The primary language of the Philippines is English
Analysis and Opinion
By Joe America
Let’s start with two important definitions.
- primary, adjective, of chief importance; principal
- is, verb (used with he, she, it, and singular nouns, a form of the present tense (indicative mood) of be)
English is the most important language in the Philippines. It is the difference between upper class, middle class, and lower class. Other languages are popular, prevalent, and important, as French is to Canadians. But English is the language of success, monitarily.
If you are not driven by money, no worries. Stop reading now and go about your business. For you, my premise is wrong, so I am wrong.
For the rest of you, I would observe that English is the primary language of the Philippines today. Right now. It has been for some time. It will be for a long long time unless China takes over the country. But then, even Chairman Xi speaks English.
I was struck by this in several visits to hospitals in Cebu. Doctors speak sophisticated English, nurses speak good English, and janitors speak Pilipino. I’d venture to guess most businesses here have a similar stratification. A correlation, or a cause. Or both. Doesn’t matter. The better the English, the better the paycheck.
All the arguments about what languages should be taught are for pride, for love of clan, for a sense of belonging. But no other Philippine language will get you hired anywhere outside the Philippines, and none will get you into a lot of businesses and government offices here, either. English is required. It is the language that crosses above all other Philippine languages. It is the language of the Constitution and all laws.
My point is, stop letting pride and your need to belong limit the opportunities for Filipino kids to succeed at making money. Stop arguing about languages. They will have more pride with money, and will belong more places with it.
- Hire teachers who are good at English
- Teach English as the primary language
- Teach Pilipino as a secondary language
- Speak the local language as it is natural to do
- If you are a parent, make sure your kids can read, speak, and type in English
Then send your young people out to enrich themselves and the nation.
_________________________
Photograph from article “English as a medium of instruction in the Philippines“, from englishmajors2016.wordpress.com
The Society of Honor by Joe America 
I was looking for Catholic parishes in Bankal/Pajac, and decided to just pan out and look for churches around in islands, aside from Mormons (in Mactan), there’s Mormons all over the place, and 7th day Adventists, and JWs, etc. I know Mormons are known for learning local languages, but do Mormons teach English there? or JWs? or 7th Day Adventists? or Lutherans, etc. etc. Maybe leverage US churches to do more English instruction, and bring Filipinos over like Xi up there. just do more English. Listening is already pretty high for most Filipinos, they’ll understand when you talk to them, but harder to talk back cuz lack of practice. Do more conversational meets, less grammar etc. do reading/writing last. just talk. talk and listen. back and forth. hospital janitor will respond to that. for sure.
If anyone noticed that Mango Ave girls were speaking better English and had ready phrases from movies like Gladiator, like I will have my vengeance , in this life or the next. that was me! or Kingdom of Heaven, It has fallen to us to defend Jerusalem! lol.
My point, watch lots of American movies, memorized phrases goes a long way.
I’m reminded of a drunken Harrison Ford falling off the bar stool whilst explaining to the blond American socialite who came to his island for love, “It’s an island, babe! If you didn’t bring it here, you ain’t gonna find it here!” Or the beaut as he slurs “Never bite the hand that feeds your face”. My kids memorized maybe 20 quotes from that movie, “Six Days, Seven Nights” and all got As in every English class they ever took. You might be onto something here.
LC, I ALWAYS went out of my way to speak perfect, grammatic English during my first 4 years here in the US; result: I either turn heads or stuck out like a sore thumb!!
With INC, yes, you’ve highlighted the three religions that use branches to collect a bigger flock, and have good success at it. I don’t know much about them. I presume English is prominent, and it is up to them if they think teaching English would help them grow. I’d think it would.
My deep dive into the Filipino music industry has shown me that Visayans mostly speak good English by default. A lot of Visayans starting their showbiz careers in Metro Manila had to learn to speak Tagalog properly first. Some tongue tied in answering in English managed to do so when they had overcome their shyness in order to answer foreign interviewers while those from Cebu itself usually were seen as „posh“ in Metro Manila due to speaking English.
Ilocanos have always spoken English well and adapted easily to Tagalog. So it is the Tagalog plurality, not majority, that has at times issues with English. Of course, the de facto language on TV and even in the Senate is some form of Taglish. Joey has mentioned Bislish as well. Thought that only old-timer migrants to Germany speak the weird mix of German and Filipino that even Alan Robles observed, but the newcomers, aka nurses, at times speak a new mix.
Teaching Filipino properly has failed by all accounts. Having just it as a subject or Araling Panlipunan in Filipino makes it a second language by default. My brother and sister learned French as a secondary language in a bilingual German high school with French course plus geography, and I think history in French, so the language and TWO subjects. Of course, everything else was taught in the primary language, German. Except English..
My point being, whatever you decide to do, do it properly. AND don’t tolerate mixing if possible. How do I know? My mother taught German and French language at Ateneo. I sometimes helped her create language tapes as the university had a great language lab but not all the tapes to the books. My first recording studio experience, so to speak. Of course, I took part in occasional classes and saw how they went. As LCPL_X mentioned, talk and listen. All had to take part.
The Philippines muddled through its language politics for decades, and of course, what happens is you have some who apparently can’t express themselves properly in Tagalog or in English. And of course, the Visayans who have boycotted Tagalog. And many indeed are right when they say one subject in school doesn’t teach it properly, especially as it isn’t spoken on the street there. And as for what LCPL_X said about movies, that makes sense as well.
There was a time before the Internet, long ago, when the Dutch had a huge advantage over Germans as their market was too small to dub Hollywood movies and American TV shows. Everything was subtitled, so the Dutch spoke excellent English in the 1980s already when most Germans could NOT speak English or just barely. The Internet has made Germans level up now, everyone under 35, even the plumbers and carpenters, speaks some English these days.
It might be true that reading comprehension is down in the Philippines, but the English accents there now are a far cry from the 1970s, when some started singing „on the first part of the JORNEY“ when covering America’s „Horse with No Name“. So I guess build on that?
Words of wisdom, for sure. I think no one in government has asked the question, “What are we here for?” (A) To preserve Tagalog as a global language, or (B) make our citizens secure and comfortable? I know what Visayans don’t want, Tagalog speakers to presume they are more important. So we have a breakdown of purpose A from the getgo. But everyone wants B. So just go for B.
HINDI ako sang-ayon sa sinasabi ni Joe dito.
Why is that, PP? Do you think pride is more important than money? Or Pilipino is a globally competitive language? Or that the Philippines is whole and can fend for its people independent of other nations? What are you striving for?
Having a national language is in order to a) be able to communicate more effectively internally and b) have identification
Thus, even before the French revolution started to try to push back against dialects like the Gascon of D’Artagnan, French Kings decided that the dialect and language of Paris was to be spoken by all subjects. Spanish kings did something similar for Castilian with partial success.
Modern Italian was only spoken by 5% of Italians upon unification. The rest was the Republic and it’s school system pushing the Florentine language and dialect as Italian. Which is why many Italian-Americans had grandparents who didn’t speak what is called Italian today.
The islands of Sicily and Sardinia were most tenacious in keeping to their regional languages. There was a recent European Mafia movie about a Mafioso in US exile from Sicily and under witness protection telling another, “I don’t even speak Italian, don’t expect me to speak English.”
Mexico chose Spanish even if extremely few spoke it at Independence and TAUGHT it to all.
India is a mixed bag like the Philippines as it has English and Hindi. Many especially Southern Indians dislike Hindi, so it is stuck with English. Their accents are strong, but I believe that English is better taught there, based on the grasp of concepts I see in Indian IT experts.
Sure, I get the idea of national language as showing “we are our own masters,” but that alone is pretty useless. My father’s emphasis on Filipino as helping people understand stuff better is a bit more, but maybe a primary education with less rote would cure that issue in the Philippines.
What often does happen, and I guess that was what annoyed Joey with some Filipino call center agents is a certain lack of comprehension that shows when stuff goes off the script. That is because of too little conversation in class and too much parroting over there, I guess.
I recall blank stares from Filipino IT folks in the 1990s when I asked what an obligo was. Well, now I know it is money reserved for orders. But they were dealing with obligos, using the word.
Speaking in Filipino will not change that drone mindset, I am sure. That is the real issue IMO.
Ah, yes, rote education and responding as expected. I was amused this morning at John Cleese’s explanation of a joke as two frameworks meeting to either create new meaning (laughter) or not. The Philippines seems a one framework nation. When the second is overlaid, no new meanings are created. Thus the trouble with satire and problem-solving. That may be loosening up now thanks to the effectiveness of social media at introducing new frameworks. But there seems little effort to proactively dig for new constructs and solutions in government. Agencies had to be forced to use computers rather than seeing them as necessary for competence. And DepEd still can’t get computers into their system as the lifeblood of future knowledge. Just grunting along.
Language, the same. Trying to be both nationalistic and rich when there is no way markets will accept instructions for Philippine produced goods in Pilipino.
Visayans may yet surprise everyone as they always had to see two frameworks at least: the Manila framework and their own framework or perspective.
Otherwise, one just has to look at how Filipinos often deal with Fil-Ams or how recently Carlos Yulo’s Fil-Aussie girlfriend Chloe was “burnt at the stake” by some. It is amazing how many theoretically educated Filipinos are otherwise like European peasants from around 1350.
As for money, not just internationally oriented PPop but also mostly Tagalog OPM are putting English subtitles into new music videos. Many international fans love the sound of Tagalog, a language melodic when sung and fierce when rapped, but they want to know the meaning.
Interesting that attraction for Tagalog in music. No prepositions I suppose. 😂🤣😂
Well, the fans of Latino music are attracted to some variant of Spanish or to Brazilian Portuguese. KPop fans exist who try to learn Korean.
The exotic does have its attraction, always did.
Yes, indeed! More power!
There are less and more attractive languages, though, I guess. And downright weird ones like in the short video below:
Here’s a way to take a load off:
Rosas Pandan
When we were kids we memorized the Voltes V opening and closing themes in Nihongo.
As in the comic above or more seriously, in the video below.
Southern Indians (mostly Tamil) had a few change leaders after India’s independence who pushed usage of the English language and creating a BPO/IT industry Tamils were historically looked down upon in the Indian caste system due to being darker skinned compared to higher castes. Same for the various IT universities in Tamil-dominant Indian states.
In my first forays into enterprise business, Indian IT workers were quite terrible as they were still thinking “inside the box.” I’d often be frustrated that I could complete projects with a “strike team” of a handful of American consultants, but usually was saddled with Indian resources from Infosys, Cognizant, Tata. The enterprise would be able to hire 5-6 Indian resources for the price of one Western consultant’s hourly fee. Middle managers are often risk-adverse and went by SLAs that the Indians were able to provide, despite the fact that projects with Indian resources often took longer and made more mistakes. The SLAs really knocked out a lot of older Boomer/GenX Western consultants as being mostly independent consultants we were not able to compete. Many Millennial consultants just didn’t even try. I’m hard headed so I stuck with it.
Indians in the IT field used to be boxed in because they also came from a society that is highly hierarchical where leaders were often incompetent yet displayed tyrannical tendencies. There would be palpable fear in my Indian resources eyes when I told them I’d support them in going against their Indian “manager’s” incorrect decisions as I had ultimate control as project manager.
Over time though the Indians leveled up by recruiting Western consultants and learning lessons from Western “out of the box” thinking. Nowadays Indian IT consultants are quite good as they have a training pipeline for lower experience people. There is still some drone mindset, but much less. This shows the importance of considering other viewpoints and ways of doing things. Filipinos exist in much of the same “boxed in” thinking, and can level up the same way the Indians did.
Visayans mostly speak good English by default. A lot of Visayans starting their showbiz careers in Metro Manila had to learn to speak Tagalog properly first.
Visayans may yet surprise everyone as they always had to see two frameworks at least: the Manila framework and their own framework or perspective.
These two thoughts are related, Ireneo. about linguistic hierarchy and hegemony. of course not all languages are equal, Navajo and San and Aboriginal languages have been found to have more nuanced concepts of time and space. yet English is on top. so just cuz its on top now has nothing to do with its superiority, just means market share bigger. you wanna understand consciousness probably learn San or Navajo or other such languages with time/space concepts.
To Proud Pinoy’s point, if he’s Tagalog theres a good chance he’s using his own language to establish dominance on other Filipino languages (thus its speakers). and your point about Visayans is mainly cuz they are number 2 in the food chain over there, and can easily supersede Tagalogs by simply using English, hence that “default”. they are just playing the heirarchy game.
In conclusion (sonny I don’t know if thats part of adverbial connectives, but I use in conclusion a lot now too, lol, even when not concluding , lol, like in conclusion I will have coffee then tea and who knows what else before finishing, lol.), theres no linguistic hierarchy or hegemon, your mind can fit as many languages in your head , the more the better. sure it gets harder when you get older, and 0-7 years is the best cuz you’re like a sponge, cram as many languages as possible in there.
That aside, languages and mastery (or doesn’t even have to be mastery, just memorized phrases etc is good enough). it needs to be used. so thats all DepED needs to understand, talk and listen, talk and listen, listen and talk, wash and repeat. then get on blogs or social media, and supplement your talk and listen, with write and read, read and write, etc. etc.
LC, I ALWAYS went out of my way to speak perfect, grammatic English during my first 4 years here in the US; result: I either turn heads or stuck out like a sore thumb!!
On top of different languages, code switching too is important (or not depending on what you’re doing). this is dialect stuff or slang, language evolves, if you’re talking like a book or speak a language style from a by gone era you will still out, if sticking out is the purpose then good, if not remember that bar scene in Inglorious Bastards when that SS was evesdropping on them, and he says I agree with Max you’re speaking an unfamiliar dialect of German… best to keep mouth shut and resort to pantomine. for me, though I like it when people speak perfect cuz I cannot do this, i’ve heard this ‘perfection’ from other non native speakers and I learn something new from them, cuz my English sucks. like Rep . Barbers in Quadcom hearing asking congressmen/women if their question was ‘germane’, and I’m now using it when some one interrupts my stream of consciousness. like wait , is this germane? lol.
sonny, did you ever get into Chicago black slang over there? i’d imagine 70s and 80s over there would’ve been a trip. I remember when Ebonics was a thing then it wasn’t and same issue levied on black population about speaking the perfect King’s. and blacks just ignore all that and speak whatever however they want. but in employment though, and its true for the military, especially the Marines, you’re expected to talk like some Mid-Western media news personality. and thats that linguistic hierarchy, hegemony all over again. totally arbitrary. no basis on reality, just axiology i value this more than that stuff. I’m Googleing art brut now , sonny, about art done by schizophrenics specifically. and realized Carl Jung’s Red Book is that. art and language are the same i feel, sonny. just be careful not to ascribe perfection to it, truth is what its for, elusive it must be. though practicality wise Joe’s espousing of getting a bit of said market share is also a good reason to learn English, but i’ll go one step further and encourage everyone to learn all Filipino languages as well as English. most in Mindanao speak 3. but just use it should be the mantra. don’t let it die. lots of languages dying these days.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outsider_art
Ascribe no heirarchies. Save all languages. or as much as you can.
Even bird speaks cat, lol:
Even within Austronesian languages themselves, there are hierarchies, Javanese with its court culture of old having the most speech levels:
https://languageboat.com/the-importance-of-speech-levels-in-the-javanese-language/
Tagalog with a somewhat less pronounced court culture classically had 2 implied levels, not 3 explicit ones like Javanese, and Manila Tagalog of today has practically lost them except for po which Visayans don’t use at all.
Chavacano has formal and familiar speech registers.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chavacano#Forms_and_style
The East Timorese upper class uses Portuguese much like the Filipino upper class used Spanish for a while and English later, to mark who’s boss.
Spanish lost its distinctiveness in the Philippines after its 1930s peak, MLQ3 wrote. By that time, “too many” spoke it, and Spain no longer had the old aura of power. English nowadays in the Philippines might be on the same route as call center agents are not seen as “high class.”
A certain type of English was similar to Ivy League English in the USA or Oxford English in Britain for quite a while in the Philippines. “You can’t sit with us if you don’t speak like us.” Please bring us our drinks if you are brown-skinned and flat-nosed, MRP might add.
Yes, beyond doubt, English is the primary language in my country. G. H. Abad
Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone
Good of you to say so, Gemino. I was wondering your thoughts.
5 years ago I would not agree even with abolishing the mother tongue as the starting language while schooling. Now I agree with that and BBMs proposal to have English as the main Language when dealing globally even Miss Universe. But if one has no command of the language then one must not refuse having interpreters.
It’s a downer that the 114 languages spoken here (when I arrived in 2005) are sure to see some passing on. I don’t know what the count is today. But the earth spins on, losing critters and languages like dandruff. But we get storms one after the other and there are big issues ahead. No time to weep.
That is the way things go when people interact more and those languages with more speakers are preferred. Until new “Dark Ages” come similar to the Bronze Age Collapse or the actual Dark Ages, and people grow apart again.
Romanian, Italian, French, Spanish, and Portuguese were all just Latin dialects around 300 AD while a Saxon in Germany and an Anglo-Saxon (whose folks had just drifted off to a rainy island while fishing) could communicate easily in 800 AD. Conversely, the Romans steamrolled nearly all Celtic languages on the European Continent to extinction while the Anglo-Saxons pushed the rest up the hills on the rainy island they settled. Most of the Philippine languages that recently went extinct or are close to extinction are Agta languages, BTW.
Joe, my difficulty with English is with adverbial connectives, e.g. however, moreover, etc.
No mind, sonny, we all struggle with some things. I once had a boss who simply could not stand it if I put “therefore” as a parenthetical in the middle of a sentence. So I’d put them there every now and then out of pure mischief. And spelling is my big problem. I keep saying the Philippines is fuedal.
Germans speaking English in literal translation of German grammar and expressions sound like in the video below.. weirdly Shakespearean:
Hahaha! This video reminds me of our Speech/Audio Lab classes at Concordia College where our conversational English were recorded so we can listen to the absurdity and hilarity of our Barok and Carabao English and learn polished and professional American English. We were taught about diction, grammar, enunciation and the other mechanics of spoken and written English.
Thus the reason for the push of the mother tongue, the dying languages. Some are dead already and they want resurrections.
Even among the dozen or so major languages with around at least a million speakers, some are fading into the background.
When Joy Esquivias from Sorsogon got 4th place in the Voice of Germany, the local radio station in Casiguran interviewed her in Tagalog when she went home. I would not have been surprised if that had happened in Camarines Norte, which is adjacent to Quezon.
Wouldn’t be surprised if Bikolano goes the way of Neapolitan in Italy, spoken at home but in public they all speak Italian.
I have read that Pangasinan and Bolinao languages are being pushed back.
Joey has written about how Cebuano aka Visayan is used also by different Visayan groups to communicate with one another, especially in Mindanao, IIRC. In a world of mass media and mass travel, languages with more speakers prevail. Tagalog, Cebuano and Ilokano will.
Re Cebuano in Mindanao.
I concur especially in Davao City.
bisaya, a language spoken by many money launderers, haha. and it is to cebu city that most come to bank their secret hoards and stashes. cebu is fast getting richer and may soon give makati city a very serious competition. and dabaw city is also fast on the uptake.
In the last 20 years or so I’ve visited Mindanao occasionally for projects or works I’ve noticed that in this time (comprising an entire generation ) native Mindanaoan languages have been dying out as especially the younger generation has adopted Cebuano as the lingua franca. In Muslim majority areas the lingua franca is Tausug regardless of originally ethnicity, though Tausug speakers often also can communicate in Cebuano to varying degrees.
It’s kind of a shame as certain ethnic groups like Chavacanos, Subanen, Butuanons, Manobos, Maguindanaons, Maranao/Iranaoans, Iranun, Surigaonons to name a few have beautiful languages. The youth have nearly completely forgotten their native languages, and the native languages are spoken mostly by the elderly. If Visayans complain about “Tagalog colonialism,” they are doing quite a good job copying the behavior in Mindanao.
There are pockets of other immigrant languages though. For example in Sultan Kudarat Ilonggo is the prominent language. A bit further south, there are many descendants of Waray internal immigrants in General Santos.
Native languages are going extinct. Supposedly there are still a sizable number of Dabawenyo speakers in Davao, yet from my observation Cebuano has taken over. Subanen are known for being a peaceful people (with gorgeous women). The various Moro and NPA conflicts on the Zamboanga peninsula in the 2000s was a major contributor to the destruction of Subanen as a viable language in my belief. As a Spanish speaker I enjoyed being able to communicate with Chavacanos, but on my last visit I barely met any speakers — just old lolos and lolas. Chavacano has been largely replaced by Cebuano and Tausug in Zamboanga City.
Of course one can say that throughout history weaker groups that were not able to resist the invading majority culture will inevitably dwindle. This much is true. Still the Philippines’ vast ethnic variety and culture are what makes her interesting to me. Eventually Cebuano culture and language which already has a strong foothold in the Visayas and Mindanao may even take over culturally the entirety of Leyte, as Tagalogs had taken over Luzon culturally besides the Ilokano areas.
BTW have you heard of the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskayan_language in Bohol and the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskaya_people that use it ritually?
“..The Eskayas speak a Boholano dialect of Cebuano in daily life. Boholano Cebuano is the dominantly used language among the languages spoken by the members of the Eskayan tribe. This variety is used in their close familial interactions, in their conversations with their neighbors in the community, in their transactions in the barangay, school meetings, social gatherings, church rituals and in the trade and commerce. However, they are better known for their auxiliary language, known as Eskayan, or Ineskaya, which is used for prayers, songs, and formal speeches. Lexically, Eskayan shows no clear relationship with any known language (however, considered to be an encryption of Cebuano) although there is strong but inconsistent Spanish influence. A striking feature of the language is its unusual phonotactics..
..Under the direction of Mariano Datahan, the group converted en masse to the nascent Philippine Independent Church in about 1902. Community members revere the entity Suno which is conflated with the Santo Niño, and in addition to weekly church services they are served by appointed spiritual leaders known as biki and beriki. The biki, or bishop, is responsible for performing harvest ceremonies and other rituals such as house blessing. Before a house can be constructed, a ritual is performed in which a spiritual leader asks the permission of the spirits. If permission is not granted, the builder must select a new site. The Eskaya also retain spiritual traditions once widespread in lowland Boholano rural communities..”
“..According to speakers, the Eskaya language and script were creations of Pinay, the ancestor of the Eskaya people, who was inspired by human anatomy. Pinay’s language was “rediscovered” in the early 20th century by Mariano Datahan (born Mariano Sumatra, ca. 1875–1949), a Messianic rebel soldier who transmitted it to his followers. Datahan had founded a utopian community in southeast Bohol in the aftermath of the Philippine–American War, in order to resist imperial claims and establish an indigenous nation in Bohol, and the Eskayan language and script were seen as the embodiment of this incipient national culture..”
Well, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised about the island that produced the likes of Tamblot and Dagohoy, whose followers held out in the mountains even after his death.
Seems they retained a lot of the indigenous “magical datu” culture over there.
I’ve been to the Eskayan barangays, but what struck me was they seemed to just speak the regular Boholano dialect of Cebuano. I’ve also heard quite a few stories about the Eskaya, including all the conspiracy theories and legends. I’ll admit for a while I thought they might have been another Marcos Sr. era hoax like the Tasaday. I’ve concluded that the Esakaya were probably a semi-isolated group of Boholanos who retained some animist beliefs that they later syncretized with Catholicism. Possibly they were also influenced by Datahan’s preaching. Then again, in the bukid across the Visayas and Mindanao, one can find many probinsyano who retain quite a bit of old animist beliefs that were syncretized into local Catholicism to varying degrees. By the way, you probably knew this but one of the most effective ways the Spanish friars converted natives in the Americas and the Philippines was by explaining Catholicism through an animist lens that natives would understand, causing many cultural practices of Latinos and Filipinos to contain echoes of previous native animism.
Joey, these things were to die for. I thought they were tamarindo paste at first, then tasted it and fell in love instantly. I felt like a tarsier out of his cage. do you have ingredients and how to make these over here? also Mexicans make tamarindo paste here but theres isn’t as good as the way they make ’em in the Philippines, served in banana leaves. if you have ingredients for that too, i’d love to try to make ’em.
https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1992165/its-back-to-filipino-and-english-from-kinder-to-grade-3-classes they will still have the option of using the mother tongue as an auxiliary language in places where it is homogeneous. And will review stuff based on actual success. Like wow..
On Twitter some years ago, a veteran DepEd teacher told me mother tongue based instruction was a mess in places like Metro Manila where people have many different mother tongues including English, as there are families nowadays that raise their kids with English first. Even the patriotic Youtube influencer Cashual Chuck (famous for “Filipinos that made Filipinos proud” and complete docus on SB19) raises his kids in English. I get the point of mother tongue based instruction as the map between reality and words is first built in your mind in the language you speak at home. If the map you learn in school is somewhat in sync with the map you have learned at home, better for comprehension in the long run. Some ethnic groups here in Germany, like Munich’s Greeks, have supplementary schools in their own language to bridge the gap in early years as certain migrant groups don’t speak German at home. Possibly, the bridge for those with rare mother tongues in PH could be Youtube videos with cartoons. Kudos also to the House for not throwing away the good in K12 with the bad. They have learned a bit.
Even the patriotic Youtube influencer Cashual Chuck (famous for “Filipinos that made Filipinos proud” and complete docus on SB19) raises his kids in English.
Theres a bunch of Filipinos like this, good intentioned parents lay down the law English only household. great if they live in the hustle and bustle, kids have friends who speak local languages play together etc., effectively learning English and local languages. but if in cloistered subdivisions, or friends also in the same boat, when they interact say outside the home they’ll find it difficult to express themselves.
Thus the reason for the push of the mother tongue, the dying languages. Some are dead already and they want resurrections.
Though I agree with karl here, just keep pushing for bilingualism or trilingualism or more. its not either or. Just requires a lot of input, then elicit that output, listen and talk. input is passive, output you gotta really have ’em talk. and the listener ideally should be fluent, but just to practice getting repetition in using words grammar and meaning down can be a peer to practice use. that’s most important.
Same with reading, reading is passive. But writing is a totally active process. keep pushing for active, talking (and writing). though active listening and active reading are also a think, but that’s more academic stuff. talking talking talking… that’s how you prevent language deaths, karl. save ’em all.
Some ethnic groups here in Germany, like Munich’s Greeks, have supplementary schools in their own language to bridge the gap in early years as certain migrant groups don’t speak German at home.
It’s Armenians for us here in Socal, Ireneo.
Glendale, as I recall, was the Armenian center in LA.
Yup and up towards the 210 fwy. a lot of Armenian schools in the valley too. Van Nuys etc.
Is abolishing the mother tongue as a medium of instruction in early childhood education a done deal? I think it is logical to use the mother tongue to introduce the national and secondary language at least in the Pre-K and K level. Could you please tell me what made you change your mind?
I will check on the status JP. It is more of if you could not beat them join them. Mass migration would make changes on the dominant language spoken a region. If the former majority turn into.minority then would they gave the right to force their mother tongue onto the others with different mother tongue than theirs. I hope I made sense. If not let us find ways to make it sensical.
Thank you Karl. What you posted made a lot of sense.
Thank you JP and my pleasure.
It lapsed into law JP.
https://legacy.senate.gov.ph/lis/bill_res.aspx?congress=19&q=SBN-2457
“The medium of instruction shall revert to Filipino and, until otherwise provided by law, English, pursuant to Article XIV, Section 7 of the 1987 Constitution. The regional languages shall serve as auxiliary media of instruction.”
Note that schools retain the option of using regional languages if that works best for them.
Many thanks Joe.
Unfortunately, even some college graduates nowadays don’t know or they are not aware of proper grammar. In my more than twenty years of stay at Bank of the Philippine Islands, we spoke to clients in English, write correspondence in English.
My only grandson is bilingual. My daughter and son-in-law taught him how to speak English early but he also speaks Tagalog fluently. Some of his classmates tag him ‘English boy’.
Yes, I think there has been some regression with the breakdown in education, covid, etc. But it penalizes Filipinos.
Patriotism and Nationalism are concepts that derived from national awakenings in the 18th century, most closely associated with the American Revolution (patriotism) and the French Revolution (nationalism). As Irineo and I have explored various historical context, I have remarked that nationalism holds the Philippines back.
Unlike nationalism in France, Spain or Italy where other ethnic groups and language groups were subsumed into the nationalistic image, the fractured nature of and distance separating the Philippines islands provided resistance to imposing a national identity based upon Filipino nationalism as defined by the Tagalog-dominant groups of the Revolution. In my own historical understanding, this was evident early on by the constant pushback of other Philippine ethnic groups and the lack of will or resources in Manila to more forcefully subject others.
Perhaps even by the Third Republic statesmen still didn’t have the benefit of hindsight that history provides. But by now it’s quite clear that “Filipino” (the artificial language construct) has failed. Tagalog-first policies and programs have failed. Largely independent peoples don’t like to be subjugated, by force, culturally or otherwise.
English was always a better choice as the national language and lingua franca, as English is a neutral language that most can agree upon. Filipino nationalists and the Filipino Far Left clash on many issues, but they seem to both agree that English for whatever reason is “imperialist.” This naive thinking is one of the reasons why the Philippines has been held back. In the US today, English is lingua franca yet go to any public space and one can hear a dozen or more mother languages being spoken out in the open, with Americans switching to English when inter-group communication is necessary. In countries around the world, education secretaries and ministers are rushing to provide English language lessons to better prepare their students for a modern, cosmopolitan (citizen of the world) reality. There is a reason why international business is conducted in an agreed upon language (despite what the French nationalists have to say in their insistence that French be co-equal hehe).
We must get away from Filipino nationalism. Nationalism is a concept of ethnic superiority to the exclusion of others, even citizens of the country. It hasn’t worked out well for the Philippines. The Philippines should stop making the same mistakes continuing now for over a century since the Revolution. Instead Filipinos should discover patriotism, which is the reverence to an idea, an ideal, that can be universal enough that all can participate as patriots despite mother culture, personal creed or beliefs. Making a neutral language that nearly every Filipino already uses to varying degrees of competency as lingua franca would be a start.
Nicely put. Nationalism that promotes exceptionalism is indeed troublesome and I used to cringe when President Obama claimed it for the US. Nationalism that puts everyone on the same team, say in the event of war or calamity, or just feeling good about ones homeland, helps strengthen the nation through bonding. For the Philippines, English is the clear path to unity and enrichment, Tagalog to regional strife and global non-competitiveness.
Well nationalism that puts everyone on the same team is almost always exclusionary and expects conformity. Nationalism does not have room for new ideas, and in fact is against evolution. Nationalism is inherently conservative and regressive, often being based on ethno-mythology that is inflexible. In cases that nationalism can have positive results, such as rallying the people in case of war or calamity, patriotism can do the same thing but better. The Philippines should discover patriotism which unites and enriches based on shared ideas, and abandon nationalism which forces Filipinos to twist into knots to justify and make sense of the many contradictions in Filipino history, culture and life thus continuing to confuse everyone over a century later.
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-anarchism-and-other-essays#toc7
What’s the opposite of nationalism though? Globalism? but thats more a capitalist mask, more similar to Colonialism. is there such a thing a Cosmopolitanism like in practice, where its more like how Joey’s life would be, traveling making connections with the world not thru business but with people. less like Lee Greenwood’s stupid song and more like Woody Guthrie’s This Land is your Land, except by land its actually the whole world. that’s being meant. cuz i’m totally aboard on this. cuz just the other day I watched MY OLD ASS which is some teenage teen drama comedy and I was totally crying and am all like dude (talking to myself) what the f is wrong with you, this is some teenage rom com (really good movie though), we’re just watching this cuz there’s no HBO Max and we have no access to DUNE Prophecy. my point and in conclusion, I’m open to Joey’s anti nationalism idea and wanna hear more about it and can I bring over my aliens, plasma consciousness and collective unconscious in to this new -ism. whatever we wanna call this new -ism.
Whether we like it or not, we all live in a cosmopolitan world. There is no going back to nationalist inward-looking society. But if the world wants that then so be it, because countries like the US that have all the national resources necessary within her borders will laugh away. A prominent example of nationalism today is the behavior of the PRC and Russia. The PRC despite its size does not have all the natural resources necessary for a modern economy, which is why the PRC became belligerent towards its neighbors. Russia has many of the natural resources within its borders, but due to being run by a gangster mafia that is incompetent at developing Russia’s resources, they find it easier to steal already-developed resources of other nations like Ukraine.
By the way, I gave your screenshot a quick read and disagreed with it. Then I realized it’s from an anarchist propaganda pamphlet. Anarchists are the worst of the worst, even worst than communists in my opinion. At least communists want to fashion a society where everyone but the leader works. Anarchists want to have a society where everyone else works, except them, and they still expect all the niceties of modern and civilized life. It’s no wonder anarchists mostly exist in the West, and anarchist communes are populated by rich, entitled White youth (or old White anarchists who never grew up because their trust funds allow them to stay as permanent complaining babies).
You use a harsh definition of the term, I suspect because extremists and dictators call group obedience nationalism. Patriotism to me is essentially love of country, no matter how disagreeable things can be. One is a command, the other more inward and voluntary, more inspired than led. I view nationalism as a policy effort to create a unity that people buy into. It gets into specifics, as a team is organized around roles and goals, and it for sure is innovative to be successful. It does not wait for people to feel good about things, but works to inspire them through a platform of actions that build wealth and security.
Having this discussion caused me to look up American nationalism, and your definition is pretty accurate. Trump is a nationalist, for instance. Nationalists impose restrictions (e.g., you have to be Christian, etc.) to be a true American. There is a form of nationalism, civic nationalism, that promotes the values America was founded on, equality, inclusion, etc. It cuts out the restrictions. But for now, I concede nationalism is a bad idea, generally.
When one gets into the semantics of “nationalism vs patriotism” the definitions can seem quite similar, and that’s because both concepts derived from the same time period in two inter-related national awakenings (Revolutionary America and Revolutionary France). However, the meaning of the two words have diverged quite a bit in the early 1900s with the rise of ethno-nationalism, thus giving nationalism bad connotation. Here’s a quick overview on the differences and a short history of the terms:
https://www.dictionary.com/e/patriotism-vs-nationalism/
But to simplify things, patriotism is the pure form of love and service to one’s country, while nationalism is the extremist version of misguided love to one’s country. America held to the pure ideals, while France devolved quickly into chauvinism and exclusionism with the excesses of the French Revolution. Both the American and French Revolutions had a profound affect on Western political theory.
The French eventually settled down with a more moderate version of nationalism. But French nationalism still expected each region and dialect of France to submit to Paris’ view, which stamped out regional pride and culture. Fascism in Spain, Italy and late Wiemar Germany took nationalism to an even greater extreme of ethno-nationalism and ethnic-racial superiority which forms the basis of most of the bad connotations nationalism has today. One can argue that Trump’s version of nationalism in MAGA follows similar themes of ethno-nationalism and racial superiority. Nationalism often requires to be rooted in an invented myth, usually based in ethnicity or legends of great bygone eras. Sometimes nationalism’s ethnic myths are invented, as in American nationalism strains that put all “White” people, most of which were non-Anglo Saxons that were previously looked down upon, into a constructed ethnic identity.
My issue with Filipino nationalism is that it’s just a weaker, more diluted version of the above examples. No shock here as the Kapitunan were mostly not members of the Ilustrados, and probably learned the wrong meaning of the stories Ilustrados brought back from Europe in relation to the nationalistic awakenings at the time period. I probably wouldn’t have an issue with Filipino nationalism if it was strong enough to will into existence a new national identity and national construct, but over a century later the Tagalog-dominated mythos has largely failed as other Filipino groups persistently opposed.
So that leaves me with patriotism. Patriotism is love of one’s country. Patriotism is respect and honoring the ideals, not a race, ethnic group, or culture, real or imagined. But patriotism is also service to one’s country and community, in forms great and small. Usually we understand a patriot as someone who paid the ultimate sacrifice in war, or the wounded. Certainly those who paid at great cost to regain Filipino pride to drive out the Imperial Japanese in WWII were patriots. The Ilustrados were also certainly patriots through and through. I’m not so sure the Filipino Revolutionary “heroes” as a whole can be defined as patriots, as they wanted to impose their order upon others. But those who serve their local community, even if their personal sacrifice is smaller, are still patriots by definition.
Patriotism is about “We,” while nationalism is about “Me.” I do hope that along with English being made a neutral lingua franca to ease ethnic tensions, Filipinos can learn the meaning and value of patriotism that promotes a new unity.
That works for me. I think all governments are self-dealers, more nationalist than patriotic, and most citizens are obedient patriots. We could do four quadrants of the Boston Consulting Group matrix, with one axis citizen directed weak to strong, and the other government directed, weak to strong. I’d imagine the Philippines would be in the weak weak box, the US prior to Trump, strong strong.
It usually takes great amounts of ego to go into politics. Sadly, too many politicians are opportunists and will say whatever they need to say to be elected, then quietly forgo their bombastic promises. The very thick faced will even blame others why they haven’t fulfilled promises. Not everyone is cut from the same cloth as Cincinnatus, who voluntarily gave up absolute power back to the people of Rome multiple times. But we can say some politicians despite their massive egos have the national interest at the forefront. They are harnessing their ego for the national good.
Strong civic participation results in (good) strong government. JFK understood this when he tried to reinforce early civic education and participation way back in the day. In my time, which is shorter than yours, I directly saw the effects of the degradation of education can have on American society. Uneducated and under-educated citizens make compliant citizens, which is why the billionaire-evangelical alliance started breaking local-controlled American education down at the local level. The fruits of their efforts are not evident as some studies have claimed the average adult GenZ American has the equivalent of a 5th grade literacy, which is functional illiteracy. I don’t believe Philippine dynasts are nefarious enough to plan such a long game akin to what is happening in America, but their lack of focus on education accomplishes the same result of compliant citizens.
The government facilitating positive change helps greatly, but in the absence of such, I hope we can start exploring alternative, non-government ways to affect that change for the Philippines. Civic organizations if strong enough can play a major part in change themselves, and/or by pressuring for better governance.
Google AI says there are “many strong NGOs” in the Philippines and provides a laundry list of examples. All kinds. I think Filipinos do have a generous spirit and so this doesn’t surprise me.
I’m obsessing over 2028 at the time so don’t wish to get side tracked on this. But if you’d care to pen an article, I’d be happy to publish it.
Well I certainly think *some* Filipinos have a generous spirit. Usually every family has a handful of such individuals who seem to have endless empathy and concern for their family and neighbors. Then there are some Filipinos who are simply takers and become belligerent even if they don’t get what they ask, then demand.
The problem to overcome is how to increase the amount of people with empathy and concern for their neighbors, which once opened up to a large scale would create a nation that is engaged with creating positive results. The successive waves of OFW and internal migration to earn for family survival has both positive and negative effects. The positive is the movement of people further homogenizes the Philippines as various ethnic groups interact. The negative is that family and friends networks are broken up and fractured, which creates less opportunities for societal cohesion and order. I would gander that the negatives presently outweigh the good, but civic organizations, religious fellowship, and NGOs can counteract the negatives.
Look where he got that definition of patriotism, Joe. From the Anarchist Library. Of course it will color and discount any concept related to a positive construct about a state/government/country. Your definition of patriotism is what every credible dictionary say it is.
Patriotism is about “We,” while nationalism is about “Me.” I do hope that along with English being made a neutral lingua franca to ease ethnic tensions, Filipinos can learn the meaning and value of patriotism that promotes a new unity.
Nationalism isn’t “Me” its the nation. Patriotism isn’t “We” neither, its literally father (patrios) meaning the nation, so its loyalty to the nation. like a one way street. the nation doesn’ t have to be loyal to you, though if it wants to survive it can be. its like one big one way circle jerk, you fuel one with the other. Sure we can play the coop this word so its ours game, or play revisionist with the word but its about loyalty to something fleeing, either a king or a nation.
The purpose of which (that’s nation and the patriot) is to dominate another nation-patriot domain, say China or the Philippines. sure you can be allies now, like current Filipino patriot and American patriot relationship right now having the same “goal”. but the moment the nation shifts (eg. revolution or election or via largesse) to another cost benefit interest, all that gets reimagined, to the point where that Filipino patriot will have to fight that American patriot, eg. see European alliances thru out history.
So you have to get outside the nation states model to understand the context of nationalism and patriotism. and how screwed up it is. example, Michael Corleone, was a patriot cuz he served in the US Marines, but then he got out and served literally his own father (patrios ) so that world patriot doesn’t apply to him anymore. ironically its the etymology of the word itself. but he’s not working to the nation’s interests, but opposite it. i could go on and on about corporations.
But lets take it further back, hunter-gatherer societies, of which some still survive to this day. Badjaos have to be forced to pick one of 3 nation states. Why? cuz thats the way it is. either they become Filipino, Indonesia or Malaysian. but actually they are loyal to the Celebes sea, predating nation states now surrounding it. but theres no national gov’t in the Celebes sea. if they join the AFP, is that patriotic? yes, but it would be totally arbitrary cuz where they’re from really is the Celebes sea. same for Bushmen of southern Africa, etc. etc.
lets go somewheres in the middle, but prior to nation states, in the Levant and Egypt (and Turkey/Greece) there are still monasteries as old as the Roman Empire or up to its collapse and still going now. those monasteries have seen empires and kingdom and countries fall. the monks inside sure will be of their generation but the age of those monasteries will not escape their understanding of how time and nation states work. those guys will never use words like nationalism or patriotism, they don’t have to they pre-date such concepts, same with Bushmen, Badjaos, etc.
and still survived.
Whether we like it or not, we all live in a cosmopolitan world. There is no going back to nationalist inward-looking society. But if the world wants that then so be it, because countries like the US that have all the national resources necessary within her borders will laugh away.
And this is why nationalism and patriotism fails exactly, because where we set borders is totally arbitrary. But that arbitrariness of where borders lie, usually done thru dominion and war, is at the heart of why Patriotism in the end is the ultimate virtue of the viscious (nations) and why either we come up with something better to make Greta proud, or we keep supplanting it. make no mistake Anarchism is just a place holder, its no solution. its merely there to say nationalism/patriotism has led us astry, we need to come up with something better,
“Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is against all forms of authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including the state and capitalism.”
I don’t think ANTIFA as anarchists, they’re just bored idealistic kids. you want long term anarchists, look to Quakers.
Civic organizations if strong enough can play a major part in change themselves, and/or by pressuring for better governance.
Agreed. I would just add also religious organizations that do civic engagement. the civic organizations that purport patriotism and nationalism scare me. although Boy Scouts/Girl Scouts not so much though it started as such, but they’re more like help the oldies and Bear Grylls stuff depending where they’re at. Team Rubicon I like. but again these organizations tend to be fleeting , look to other orgs…
hunter/gatherer societies, negritos, badjaos, lumads there I think have a lot to offer.
come to think of it dynasts too, cuz these are old family units, some i understand even go all the way back to Spain. and the Chinese dynasts though mostly will be merchant class, will also reach all the way back before nation states. hell even your family and lineage , Joey, will be a deep well to mine how orgs/families did things prior to patriotism/nationalism and how they still can. but this here is the goal,
because when we start going to Mars, etc. nation states will become obsolete by definition (no more borders, new ways to organize), and we’ll have to come up with a different word to replace patriotism. We have to be anarchists. not where black and go rioting on the streets but more like Quakers. supplanting old ways of thinking…
Patriot ———-> Nation
Patriotism ——> Nationalism
so how ’bout…
Love ————> Life (if plasma is indeed alive, then nonbiological life too)
That’s it.
My point here is to think wider. deeper. longer. bigger. you gotta encompass more and everything.
I think Greta can get on board this one. She should’ve handed off that Gaza stuff to Malala (she was probably all like, girl, i ain’t touching that! lol). Now our new Greta is RFKjr.
Patriotism scares you because I think you misunderstand the meaning of the word. Rather, it’s nationalism that should scare us as nationalism while it’s fine when it’s moderate, can quickly go off the rails into ethno-nationalism (ex: fascism). There are many scary people nowadays that claim the mantle of “patriotism,” but are in fact nationalists (ex: MAGA).
And I was in the Boy Scouts (Life Scout, one rank below Eagle). We did not do Bear Grylls stuff, though that would be nice to cosplay then go back to a warm hotel. We did stuff like hardcore backpacking across mountains. But we also did help in civil society, such as helping oldies.
Patriotism scares you because I think you misunderstand the meaning of the word.
Lee Greenwood’s song = Patriotism
We did not do Bear Grylls stuff,
Wait, every Eagle Scout i met, cuz they all get automatic PFC rank out of bootcamp just for being Eagle Scout, said they all had to drink their pee to get Eagle Scout.
Lee Greenwood is not a patriot. He’s a moron. Patriotism requires sacrifice. Nationalism requires no sacrifice, only empty emotion.
Patriotism requires sacrifice.
I agree, and why I’m scared of it, Joey. people gotta die. is why.
Many more people died in supposedly equal society, such as “communism.” And not all sacrifice requires dying for one’s countrymen. We can say a firefighter who rushes into danger despite personal safety is a patriot.
We can say a firefighter who rushes into danger despite personal safety is a patriot.
Cops and firefighters are not “patriots” the same reason teachers and doctors are not, Joey. Though Marcos during Martial Law operationalized DEPED along with army and constabulary to fight NPA. those teachers would be “patriots” if died or injured, cuz nationalism.
If the cop, firefighter, teacher or doctor made a voluntary, personal sacrifice in the greater good of their fellow countrymen, they would fit the definition of “patriot.” If the cop, firefighter, teacher or doctor did not make a voluntary, personal sacrifice for their fellow countrymen, then they are not a patriot by definition. By this reasoning, firefighters have many more opportunities to perform patriotic duty than cops, teachers and doctors.
As for your example of Martial Law, even if the person was operating under the undemocratic Marcos regime made a voluntary, personal sacrifice for the greater good of the countrymen, they would also be patriots. If they simply were following orders and were in it for money or coercion, then they would not be patriots.
I have explained how patriotism and nationalism are related terms, but the two words don’t mean the same thing.
If the cop, firefighter, teacher or doctor did not make a voluntary, personal sacrifice for their fellow countrymen, then they are not a patriot by definition.
Now i’m wholly confused, Joey. so if they don’t do this voluntarily and personally sacrificing, then they are not patriots? or is it that their employment cuz then county sanitation workers or sewage plant operators where would they fall?
I have explained how patriotism and nationalism are related terms, but the two words don’t mean the same thing.
Agreed. and why I said one fuels the other. the relationship is not acyclic, but cyclic. like a circle jerk.
I once asked Benny of GRP about heroes.
Joe: “Are soldiers who dive on grenades to save their buddies heroes?”
Benny: “No, they are good soldiers.”
Think of things this way: If someone keeps loudly claiming something, like some men nowadays claiming to be “alphas,” they are probably not that thing. No real alpha needs to claim to be an alpha, people would just recognize it. The same goes for patriots. Many Americans claim to be patriots (mostly MAGAs), yet if they were true patriots they would not need to claim to be a patriot. Patriotism requires volunteer, personal sacrifice for the community around them, and most importantly patriots are usually the most humble people among us.
I don’t know anyone who became a firefighter for the money; firefighters don’t really earn that much money. Firefighters become firefighters because they want to serve the community despite possible personal danger. If someone wanted money they would become a cop lol.
County sanitation workers or sewage plant operators are jobs that don’t convey patriotism. But let’s say if the sanitation worker saw a baby hanging off the freeway overpass and rushed to save the baby, they would be a patriot. Patriotism isn’t a job. Patriotism is an act of selflessness that often requires losing something personally or sacrificing for the greater good.
and no, the relationship between the words is not cyclic or a circle jerk. Patriotism and nationalism are distinct words with different meanings, though they derived from the same time period. I have explained this many times in previous comments.
The concept of Patriotism/Nationalism requires heroes, same with martyrs, Joe.
but I do agree with service and sacrifice. like for your buddy, or your family or your community, even strangers, where there’s directness involved.
But when it gets into abstractions, heroes and patriots is problematic for me, Joe. like dying for your faith, or like Lee Greenwood’s stupid song, defend her til today. if that defense isn’t like Red Dawn, then forget about it. it’s bulshytt.
No, you’re conflating political propaganda (good or bad) that makes those who paid the ultimate sacrifice to be heroes and martyrs. I don’t think anyone who made a split-second decision to take a grenade for his battle buddy ever thought about “Hmm I’m going to jump on top of this live grenade and blow myself up so I can get a posthumous MoH.” They’re thinking “I’m going to save my buddies so they won’t die,” that’s it.
I think your point of contention with the word “patriotism” is due to misunderstanding the meaning of the word, and focusing more on the propagandistic aspects that are pushed by certain (usually right-wing) politicians.
I don’t know anyone who became a firefighter for the money;
LOL, then that’s where we differ , Joey.
I think your point of contention with the word “patriotism” is due to misunderstanding the meaning of the word, and focusing more on the propagandistic aspects that are pushed by certain (usually right-wing) politicians.
Actually, i’m kinda curious now that you have such a hard on for this word, Joey. like you should be in agreement with me. because this word is usually conjured up when nations go to war etc. etc. but you’re redefining it for hero, or service or sacrifice, like every day use, well those words already exist, why make it patriotism? patriotism is very specific, its in service or sacrifice usually heroic, for the nation. for national interest, Joey, and some random county sanitation worker saving a kid is just not it. nor police nor fire nor water & power. not even a clerk for city hall.
I have a hard on for this word because words have meanings, both in the definition sense of meaning and in the societal-cultural meaning. I’ve explained both haha.
And the incorrect understanding of the word due to the over-valorization of the US military after 9/11 caused this. This is an extension of the culture wars in the US that was entirely fabricated by the GOP since the 1990s. In fact, the over-valorization of the military was started partly to cover up Bush Jr.’s eff-ups after the Iraq II invasion. Now we have cops cosplaying as special operators and calling themselves “patriots,” and even have civilians who cosplay as military and call themselves “patriots.” The word got dumbed down by right-wing propaganda, but the meaning is still there even if people don’t want to recognize the true meaning. People choose to pick and choose what to believe I guess. Even if it’s completely wrong.
Patriotism in its actual meaning is good. Filipinos should embrace it.
Patriotism in its actual meaning is good. Filipinos should embrace it.
… and you don’t think it can be coopted exactly the same way that you’ve perfectly outlined above, Joey?!!
Nationalism can co-opt and cloak itself in patriotism, yes. But that still doesn’t mean nationalism and patriotism is the same.
If you say words have meaning, then how s it that it can easily be coopted then, Joey?
Co-opt means someone is lying to twist meanings. It doesn’t change the actual meaning. It just means a bunch of people are not smart enough or curious enough and believe whatever someone else claims it is. Someone can constantly lie that the sky is purple when it’s blue, and it doesn’t change the fact the sky is still blue even if a bunch of people now incorrectly believe the sky to be purple.
It’s not lies or twisting, Joey, the subtlety of the concept is here:
dependent on which side you’re on.
This quote is an example of moral relativism. But the good thing for us is the majority of the world has more or less settled on moral norms. And misapplying quotes like this muddies the truths of moral norms. Contrarians are often wrong.
I enjoyed this read, LCX. Sometimes we do get tied to words, and the tying is like an anchor that blinds us to deeper meanings. We find comfort in our opinions even if they are not actually accurate. Thanks for the stretching exercise.
Thanks for the stretching exercise.
My pleasure, Joe. and good nite.
LCpl my man, it’s gonna be difficult to argue the meaning of words with a Linguistics degree holder who once got a perfect score on the SAT Reading and Writing exams haha.
Your premise is incorrect as you misunderstood the word root and etymology of “patriotism.”
The etymology of the English word “patriot” derives directly from Middle French “patriote” (compatriot), which comes from Latin “patriōta” (countryman) and further from Greek “patriṓtēs” (of the same country). Going further back in the etymologic reconstruction of Ancient Greek, the root would be “patrís” (father land) which is an alternative form of “patḗr” (father, one of the epithets of Zeus). Linguistically we can also understand the root word to mean “father land” or “Zeus land.”
The Latin “patrios” is the plural of “patrius.” Patrius is a Greek loan word to Latin, the meaning of which goes back to the proto-word “patēr,” which one can correctly identify from the previous etymologic explanation as going directly back to the Greek root word “patḗr.” So we can conclude etymologically that the Latin “patēr” means the same as the Greek “patḗr,” that is to say “father,” and also in this case the Roman name of the epithet of for Zeus, which is Jupiter. And as the Romans/Latins borrowed greatly from the Greeks, we can also understand the root word to mean “father land” or “Jupiter land.”
So as I explained, the Latin patrios which formed the basis of your premise connects directly to the proto-word at the root. While the English word “patriot” is derivative of additional meanings much further from the proto-word root. Latin is not as complicated as Ancient Greek, and thus Latin lost a lot of the meanings of word variations even if certain words shared the same proto-word root.
Therefore your entire argument that follows is incorrect 😀
P.S. Quakers were far from anarchists. Quaker society was and still is highly organized, which is the opposite of anarchism. I have studied political theory and political systems extensively both privately and in university, and can share the history of the nuances between Far Left political ideologies at a later time if it is relevant to our topic at hand.
Therefore your entire argument that follows is incorrect
I don’t see how its “incorrect” , Joey. Plane me more.
Quakers existed hundreds of years before the modern understanding of “anarchism.” The modern anarchist movement grew out of the Leftist workers movements I reaction to industrialization. The leftist workers movements quickly split into Anarcho-communist, socialist, and liberal factions near the very start. Socialists have since moderated and we can see most of their ideals in “old school” progressivism. The anarchists and communists were kicked out of the workers movement near the beginning. Then the communists kicked out the anarchists, or otherwise used anarchists for communist goals (see Bolshevik Revolution, where the communists quickly suppressed/killed off the anarchists after Bolsheviks won in the Russian Civil War).
I was going for the peace and anti-hierarchy comparison, Joey.
Without hierarchy there is no modern society. Societies rose because people decided to specialize duties/jobs. Your line of argument here is quite muddled. I think the more correct line of argument is to move towards fairness in relation to the effort and value people give back to society.
the effort and value people give back to society.
Agreed. and why I included hunter/gatherers and monastics. as well as Michael Corleone and Neo.
If I may suggest, argumental reasoning regardless if correct or incorrect, is much more effective if the reasoning is focused. Throwing a bunch of random things or examples together that don’t have any connective tissue is why your comments often get pushback.
Less hierarchy is better is all i’m saying , Joey. are there no-hierarchy systems? sure. Plasma consciousness and Collective unconscious. psychics and mystics. In this world, the Quakers comes closest to me, they have Meeting for Worship (programmed or unprogrammed, no hierarchy vs. some hierarchy). then Quakers have Meetings for Business etc. where they come together, like Worship, but theres worldly intentions in their meditations , then a decision for this and that, like getting their roof fixed or expanding their parking lot, etc. etc.
This articlesays Filipinos still proficient in English.
https://www.bworldonline.com/infographics/2024/11/18/635357/filipinos-still-highly-proficient-in-english-language/
karl, i don’t see India. i wonder how India did in comparison to Philippines.
ahem, we beat china in that regard. china speaks the least english in the world compared to us filipinos. chinese preschoolers have to learn a minimum of 1000 characters before they can read and write.
filipino and english are both the official language in our country. though our citizens speak english if they want to be understood universally as english has a wider range and farther reach, understandable by almost everyone.
most of us are comfortable speaking filipino too, even those who have gone astray (overseas) for a long period of time found out that filipino is an easy language to fall back on, on their return home. foreigners also found our 2nd official language which is filipino an easy language to learn and master as filipino only has 20 letters in the alphabet compared to 26 in english.
oh, here’s India:
69
My son has been studying Mandarin for several years now. It’s hilarious listening to him gaming with Chinese players. Very good tonalities. I asked him, on a scale of 1 to 100%, how far along are you at being fluent. I was expecting maybe 60%. “About 5% he said.”
gamers have their own linggo and can get along fine. they have this uncanny ability to sus each other and so tuned in – that they can almost read each other’s mind.
That’s true. Patterns repeated thousands of times get drilled into the brain as data.
NPC is now used everywhere and for all situations these days.
these guys are perfect fodder for patriotism, Joe.
The more NPCs you have in a nation, meaning individuals who cannot partake in said wider narrative (re Anathem, they’re called slines) the more easily they can be swayed to do this and that for your “country”– but actually national interests dictated by one single person (Putin/Xi) or shadow entities (banks/companies/USelites) define said interests.
The fact that patriotism is now thrown around like its good. per Joey, means we’re headed the wrong direction. its par for the course in China and Russia, they have more NPCs thus more patriotism. the difference is in skepticism and dogmaticism. Americans are usually on the side of skepticism. but lately with all this talk of patriotism and “thank yous for your service”. and Lee Greenwood,
and Trump and his hawks, America i think is headed now to the dogmatic direction re patriotism. when skepticism should be the default. as words like patriotism is thrown about.
Joe: “and also that debating words is a distraction to understanding unique contexts.“
that’s the unique context we’re in. Because as shitty as China and Russia are, we’re usually the ones starting these wars. although I agree some preemptive strikes are warranted, most of the wars we start tend to be unnecessary. leaves people worst off.
So a Filipino patriot should be both wary of Chinese and American patriots. I guess thats the main take away here. but the number of patriots (read true believers) is dependent of how many NPCs there are in the country. Americans should have more skeptics than dogmatic patriots.
Be more like Quakers, be more like Smedley Butler.
ahem, filipino patriots and american patriots speak the same language and trained using nearly the same military hardware and we are both allies united in the same cause. and believe it or not, we trained for the day of reckoning coz we have a common enemy. those chinese patriots are so out of our loop, and so hard to understand, they must really be aliens! not content with using water cannons and carrying machetes and bolos to hack at our boats when they could have used their robot dogs of war, aha, those dogs can backflip but cannot swim, okey dokey, here, doggy, doggy! the russians are using beluga whales.
we are both allies united in the same cause. and believe it or not,
Today we are, kb. But that can easily change. Thus a situation where there’s 3 different patriots mayhaps will happen:
Chinese patriot for China,
American patriot for USA,
Filipino patriot for Philippines.
Three different national interests. Two big fish, one small fish.
its one big fish, trusted, vetted and true, with a confirmed ally also trusted, vetted and truer; the other big fish is just a pretend big fish, now panicking that a bigger fish is looming.
Say Tulfo is elected president in 2028, kb. and it turns out Tulfo’s a Chinese mole Manchurian candidate, and dismantles USA alliance and build build builds up Chinese alliance.
Filipino patriot and Chinese patriot will officially be together.
Or say, Xi isn’t really doing anything just focused on China and the Arctic, but USA does a USS Maine and Gulf of Tonkin or whatever pretense,
now Filipino patriot is in another unnecessary war same same boat with American patriot (per Smedley Butler).
lots of scenerios where all 3 patriots can converge or diverge, kb. but for sure only one small fish.
No shock here as the Kapitunan were mostly not members of the Ilustrados, and probably learned the wrong meaning of the stories Ilustrados brought back from Europe in relation to the nationalistic awakenings at the time period.
Okay, after some coffee and thinking more about this. And rereading Anathem, cuz I just recommended to Joe that he tackle it again. i’m hoping he’s back into it. But I agree with this “stories” , Joey. at the end of the day, nationalism and patriotism are stories we tell ourselves. very much like propaganda. the difference being how much you buy into said propaganda. for example, US Marine is an identity i embrace completely and I can read about adventures in North African Barbary Coast and see myself there, or 8th and I barracks during 1812 war. etc. etc. cuz i’ve bought into it. 1775 and all. I’m sure if say you’re a monk in a monastery somewhere in the mountains or in the middle of a desert plateau you’d probably also relate to stories of ancientness or oldness of your organization you’ve taken part of. Same I’m sure with American, we’ve bought into it us Americans here born here or naturalized. its a great story especially cuz we’re hegemon right now. if I were Russian i’d probably look for a another narrative to join. cuz the story’s not going so well. same with Filipino. cuz in their story, they’re always losing or getting saved by others, etc. etc. Joey, mentioned the French well kinda similar. but if you focus further or focus in more micro- you’ll see eskrimadors or wine makers in France, and they have a narrative specific to them, that’s part of Frenchness or Filipinoness but where the story is more adventurous people are winning, especially French goat cheese makers. there’s something to be proud about. I’m sure Kalamay makers of Bohol will feel similar, eg. we’ve got this great product we’ve been making a long time now (like French goat cheese).
When nations fall, say we ‘ll get to Mars and Elon Musk is there, well we’re gonna be X’ers or Tesla-doids, not Americans or Filipinos, whether we keep using the word patriotism, i dunno, but Elon will come up with some sort of narrative to get our loyalty or simply keep us in line. more loyalty is if we get to participate more in said narrative or story. have adventures within it, like American patriotism right now cuz we’re hegemon. Filipino patriotism is more like Duterte youth or Marcos loyalist, not much of a narrative really. Filipinos go abroad and they default to ethnolinguistic groups, or eskrima or kalamay or lechon makers (like that really old Spanish restaurants that serve lechon but their cooks are all Filipinos). or town or city fiestas recreated celebrated abroad. My point, whether or not Katipuneros learned the wrong meaning or right meaning of Nationalism/Patriotism, at the end of the day it is still about whether individuals can have their own adventures (or Hero’s journey) within that story. This goes back to your “agency” giving DE Filipino agency, Joey.
Anathem is like that movie Mindwalk.
And TSOH is like Mindwalk.
Joe and karl’s been here from the very beginning, then there was Ireneo, i came shortly after, then this year Joey came into the picture. also kb, JP, etc. etc. folks who left folks whove returned… 10 plus years. what if joeam dot com will be here for another 100 years, or 1,000 years, or 10,000 years. today its just the Day Gate, but if we were cloistered interacting purely like inside a concent (monastery) in Anathem, (or the archived talks really) well in a 100 years or 1,000 years all this stuff we’re talking about here will have all but disappered. imagine Mont St. Michel and timelapsed of the world going by 1 day, 1 year, 10 years, 100 years, 1000 years and 10,000 years. well you have to pick something that’ll be constant. and stories will be that, but more importantly agency or simply put the agency which an individual can partake in that wider narrative, his own choose your own adventure individual story, eg. like Mr. Anderson and Neo in Matrix.
We can supplant Nationalism/Patriotism, but whatever we replace those concepts with, you have to allow personal individual adventures.
Lee Greenwood ————> Trump
Woody Guthrie ————-> LCPL_X
So in a sense, these are very much, acyclic graph each, or one DAG:
quick synopsis for those that don’t know what I’m talking about:
on the title:
well I guess this is germane now…
ooooops, this one…
Russia and the People’s Republic of China will never find a new story or narrative, as their cultures are quite revanchist. Basically they have told themselves a lie through historical propaganda, but then made the mistake of falling for their own lies.
Russian Imperialism saw itself as a continuation of the Roman Empire. That’s why Russian rulers had called themselves “tsar,” which is the Slavic version of the Latin “caesar.” The Russians see themselves as the Third Rome and legitimate successor of the Roman Empire (First Rome was the Roman Empire in the West, Second Rome was the Byzantine Empire). Russian neo-imperialism in Eastern Europe and Central Asia is an attempt to go back to that false national narrative.
The People’s Republic of China is built upon Chinese neo-imperialism, as the Han (Chinese) people originated in a very small part of China. This is why the Han have forced other “Chinese” ethnicities to become Han, and they are doing the same in Tibet and Xinjiang now. Historically China has seen itself as the “Middle Kingdom” that the entire world revolves around. Ancient Chinese emperors literally believed that everything their agents touched, belonged to the emperor which is the basis of the modern day behavior in the South China Sea.
Both the Russians and Chinese conveniently “forget” that the times their former empires were “great” was when outsiders had taken over. In the case of Russia, the Russian Empire was most powerful during the time the Golden Horde (Mongol subgroup) controlled the Russian lands. In the case of China, the various ancient Chinese Empires were “great” during the time various “barbarians” controlled China such as the Mongols, Manchus, Jurchen.
A country based on a lie will eventually collapse on itself. Certainly being based on a lie makes it much more difficult to create voluntary unity.
That’s my point about the narrative of the Philippines since the Revolution, which was based on half-truths, misunderstandings, and then the attempt to push that narrative across the islands was not forceful enough so thus failed. The Revolutionary project was one of the Tagalogs trying to force their square block into round holes of other Filipino groups, which was met with not only resistance but physically the blocks won’t fit. But that’s history. Filipinos can decide on a new future if they want. A future of unity through looking at what all Filipino ethnic groups share culturally as finding shared values/ideals. Continuing to push for a thinly veiled Tagalog-centric national identity will just not work because other ethnic groups won’t conform.
That’s my point about the narrative of the Philippines since the Revolution, which was based on half-truths, misunderstandings, and then the attempt to push that narrative across the islands was not forceful enough so thus failed.
We agree here. As to Russia and China never finding their stories, again… 1 day, 1 year, 10 years, 100 years, 1,000 years, and 10,000 years. the constant here is there will be a new narrative, that will replace Patriotism/Nationalism.
Hays…
Russian and Chinese neo-imperialism are textbook examples of the extreme form of nationalism.
It has nothing to do with patriotism.
So Russian and North Korean (hell maybe theres Chinese) soldiers in Ukraine, they’re not patriots then?
Oh, those Russians are definitely in Ukraine for the money, which is 7-10x plus the monthly pay of an average Russian. Heck, Russian mothers, wives and girlfriends are praying for their men to get killed so they’d get a bigger payout. North Koreans, well they are a brainwashed society and go where Dear Leader tells them to go.
Both are not patriots.
Both are not patriots.
okay, lets attack this from another angle, Joey, would you agree that Putin and lil Rocket Man (and Xi) would call them “patriots”??????????????????
Irrelevant as the Russians and North Koreans don’t agree with the concept of patriotism. They would use the word “martyr” or “hero” which derives from communist propaganda. In fact there was an entire bureau within the Soviet system for the express purpose of “Making martyrs.”
Check out Vladimir Komarov, a Russian cosmonaut who died unnecessarily due to the incompetence of the Soviet space program, when his capsule crashed into the ground after falling from space. After his death, the cause was covered up and he was made into a martyr, given the Hero of the Soviet Union and Order of Lenin, the two highest decorations in the USSR. An entirely false heroic story was constructed around his death that was believed by most Russians well into the 1990s.
They would use the word “martyr” or “hero” which derives from communist propaganda.
We’re arguing semantic and syntactic now, Joey. those words would all fall under the meaning of patriot in English, cuz we don’t really use martyr though hero. we do. but where there’s national interest, ie. invading Ukraine, there will be patriotism.
No, you’re arguing with someone who holds a degree in Linguistics haha. Come on buddy, we’re beating a dead horse at this point and getting quite far from the original discussion I was trying to get across with Joe which is patriotism is good, nationalism is bad.
But since you opened this new can of worms, first please define “national interest,” because it’s not going to mean what you think it means, especially in relation to the Russians invading Ukraine somehow being patriotic.
patriotism —–> nationalism ——-> national interest (eg. manifest destiny or invading Ukraine or 9 dash line) ——-> patriotism
One big circle jerk, Joey.
This is not the definition of national interest. National interest is defined as:
“The national interest is a sovereign state’s goals and ambitions – be it economic, military, cultural, or otherwise.”
Which derives from a saying of the medieval Italian diplomat Giovanni della Casa: “ragione degli stati” or “reason of state.”
So by this meaning, Putin is not acting in the national interest of Russia by invading Ukraine. Putin invaded Ukraine as a personal vanity project, and now he’s stuck there because he thought he would easily win in 3 days. If Putin withdraws he would lose all power as pretenses and the house of cards would fall.
There is no linear progression in the meaning of patriotism and nationalism. There’s a connective line, but not to each other but to the root word which I explained previously. Come on man we can’t just connect all the pins like a conspiracy theorist; things just don’t work that way.
Putin invaded Ukraine as a personal vanity project,
Interesting. Was Gus Grissom a patriot? Sure. A hero? No. A victim? Yes. A nationalist? That warrants research. Are all politicians by definition nationalists? It seems so to me because they advocate for policies that are restrictive on some. Are all politicians patriots? Not MAGA.
I’m enjoying the discussion.
The important differentiator of “nationalism” is the restriction is outward, such as the anti-immigrant policies of MAGA despite the fact that agriculture and meat processing work is done by cheap immigrant labor. Such nationalism also excludes citizens of the minority from agency as full citizens and seeks to remove the rights of those citizens (the denaturalization and deport narrative), or at a minimum convert them into a group of second class citizens with fewer rights.
I don’t think any reasonable American supports open borders or flouting of US law. The issue really is that there hasn’t been any major immigration reform since Reagan due to GOP opposition, and so recent immigrants are taking advantage of a broken and underfunded enforcement system. Those who claim asylum, which is a human right, often get to stay permanently since there aren’t enough judges to process claims in a timely manner.
I think all governments have some form of propaganda. The case of Gus Grissom and his fellow astronauts was certainly an example of US state propaganda. But the important difference is that in open societies propaganda tends to be positive extolling what is already true, while in closed societies like Russia and China the propaganda is usually negative pushing falsehoods as if it’s the truth.
Nationalism is not building a better nation by imposing racial restrictions, such as blacks only drinking fountains, or requiring “real Americans” to be Christians? What is that called then?
Nationalism should and must include nation building. Otherwise why call themselves nationalists.
Yes, and a nation can be built through both external and internal policies, it seems to me, so I’m having a hard time with Joey’s definition.
Nationalism in its extreme form has no problem with ethnicities outside of the majority existing, as long as those outside are subservient or second class. More moderate nationalism such as the French form, prominently in modern times displayed in Gaullism is fine with broadening the definition of who is “French.” My issue with nationalism is the quickness of which nationalism can go off the rails and enter extremist territory if there aren’t strong guards, which is displayed by for example Le Pen’s National Front/National Rally or Germany’s Alternative for Germany.
Or America, with Trump. What is interesting to me is that the Philippines moved past the nationalist Duterte as if he didn’t exist, its dynastic democratic infrastructure acting like shock absorbers. Dynasts seem like little nationalists to me. Marcos seems more the patriot, oddly enough, subsuming his personal gains to the wellbeing of the nation.
The words fail, in such scenarios. I think it comes from trying to overlay history on the present, when the present has its own context and complications.
I wouldn’t write off Duterte and Dutertismo that quickly Joe. The undercurrents that allowed Duterte to rise are still there, his supporters and tag-alongs are just fearful on speaking out their support because they’re afraid Marcos Jr. will do to them what Duterte threatened to do unto others. Mindanao was a lot closer to popular revolt than many far away observers think. The popular sentiment was only quashed when all the governors and the Moros opposed, and they control the local security apparatus. I wouldn’t doubt for a second that there would’ve been absolute chaos if those governors did not stand more strongly from what I saw on Cebuano language sentiment. So you’re right the dynasts ironically provided a bulwark. I still think Marcos Jr. is a bit incompetent and laissez faire in his governing approach, for better or for worse. Status quo is better than chaos, and allows room for opposition to organize.
I’m not writing Duterte off. I’m making the point that Philippine democracy, as dysfunctional as it is, has stability and staying power, and also that debating words is a distraction to understanding unique contexts. I just go with Humpty Dumpty, a word means what the speaker intends for it to mean. So you and LCX can use nationalism or patriotism however you wish, and if I don’t understand the point, I can inquire further to get past the word blockage.
I further think that President Marcos is like most presidents, a guy with a tough job who does good things and bad, and we can run a tote board while he’s in office, and draw a conclusion later. Everyone will do it differently than we would.
As I reflect on this, Marcos seems not to be a nationalist to me. He is more a populist and propagandist (not bad by definition), and a patriot. Or a wolf in really excellent sheep’s clothing, there is always the fact we have imperfect data.
I agree that Philippine democracy has stability and staying power even if the status quo isn’t where we’d both want it to be. There’s much room for improvement and reinvention.
Well I decided today was going to be one of the days I’d walk with LCpl down his rabbit holes. I’m feeling especially patient today, probably because I got a bunch of house cleaning done in preparation for some Black Friday purchases. I’m not sure if I’m regretting taking the walk down the rabbit hole yet though, but I detected a slight headache near the end. My original point was concise as can be but now we have a long muddy thread between me and LCpl hah!
Haha, I feel your pain.
As for democratic propaganda being truths and dictatorial propaganda being lies, I’d say that is a textbook distinction, but not one in reality. Bush touted WMD in Iraq, a lie, and Russians or China accurately pronounce America as intrusive, a truth.
Propaganda is marketing, the good or bad of it determined by whose side you are on.
Sure America can be intrusive in her zealotry to spread her beliefs and ideals, which creates problems when the other country does not want it. But I really have to disagree with Russia and China characterizing the US as intrusive without exposing their own skeletons. Both Russia and China, but especially China has a 2,000 year history of “intruding” upon its neighbors, often by force, as any Vietnamese or Korean will attest. The Han Chinese did not visit to spread ideals, they came to take and conquer. Of course it’s easy for Russian and Chinese propagandists to criticize the US, an open society, while they keep their own societies closed and suppress bad news. I’ll take the open society, warts and all.
“Russian mothers, wives and girlfriends are praying for their men to get killed so they’d get a bigger payout”. Maybe a few, anecdotally, but I’d guess this is not a true statement, in fact. Or cite it as a percentage.
This has been well documented by Russian speaking observers who translated phone call intercepts, and by videos made by wives themselves who are upset they didn’t get the full payout. Russian culture under Putin is a culture of death and cruelty. See this recent article from WSJ, journalist Matt Luxmoore a Russia specialist:
https://archive.ph/wtrq3
The article has a picture of two women grieving over the loss of a man, not cheering the wads of cash they received. “My son and husband earned this money with their blood,” Lyudmila said. She did not say, “oh joy, I can get an apartment now.”
Your statement denies the humanity of Russian women, and I don’t buy it. Yes, deathonomics is real, as is servantonomics in the Philippines, in the form of remittances. But, no, I don’t believe Russian women are happy to see their loved ones killed, for the cash.
I don’t sense any humanity in a culture that valorizes the wholesale rape, pillaging and destruction of a peaceful neighbor, whether or not that culture is fashioned by decades of propaganda or not (in the case of Russia it has been hundreds of years of propaganda following the roughly same lines). I would also suggest that Russia’s neighbors believe the same as they have experienced the Russian oppression firsthand. I’ve traveled both in Russia and Eastern Europe and Eastern Europeans have stark little good to say about Russians.
Likewise in Asia, the Philippines doesn’t quite understand it yet but there is a reason why China’s neighbors are always wary. Chiefly Vietnam and South Korea are the most wary of Chinese intentions. This happens when one has been subject to imperialism by a neighbor who refused to respect humanity for a thousand years.
Sure there are some Russians who are exposed to modern morality and disagree with Putin, but most of those are dissidents or have fled the country.
I don’t know. If my loved one died and I got a big cash payout, I would be living in mourning at first rather than rushing out and spending extravagantly. The fact that these Russian family members do is a tell in itself.
I disagree. Governments install and instill inhumane policies. People are individuals, humans, dealing inside that umbrella and are more victim than perpetrator.
Well the Russians have had over 500 years to figure that out and they have not as of yet. Sure a lot of this is learned behavior, but at what point do the people share in the blame? If we always infantilize a people’s agency they will never change. The first time I went to Ukraine was well before the 2004 Orange revolution. I thought at the time that Ukrainian society was quite similar to Russian society, that is to say a culture of repression. But Ukrainians starting in 2004 to 2014 overthrew their own oppressors because no government can overwhelm a mass movement. So why can’t Russians do the same? Come to think, even progressively minded Russians are hoping Putin will just eventually die rather than mobilize like the Ukrainians did and now the Georgians are doing. Permanent victimhood eventually becomes voluntary victimhood.
incidentally, maybe that’s why hamas terrorists readily invaded israel on 7th oct, they were promised ten thousand US dollar each plus apartment, and went on killing spree.
closer to home, the death of saf 44 at mamasapano sees thousands in payout, plus the 5million US dollars bounty on marwan’s head given to whoever brought down the terrorist marwan.
the families left behind by the saf 44 allegedly bicker over the money. it was hard to know who got what, who got more, and who got less.
Still, no one is calling for more slaughters so they can earn money.
they were promised ten thousand US dollar each plus apartment, and went on killing spree.
If I were a Palestinian in Gaza, had nothing going for me, just want vengeance, I wouldn’t care for any pay out. Most who went on Oct 7 , thought they weren’t coming back, they were wrong. IDF were actually asleep or in the West Bank. why Gazans kept pouring into Israel. so it was a suicide mission from the git go.
now do suicides martyrdom get compensated, sure surviving families. but the calculus i think is more vengeance, not money, kb.
When talking about cost benefits and especially paying with your life, I think (unless you have nothing to lose) most don’t think about money. they’ll die for a bigger cause, like nation or patriotism, or for God, or both. martyrdom payout just icing on the cake. not main motivator really.
ahem, lately israel have made so many martyrs of them, israel must really be commendable. had made their wishes come true, made their dreams come true too. martyrs galore.
nah, I dont really like war, too messy.
I prefer good housekeeping where things are where they should be, and everything tallies. and we have enough of typhoons messing up our localities and destroying our landscape, making housekeeping (inventories) a nightmare. supplies have to be replenished, broken bodies mended, broken minds, that’s another story.
I prefer good housekeeping where things are where they should be,
Me too, kb.
LCpl my man, it’s gonna be difficult to argue the meaning of words with a Linguistics degree holder who once got a perfect score on the SAT Reading and Writing exams haha.
I never took the SAT. nor a Linguistic degree. just Google, Joey.
No worries bud. I use Google a lot too, but it’s also important to be able to parse information to weed out clutter. I’m teasing you about my credentials, but the real reason why I was able to ace those exams is not due to intelligence but due to being well read. Being a poor kid has its advantages. While other kids had toys and videogames, all I had were books.
The effect of power birth rates, thinking school and university population resulting to dead majors and programs.
Some Unis with German language shut it down.
https://m.koreatimes.co.kr/pages/article.asp?newsIdx=386609
lower birth rates in SoKor.
the war in ukraine, the war in the middle east, it’s no wonder the world’s population is declining further.
True but I do not want LCX idea of depopulation.
This quote is an example of moral relativism. But the good thing for us is the majority of the world has more or less settled on… the truths of moral norms.
Would you say Smedley Butler was a patriot, Joey? If YES , would you say he was more a patriot pre-coup d’état or post-coup d’état , and Why? Then apply moral relativism and moral norms in the case of Butler vis a vis 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s. then post-coup.
What’s the difference between his patriotism pre-coup and his patriotism post-coup? According to your definition of patriotism. thanks.
And if you wanna apply it to GWOT or current events, please do so also.
Cuz i agree with Joe : Governments install and instill inhumane policies. People are individuals, humans, dealing inside that umbrella and are more victim than perpetrator. (i’d just add, nations use patriotism and other such propaganda to do so).
LCpl, I’m not up to walking with you down the rabbit hole today. That being said:
Smedley Butler was indeed a patriot, especially when he exposed the fascist Business Plot against American democracy.
I already explained moral relativism, among another things.
You may use “nationalism” and “patriotism” however you want, disregarding the actual definition and also disregarding how the words are used/misused; none of this changes the actual meaning of words and ideas.
As I praised you before, you’re a really smart guy but you often get sidetracked and connect things together that have no relation, as you are doing here. Trying to force entirely separate things together like water and oil, still doesn’t make the two mix. It’s not possible. Perhaps this is due to Google, which yes gives access to infinite information but we must parse out what is true or false from the Google result rather than taking the top hits as factual. Just because someone else said something doesn’t make it true.
This reflects in some of your contrary and syncretic beliefs, such as being pro-Bernie Sanders yet being pro-Sara Duterte. The two politicians are literally opposites. Bernie Sanders is a Leftist who wants to help people albeit in a misguided way, while Sara Duterte is a nationalist authoritarian who masquerades as a Leftist populist like her murderer father. Likewise, conspiracy theories like Bush Jr. this or Hillary Clinton that doesn’t make the conspiracy theory a fact. Not sure why you tend to try to bring this things into many discussions and force connections that are not there.
Personally, I think we should understand and respect meanings in things. I think we should look at what public figures say and compare what they say to what they do, as well as take both in the context of the situation. By muddying the waters, the truth becomes much harder to achieve. Such as what happened to my clear conveyance about why Filipino nationalism is bad and that Filipinos should adopt patriotism became a long-running, wide-ranging cluttered discussion far from my original point that had nothing helpful to add to the discussion in our context of developing ideas to help achieve progress in the Philippines. I don’t mind shooting the shit, but let’s keep that to mundane and inane topics, which I’m sure we will have plenty of opportunity for.
Smedley Butler was indeed a patriot, especially when he exposed the fascist Business Plot against American democracy.
here’s his take on your patriotism, Joey:
https://ia601004.us.archive.org/6/items/warisaracketelectronicresourcetheantiwarclassicbyam/War%20is%20a%20racket%20%5Belectronic%20resource%5D%20%20the%20antiwar%20classic%20by%20Am.pdf
I don’t mind shooting the shit, but let’s keep that to mundane and inane topics, which I’m sure we will have plenty of opportunity for.
MY OLD ASS was a good movie though.
Smedley Butler was a well-read man, much like many American general/flag officers. As such, what he meant here is the misuse of the word patriotism by nationalists during that time period. That still doesn’t change the meaning of the word patriotism, which remains the same. As I said, context, especially historical context, is important.
Haven’t watched that movie. I don’t have much spare time to watch stuff so I have a long watchlist of movies to watch.
the misuse of the word patriotism by nationalists during that time period.
It’s not “misuse” if thats the norm, Joey.
Haven’t watched that movie.
Have Kleenex ready.
Did you ever get to this side of Negros, Joey? was gonna ask you what the Catholic communities, lay and clergy both vis a vis townsfolks etc., then NPA and PNP/AFP (as well as DEPED teachers) interaction is now or the time you were there? and who would you say or invoke or ascribe more patriotism to? and why? obviously NPA can invoke patriotism too. and clergy/law folks. so how does it balance out with all 4 actors involved. and patriotism.
I’m trying to pin down this: to my clear conveyance about why Filipino nationalism is bad and that Filipinos should adopt patriotism
A norm, even if repeated endlessly or even if based on a lie still doesn’t not change the definition and meaning of a word.
Okay lets use norm and definition in Negros then, Joey. test it.
Both meaning and use (both my patriotism ——> nationalism, and your patriotism as “devoted love, support, and defense of one’s country; national loyalty” ).
AFP
PNP
DEPED
Catholic Church
townsfolk
NPA
Cuz this book I’m reading now, has NPA and Catholic Church then townsfolk with more patriotism, than the national actors listed above. 70s to 80s Marcos era. per your definition.
Which book is that?
Which i got trying to research Negritos in Negros, which ended up being a dead end (at least from my end). but turned out to be a good read, so far. have you read?
Not sure what you meant by Kabankalan. I didn’t notice any NPA there the last time I passed through on my way to Ilo-Ilo. In terms of NPA, in the Visayas they are mostly ethnic Bisaya common bandits who claim NPA affiliation in order to continue their nefarious deeds. Their common activities are robbing, highway robbery, and demanding protection money from poor farmers. That’s not patriotism.
I keep saying that while people can claim whatever and say something means whatever, it doesn’t mean that they are following the tenets of what they claim. As I said, no one can self-claim patriotism. The title of patriot is given to them by others for their sacrifices for the nation, often years or decades later. Likewise, all these men nowadays claiming they are “alpha” are obviously loser betas, because no true alpha needs to claim they are alpha. People recognize naturally who is the alpha and leader. So it’s the same, later on the countrymen will recognize who is a patriot by their deeds.
In the 70s and 80s, “devoted love, support, and defense of one’s country; national loyalty” was more ascribed to NPA and Catholic Church (for what they were doing there helping the poor and what not). If its open now no more NPA, then now is not a perfect test then, thought it would be like Bohol. so 70s and 80s we go. same area. Martial Law.
Haven’t read that book. Mostly I read history. The stories in the book you shared happened way before my and your time though by a decade so I don’t have any familiarity. However, NPA has never “helped the people.” Joma Sison’s philosophy was to foment a Maoist revolution by any means necessary. Joma’s NPA needed money to buy weapons from corrupt AFP/PC soldiers, so they got that money by shaking down the poor people. Farmers, small shop owners, families with many mouths to feed — the very poor people the NPA claimed to fight on the behalf of. Most NPA members were and still are either mentally unstable university students or common bandits. Much like the Maute clan in Marawi who used “Islam” for the same purposes, criminals often twist the meaning of ideologies to justify their criminality.
Most NPA members were and still are either mentally unstable university students or common bandits.
the NPA members were local kids known to the priest (author), probably more educated than their parents but no university students. not much politics of NPA covered really just the general stuff, but the Catholic priest paints them more as heroes (thus patriotic) cuz constabulary and army (and teachers) were more abusive towards local population. NPA did more to help locals. so too Catholic clergy. you’ll like this book, Joey, very Catholic and touches on your patriotism (per your definition, not mine), only the patriots are NPA. author doesn’t use this word though, but love and support of nation. or for that particular countryside. will write more on the book.
Joma founded the CPP in 1968, and the NPA in 1969. So I’m sure the very earliest CPP/NPA members in the early 1970s were more educated and idealistic. Almost all communist movements were started by idealistic students who have good intentions how to help society. However, the good quickly either get knocked out, killed, or become bad when they taste raw power when they can control the oppressed and weak. That’s pretty much what happened in every communist insurgency and successful communist revolution.
And the author is a priest. He might see the best in people. I’m not a priest. I’m wary of the darkness in others. Also if the priest author did not use the word “patriotism,” let’s not conflate meaning or try to force words into the author’s mouth. That’s connecting unconnected things again.
Also if the priest author did not use the word “patriotism,” let’s not conflate meaning or try to force words into the author’s mouth.
“devoted love, support, and defense of one’s country”, he checks off love and support and defense, why the kids join the NPA and go into the mountains. they come back and he helps ’em out as confidant, their priest and their friend. but army and constabulary he paints as opposite of love, support and defense (they’re more about hate and offense). only its very localized the area i’ve circled in the map.
But Marcos would totally say his army and constabulary (and teachers) were patriots, back to my definition. like see-saw, Joey.
The time period the priest writes in was before NPA started killing a lot of people who would not pay them protection money. In early Martial Law, Joma and the NPA pretended to be the force of good. They ripped off their mask within a few years.
That might be true too (re sweet spot), but I’m just getting at the NPA being a direct result of Martial Law (army/police) pressure, thus the reaction to army/police would then be in fact patriotic (per your definition).
Theres weird little trivia too where priests are doing away with sponsorship for confirmations, etc.
But he talks mostly of his people (lay folk) who ended up missing and tortured, or killed, by the army/police. those too would be patriots.
No, NPA were not a result of martial law as they existed before martial law. However NPA *took advantage* of martial law to pretend to be the good guys to recruit members. Being commies and common thugs they were extremely stupid though and couldn’t keep up the pretense for long before they started oppressing people a few years later. The priest didn’t include this part because it seems like his narrative was before that had happened.
And no, those common people who became disappeared, tortured or killed by Macros Sr.’s army/PC are not patriots unless they had actively opposed the wrongdoing while also taking up the cause of good. So they would simply be victims in this case. If they had also been NPA members and they disappeared, were tortured, or killed, then they also would not be patriots because the NPA as I said were putting on a mask to hide their true selfish selves (aka not helping or sacrificing for the nation/people).
Let’s end this rabbit hole bro. You’ve gotten very far from my original comment on how exclusive Tagalog-ization is nationalistic and bad, and why inclusive Filipinization assisted by English as a neutral language is good while fostering patriotism. The general topic of this blog post is English as a national language, not the (incorrect) applications of words.
unless they had actively opposed the wrongdoing while also taking up the cause of good.
They were doing good, but also since the NPA were basically their kids, also helping them. So Catholic and NPA. but without all the high falutin’ stuff from Sison, just that small corner of the world in Negros, Joey. fighting against army/police.
The general topic of this blog post is English as a national language, not the (incorrect) applications of words.
This
is
very
much
about
English and language and meaning and dying for words and ideas, Joey.
As I read through the debate, I concluded that a dictionary provides multiple definitions of words but cannot get them all because they are contextual. Patriotism requires a cause that people believe in, and that cause may be at war with other causes. That are supported by patriots of a different loyalty. And sometimes the word is abused to support nationalistic fervor which demands that people abide by certain rules or they will be declared unpatriotic, even if they are patriotic.
NPA may have started patriotic and devolved as members sought riches rather than a better nation, but still claimed to be patriotic. And there may still be patriots within the organization today. We would be nationalists to declare them unpatriotic for not following our rules.
Well, no matter to me. NPA are terrorists by Philippine nationalistic definition, and it’s not for me to declare it otherwise. I don’t see them building much and I think the Left should come in out of its extremist woods and try to build something.
I guess people who act in bad faith, as nationalists tend to do as nationalism has lower guards against immorality, can constantly lie and call that a “norm.” A norm, even if repeated endlessly or even if based on a lie still doesn’t not change the definition and meaning of a word. Semantics especially when combined with appropriate context is often very rigid, and that’s why words have “definitions.”
Sorry buddy, I don’t watch R18 movies lol.
its not R18!!! its actually sentimental, and Canadian.
🤣
here’s more backgrounder on Fr. O’Brien, Joey:
https://columbans.ie/fr-niall-obriens-enduring-influence/ (he’s from the same city as Saoirse Ronan, well she was born in NYC actually but moved back to Dublin when 3)
arrest:
It makes me think how I interact with other people and what language and style of delivery I should use. For carinderias and buko juice vendors it’s street Tagalog; for brick-and-mortar stores in upscale malls I switch to uppity Tagalog with straight American English (no California or upstate New York accent like those balikbayan boomers do) added; when in Bulacan or Bataan with relatives, I slightly modify my accent. Or if I am in Zambales or Pangasinan, I swear in Ilocano. Of course, if I am to talk to a tourist, then it’s English all the way.
Now to the subject in hand, tribal regionalism remains entrenched throughout the islands, provinces divided into lingual domains, with some of these domains as firm and determined as Basques or Banda Acehans demanding a stronger degree of autonomy. Hence some Visayans and Mindanaons chose to sharpen themselves in English, preferring not to be humiliated by so-called “Imperial” Manila and their wielding of Tagalog as “Filipino”. I am told by my surrogate mother while in vacation that in Iloilo indeed, as soon as they know a visitor is from Luzon, they’ll mostly choose to switch to English as a preferred neutral secondary language as only a few Ilonggos have no problems talking comfortably in Tagalog, a language they regard themselves to be much alien.
Popular media, however, remains powerful enough to determine choice of language, as most home-grown entertainment productions are by and large in Tagalog. That as corporations tend to run nationwide ad campaigns, their ads are in both English and Tagalog.
Likewise, as local tourism rebounds from the pandemic, so is the need for people in, say, Siargao, Boracay, or La Union, or Tagbilaran City having to learn Tagalog so as to service the tourists from Luzon who, some of them are more comfortable talking in Tagalog than English.
Wonderful profile of how language is REALLY used in the Philippines, m. You should hear my equally chameleon-language wife switch to British English when she wants to talk down to arrogant Americans such as her husband. That is talent. I long ago gave up trying to keep up with her language dancing because it would flow from one to the other within the same conversation. She has become quite good at swearing in English so that her husband and son know precisely what she means. The use of English as the chosen neutral language when someone from Iloilo chats with someone from Manila is hilarious, and also proves the point of this blog article. English is the national language. Already.
Joe, there is simply no comparable joy to listening to native speakers speak their native tongues, writing also. Dame Judi Dench, or Ms Emma Thompson enunciating Shakespeare’s English wrhich I often call an experience listening as they speak English in full dimension. These are instances I realize how wonderful a gift the Almighty has given to us to exchange ideas & emotions with each other.
That’s true, isn’t it. Coarse or elegant, it’s always art.
😀
Good to see NH back!!!