Jesse CabanacanOnly two weeks into the New Year and within a span of a day we find attention-grabbing headlines that likely validate our blight of “living in interesting times.”(1) That day, January 13, 2010, could be a portent of things to come for the rest of the year. There were four events heralded that day in our beloved Philippines that could affect most aspects of our lives.
Mental health of government workers. Apparently, a survey commissioned by the Department of Health and conducted in 2007 shows that about a third (30%) of government workers has mental health problems. Why this was revealed only now, I don’t know. Probably they assumed this was common knowledge, so no rush therefore to reveal the results. The most common mental disorder was depression and anxiety disorder, this according to the Philippine Psychiatric Association (PPA).
My question is, were they mental cases prior to being hired by government or did they suffer the disorder as a result of their jobs?
“We think that people are just normal, but they are actually harboring mental health problems,” said a certain Dr. Edgardo Tolentino Jr. of the PPA.
Perhaps this explains some of the things they do!
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Supreme Courts restrains COMELEC regarding Ang Ladlad. As most of you know, Ang Ladlad is a gay and lesbian organization seeking accreditation from the Commission on Elections as a party-list organization to run in the coming May 2010 elections. The COMELEC denied accreditation based on its conclusion that the group was “espousing doctrines contrary to public morals.” In short, our highly educated and morally upright election commissioners equated homosexuality to immorality.
Since when has the COMELEC been the arbiter of morality? And when will these smart folks come out of the Dark Ages? The smartest of them all declared matter-of-factly that gays cannot be considered marginalized since there are already many homosexuals in Congress. To which I say let’s have a head count!
But let’s go along with the COMELEC’s logic. Homosexuality is immoral. Immorality disqualifies someone from running for public office. Therefore, Ang Ladlad cannot be accredited to run and be voted as a party-list organization in the May 2010 elections. Hello! So how many corrupt and womanizing incumbent candidates for congressman, governor and mayor have the COMELEC disqualified based on immorality? And didn’t they approve the certificate of candidacy of one self-confessed polygamous former president?
Actually, this could be explained. Please refer to survey finding on government workers.
Naturally, Ang Ladlad appealed to the Supreme Court which restrained the COMELEC from implementing its decision to deny accreditation and ordered it to include the name of the group in the ballot printing. It doesn’t mean though that Ang Ladlad can now run as a party-list group. The Supreme Court has yet to decide on that. But it’s comforting to know that, at least for now and for this particular issue, most members of the highest court seem to be within the 70% group of sane government employees.
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One in 4 Filipino families hungry. Unrelated to the aforementioned survey that revealed the insanity of a significant number of government workers, a recent poll by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed that 24% of Filipino families said they are hungry. That’s 4.4 million hungry families. Well, this is proof positive that the Philippines is a rich country pretending to be poor, again.
If you disagree, just look at the profligacy of the Ampatuans, with their stable of armored black Suburbans and their reprehensively numerous mansions. Such ostentatious display leads one to believe there is an abundance of oil in Maguindanao. (And with an army and police at their beck and call, they can annihilate 60 defenseless souls at a snap of a finger!)
Add to that the incredibly huge amounts (yes, in mind-boggling millions of dollars) that high-profile Filipino politicians bet at every Manny Pacquiao fight. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, so says the city’s tagline. If my mother and all of her 87 years only knew, she would in all humility ask, “Where to get?”
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Marriage Contract Expiration Date. Another aspiring party-list organization, the feminist 1-Ako Babaeng Astig Aasenso or 1-ABAA is advocating in its political platform an expiration date on the marriage contract. Probably an idea copied from a glamorous German politician by the name of Gabrielle Pauli, the group is proposing that a marriage contract, just like a driver’s license or passport, should expire after a pre-determined date, in this case the group is pushing for 10 years. At expiration date, the couple will have the option to either extend or renew the marriage or do nothing and just let it expire. Wow!
I may be a little slow at times but I ain’t stupid. I, therefore, have no opinion on this issue whatsoever, except to say that I love my wife dearly and will never let that love expire.
Interesting that the group’s president, a certain Margie Tajon, when asked if she is or has been married, replied in the negative and added that her marital status was somehow irrelevant to the issue at hand.
And the ever vocal Archbishop Emeritus Oscar Cruz, an expert in Canon Law and Chairman of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal (I didn’t know such a thing was in existence), dismisses the proposal as “some kind of desperate approach to right a wrong by something wrong.”
Two separate positions each at the extreme opposite end of the spectrum. And from persons who have neither been there nor done that!
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Note:
(1) “May you live in interesting times” is supposedly the English translation of a Chinese proverb and curse.
Mental health of government workers. Apparently, a survey commissioned by the Department of Health and conducted in 2007 shows that about a third (30%) of government workers has mental health problems. Why this was revealed only now, I don’t know. Probably they assumed this was common knowledge, so no rush therefore to reveal the results. The most common mental disorder was depression and anxiety disorder, this according to the Philippine Psychiatric Association (PPA).
My question is, were they mental cases prior to being hired by government or did they suffer the disorder as a result of their jobs?
“We think that people are just normal, but they are actually harboring mental health problems,” said a certain Dr. Edgardo Tolentino Jr. of the PPA.
Perhaps this explains some of the things they do!
-------------------------------------------ooOoo--------------------------------
Supreme Courts restrains COMELEC regarding Ang Ladlad. As most of you know, Ang Ladlad is a gay and lesbian organization seeking accreditation from the Commission on Elections as a party-list organization to run in the coming May 2010 elections. The COMELEC denied accreditation based on its conclusion that the group was “espousing doctrines contrary to public morals.” In short, our highly educated and morally upright election commissioners equated homosexuality to immorality.
Since when has the COMELEC been the arbiter of morality? And when will these smart folks come out of the Dark Ages? The smartest of them all declared matter-of-factly that gays cannot be considered marginalized since there are already many homosexuals in Congress. To which I say let’s have a head count!
But let’s go along with the COMELEC’s logic. Homosexuality is immoral. Immorality disqualifies someone from running for public office. Therefore, Ang Ladlad cannot be accredited to run and be voted as a party-list organization in the May 2010 elections. Hello! So how many corrupt and womanizing incumbent candidates for congressman, governor and mayor have the COMELEC disqualified based on immorality? And didn’t they approve the certificate of candidacy of one self-confessed polygamous former president?
Actually, this could be explained. Please refer to survey finding on government workers.
Naturally, Ang Ladlad appealed to the Supreme Court which restrained the COMELEC from implementing its decision to deny accreditation and ordered it to include the name of the group in the ballot printing. It doesn’t mean though that Ang Ladlad can now run as a party-list group. The Supreme Court has yet to decide on that. But it’s comforting to know that, at least for now and for this particular issue, most members of the highest court seem to be within the 70% group of sane government employees.
-------------------------------------------ooOoo--------------------------------
One in 4 Filipino families hungry. Unrelated to the aforementioned survey that revealed the insanity of a significant number of government workers, a recent poll by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed that 24% of Filipino families said they are hungry. That’s 4.4 million hungry families. Well, this is proof positive that the Philippines is a rich country pretending to be poor, again.
If you disagree, just look at the profligacy of the Ampatuans, with their stable of armored black Suburbans and their reprehensively numerous mansions. Such ostentatious display leads one to believe there is an abundance of oil in Maguindanao. (And with an army and police at their beck and call, they can annihilate 60 defenseless souls at a snap of a finger!)
Add to that the incredibly huge amounts (yes, in mind-boggling millions of dollars) that high-profile Filipino politicians bet at every Manny Pacquiao fight. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, so says the city’s tagline. If my mother and all of her 87 years only knew, she would in all humility ask, “Where to get?”
-------------------------------------------ooOoo--------------------------------
Marriage Contract Expiration Date. Another aspiring party-list organization, the feminist 1-Ako Babaeng Astig Aasenso or 1-ABAA is advocating in its political platform an expiration date on the marriage contract. Probably an idea copied from a glamorous German politician by the name of Gabrielle Pauli, the group is proposing that a marriage contract, just like a driver’s license or passport, should expire after a pre-determined date, in this case the group is pushing for 10 years. At expiration date, the couple will have the option to either extend or renew the marriage or do nothing and just let it expire. Wow!
I may be a little slow at times but I ain’t stupid. I, therefore, have no opinion on this issue whatsoever, except to say that I love my wife dearly and will never let that love expire.
Interesting that the group’s president, a certain Margie Tajon, when asked if she is or has been married, replied in the negative and added that her marital status was somehow irrelevant to the issue at hand.
And the ever vocal Archbishop Emeritus Oscar Cruz, an expert in Canon Law and Chairman of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal (I didn’t know such a thing was in existence), dismisses the proposal as “some kind of desperate approach to right a wrong by something wrong.”
Two separate positions each at the extreme opposite end of the spectrum. And from persons who have neither been there nor done that!
-------------------------------------------ooOoo--------------------------------
Note:
(1) “May you live in interesting times” is supposedly the English translation of a Chinese proverb and curse.
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