discard our garbage on the street, burn plastic, smoke cigarettes or waste food we are practically allowing “those to blame” to do the same. We notice how dirty our country is and how indifferent the government is to the environment yet we do nothing to halt or slow down it's defilement. Again we are to blame.
Whenever we purposely don't return the change to our parents, or steal from their wallets. Whenever we doctor documents or receipts. Each time we borrow something and deliberately never return it we give “those to blame” permission to do so. We should stop complaining about funneled funds or the pork barrel. We should forget about our taxes being used to buy luxury cars. We shouldn't be angry when votes are manipulated. Again we are to blame. Eachtime a journalist dies, or an activist wrongly incarcerated we slander and curse our government. But where were we when the journalist was taken? What did we do when we saw him/her dragged into a van? Did we not mock the activist when we saw him/her causing traffic on the street? Did we not turn a blind eye to their messages? They were killed by our government, yet it is us who murdered them. What hypocrites we have become, we who so readily accuse “those to blame” yet we do the same on a daily basis. It's easy for us to criticize others without seeing how dirty our hands actually are. But now, who are we to point the finger? Who are we to lay the blame? What gives us the right to impute corruption on our government when we ourselves are corrupt? The measly hundred-thousand government officials, big and small,in our counrty pale in comparison to the millions upon millions of citizens who everyday contribute to the theft, destruction and deceit in and of our country, it's people, our Philippines. Before we can blame them, before we can stop them. WE first have to blame ourselves, correct ourselves and reform. Only then will we have the right to accuse and take action. Only then will we have the right to heal.
