women in love: lesbian and feminist intersections in the bostonians

Historically, Boston had been among America’s cities which were long identified as gay. Cultural critic Joel Cohen observed that “the gay subculture of Boston seems to already have been flourishing in the eighteenth century.” One manifestation of this was the emergence in late 19th century America of the setup that has been called “Boston marriage,” wherein two unmarried, financially independent women engage in a cohabitation and/or relationship that may probably be sexual, although not automatically. It is interesting to note that the phrase came to prominence right after Henry James’ novel The Bostonians saw print in 1886.
Set in 1876, The Bostonians features the relationship of Olive Chancellor, a Boston feminist, and Verena Tennant, the young woman suffragist she gets attracted to. Upon the advice of the older woman, Verena cohabitates with Olive, promising never to marry as the two become more mutually intimate and more involved in the women’s suffrage movement. Tender to each other, the women anticipate their realization of the Victorian institution that’s the Boston Marriage. However, Olive’s distant cousin Basil Ransom arrives from Mississippi, and as the anti-suffragist Southern lawyer becomes enamored with Verena, his cousin Olive becomes disappointed not only because she is training Verena as her mouthpiece for the feminist movement, but also because she directly competes with her very cousin for her protégé’s affection.
Unlike other masterpieces by James, The Bostonians explores overt political themes like feminism and women’s overall role in society, and, inertly albeit controversially owing to the social temperament of the period that produced the novel, the ambiguously-examined theme of lesbianism. The subject of romantic attachments between women was an unconventional one in 19th-century American literature, so even as James’ novel was among the earliest works to deal with that sensitive theme, it was in a muffled manner. While the subsequent fictions of James did not altogether shy away from political subjects, it is The Bostonians wherein his political views were displayed most prominently, depicting a broader backdrop of feminism and other reform movements during the mid-1880’s as well as a silent rivalry between the cousins over Verena. James’ examination of the movement for female emancipation in that side of the West during that time may be summed up in “the situation of women, the decline of the sentiment of sex, and the agitation in their behalf.”
The 19th century in the United States came to be known “as a dynamic period in which the process of industrialization transformed women’s work and family roles.” Women began to realize that opportunities teemed outside the home, and that they could participate in the world like men do. As feministic view was seeing the light of day, the traditional attitude towards women was dramatically changing. To begin with, women would take a role in working to help slaves obtain emancipation through the anti-slavery movement, having identified with the manner slaves were being treated. As middle-class women became conscious of their similarities with men, they wanted to be treated as well, and participate in the activities men engage in, from accessing education to voting to working in order to support themselves without the assistance of men. This improvement in women’s conventional social role also affected their family role; they refused to be chained at home to rear children, cook, and clean when they could very well get out into the public sphere. During the Civil War, some of the women’s demands were shelved, but after it, more demands for equality with men sparked controversies. This entire historical scholarship revealed that 19th century American women, owing to the social progress brought about by industrialization, wore the theme of the “New Woman” with the necessary homosocial and feminist cultural underpinnings.
By the late 1890’s, the social label “New Woman” took on a problematic connotation, as it posed a modernist challenge to the Victorianism widespread during that period. Despite modernity being conventionally ascribed to the masculine culture, the New Woman penetrated that space and enabled herself as a key player as the 19th century drew to a close. This was not a walk in the park for the New Woman, as the experience of modernity is related to the public sphere of work, to politics and to city life, all of which prohibit 19th century women or render them invisible unless they are or will be mistaken for prostitutes loitering in the city streets. Also, the city existence’ transformation in the guise of accelerated urbanization, and progresses in work, housing and social relations widened the gap between the public and private arenas, with women promptly designated to the domestic sphere in the suburbs, the city’s opposites. Women of Olive’s socially and financially independent stature constitute the minuscule number of “New Women” who enjoy access to public life.
In James’ historical location mentioned in the previous paragraph, real-life suffragist feminists (from whose mold the novel’s female protagonists were cast) along with purity campaigners, rational dress lobbyists, sexual degenerates and the like were neatly categorized—despite their contradictory links—under the label “New Woman.” A phrase invented by writers Sarah Grand and Ouida two years before the publication of The Bostonians, “New Woman” was frequently strung along with feminism at large in order to define lesbian identity.
What emerged as feminism—the value system that invests women with the same rights as men and with equality among women—in the milieu in which The Bostonians was born may be traced to the organized force that denounced abolitionism in the early part of the 19th century. As every person was a self-owner, each human being has jurisdictions over his or her own body. Hence, there is a truism to the previously mentioned statement that the women related to the parallel plight of the negro slaves. More importantly, the abolitionist movement was the first radical force that women actively participated in. Within the pre-Civil War movement, women’s rights caused intense debate due to the caution with which their rights were not to be discussed in the same breath as the slaves’. This changed when the Civil War took place, as individualism was struck by war measures that included but not limited to censorship, suspension of habeas corpus and political imprisonment. While feminists were pro-war because it was an instrument to end slavery, it meant waiting until the post-Civil War for the tackling of their issues to proceed, not to mention that the war caused them to lose some of their legal rights. As the lack of reference to gender into the US Constitution became apparent as the pursuit for black men to vote was put forth, women claimed equal rights to suffrage but to no immediate avail. It was this feminist promotion of suffrage that propelled the central same-sex relationship within the novel.
Meanwhile, the rise of a lesbian identity has the effort of the late-Victorian sexologists like Havelock Ellis, Richard von Krafft-Ebing and Edward Carpenter to give credit to. Even in its infancy stage, this identity was already readable in The Bostonians in the embodiment of New Women namely Olive and, by extension, Verena. The former persuades the latter, a talented orator, to advance the women’s cause. Simultaneously, she seeks to maintain a partnership with the younger woman, one that excludes men.
Olive has the capability to engage in feminist politics and intellectual argument since she is financially independent as well as without a husband, two conditions that free her from the traditional domestic assignment for women and that enables her to participate in the public space. Her inability to speak in public, though, merits her choice of Verena as her spokesperson on behalf of the feminist movement:
“‘I want you to address audiences that are worth addressing,’ Olive tells Verena, ‘to convince people who are serious and sincere ... Your mission is not to exhibit yourself as a pastime for individuals, but to touch the heart of communities and nations.’”
The orator begins her career in Miss Birdseye’s tiny Boston townhouse, before an audience that is already won over to the side of the women’s movement. Her entrance into public life is deferred by Olive not only because the latter wants to improve Verena’s knowledge of feminist politics before addressing the public in general, but also because she seeks to maintain a domestic intimacy with Verena, an alternative to the conventional heterosexual domesticity expected in a heteronormative world.
Soon, Verena’s audience grows, increasing from the small Boston townhouse to Mrs. Burrage’s posh residence in New York. Her ultimate public oration is set in Boston’s Music Hall, where she will speak before her first mass constituency. Her entry into the public arena caught the eyes of the mass media, which promoted her as the “New Woman.” Meanwhile, Olive’s silence regarding this promotion of Verena via the mass media is much more than just a lover’s possessiveness. She is careful not to be exploited by the media for commercial benefits but desires to exploit the same media apparatus to advance the women’s cause.
When Basil comes into the picture, he is saddened by “the exhibition of enterprise and puffery” that comes with the media-covered speech for the feminist cause at the music hall. He laments Olive’s multiple struggles as she trades Verena’s oratorical giftedness to a sizeable audience if only to promote the women’s cause, rightly identifying that his cousin has “conform[ed] herself to a great popular system.” His own desire is to prevent women in general and Verena in particular from going beyond the confines of domesticity. It must be noted that his failure to be published implies the threat he feels towards women who get to penetrate the public sphere ahead of him. By keeping Verena from speaking publicly, he signifies his intent to reserve the public arena for himself, an attempt that is overwhelmed by the eventuality that Olive manages to take to the stage and speak on behalf of the women’s movement. In one of his attacks against the feminist movement, Basil gets Verena to listen to the point that
“The whole generation is womanised; the masculine tone is passing out of the world; it's a feminine, a nervous, hysterical, chattering, canting age, an age of hollow phrases, and false delicacy and exaggerated solicitudes and coddled sensibilities, which, if we don't soon look out, will usher in the reign of mediocrity, of the feeblest and flattest and the most pretentious that has ever been.”
Hence, in one of his walks with Verena, Basil tries to dissuade her from the women’s cause (in which she, addressing the public, gets objectified by the male gaze) and asks her to marry him instead. Basil advises his and his cousin’s common romantic object that “it’s not natural to give yourself to a movement or some morbid old maid.” Whereas Verena is being groomed by Olive for a public speaking career, Basil wishes her out of it by becoming his wife. Explaining how things will be after her retirement, he says,
“Your gift is the gift of expression, and there is nothing I can do for you that will make you less expressive. It won’t gush out a fixed hour and on a fixed day, but it will irrigate, it will fertilize, it will brilliantly adorn your conversation. Think how delightful it will be when your influence becomes really social. Your facility, as you call it, will simply make you, in conversation, the most charming woman in America.”
To the detriment of her political belief and public speaking stance, Verena decides in favor of marriage to a man whose political views oppose hers. In the long run, Olive loses her beloved Verena to her very cousin but musters more strength and self-confidence.
As initially stated, James’ novel was engendered by a time when Olive’s lesbian tendencies could hardly be suggested, much less discussed. James himself repressed his homosexuality, which case qualifies Olive as a fictional counterpart. Also, a good part of the novel is devoted to his disagreement with Olive’s feminist politics, mocking its principles through Basil especially in the first few chapters. At best, he was ambivalent over the women’s movement, an ambiguity that enhances the novel since it opens a similar ambiguity about the motives of Olive. While not a few features of the fictional universe of The Bostonians are displayed in a negative light, it does not follow that their opposites are necessarily positive, thus the ambiguity. It is a universe wherein nothing can be trusted. In the novel’s opening, Olive gets satirized when her sister Mrs. Luna mocks her: “A radical? She’s a female Jacobin – she’s a nihilist. Whatever is, is wrong, and all that sort of thing…” However, Olive’s view mimics the narrative view of James: Whatever is, always has something wrong with it. The novel presents no character possessing “the good values.” No absolutes to serve as standards are present.
This is why as the sisters’ characters get introduced in the beginning, one rejects the construction of herself as an object of male gaze and as an upper class while the other desperately desires to construct herself as both. Olive shows a smile that resembles “a thin ray of moonlight resting upon the wall of a prison,” and wears a dress “as if she were got up from a sea-voyage.” Meanwhile, Mrs. Luna wears curls that may be likened to “bunches of grapes,” an ill-fitting bodice and a pair of gloves that call to mind a pair of stockings. Their political perspectives—one a staunch feminist, the other a pandering male supremacist—and the manner in which they are expressed liken their appearances. Unlike her pandering sister, Olive refuses to put on a mask of sociability when she believes she must defend her feminist ideals. She suspects Basil’s friendliness the moment she gets acquainted with him, anxious that being congenial to him might force her to pander too, even in the most mundane way. When the cousins meet at Mrs. Burrage’s house before Verena’s speaking engagement, she launches into absurd accusations in reply to the trivial things mentioned by Basil. While it is manifest that Basil was unfairly censured by a feminist being out of context, James’ exposition of Basil’s inner thoughts reveals that Olive’s accusations are correct. Though Basil will pay homage to women’s femininity, he harbors tremendous fear and contempt for it, as may be gleaned from the following passage:
“…I am so far from thinking, as you set forth the night, that there is is not enough woman in our general life, that it has long been pressed home to me that there is a great deal too much. The whole generation is womanized; the masculine tone is passing out of the world; it’s a feminine, a nervous, hysterical, chattering, canting age, an age of hollow phrases and false delicacy and exaggerated solicitudes and coddled sensibilities, which, if we don’t soon look out, will usher in the reign of the feeblest and flattest and the most pretentious that has ever been. The masculine character, the ability to dare and endure, to know and yet not fear reality, to look the world in the face and take it for what it is – a very queer and partly very base mixture – that is what I want to preserve, or rather, as I may say, to recover; and I don’t in the least care what becomes of you ladies while I make the attempt!”
Many ironies may be drawn from this speech, testaments to the clashing worlds of feminism and patriarchy. One, the lawyer is satirizing the kind of femininity that Verena possesses, something that he would like to customize according to his very own private thrills. Two, the allusion to daring, enduring and meeting the ugly facts of reality could fit Olive to a T, even as Olive is likewise self-deluding in certain ways. Three and most significantly, the speech divulges the absence of absoluteness of femininity-associated values. This is important since those values are the standards utilized by men to measure women. If a woman does not deem it a positive gauge for herself any longer, then she need not be judged by it any longer. To disparage femininity is to add to the fragmentation of gender-linked myths in the novel.
These are but a few of the ambiguities painted by James in the novel’s universe: something can be something and be another thing altogether simultaneously. There is no positive absolute to measure things in this fictional universe. Therefore, the female protagonists in the novels find themselves in evil binaries, as when Verena was confronted by the dilemma of selecting between her ideology and personal affairs.
As Basil comes nearer to scooping Verena, James’ sympathy for him slowly diminishes while that for Olive magnifies as she starts to lose Verena in the closing chapters. In the following passage, Basil harbors the notion that Verena naturally exists but for a man’s love, notwithstanding Olive’s indoctrination of feminist ideology in her:
“The deepest feeling in Ransom’s bosom in relation to her was the conviction that she was made for love, as he had said to himself while he listened to her at Mrs. Burrage’s. She was profoundly unconscious of it, and another ideal, crude and thin and artificial, had interposed itself; but in the presence of a man she should really care for, this false, flimsy structure would rattle to her feet, and the emancipation of Olive Chancellor’s sex (what sex was it, great heaven? He used profanely to ask himself), would be relegated to the land of vapors, of dead phrases.”
This loss of sympathy gets an ultimate reinforcement towards the end of The Bostonians. The last two lines of the novel read: “But though [Verena] was glad, [Basil] presently discovered that, beneath her hood, she was in tears. It is to be feared that with the union, so far from brilliant, into which she was about to enter, these were not the last she was destined to shed.” To interpret these as an allegory of the battle of the sexes wherein the red-blooded American manhood beats lesbian feminism to a pulp is to miss the irony with which Basil is regarded. On an ideological point, the ambiguity James constructs involves two systems from which Verena must select: the modern sexual emancipator in the embodiment of Olive, and the radical conservative in the guise of Basil. Nonetheless, on a structural level, the radical conservative system is associated to the male heterosexual, while the modern sexual emancipator with the female lesbian. The tension, then, mounts as regards the side which one must favor. This also offers the challenge posed before lesbianism, feminism and lesbian feminism by the prevailing patriarchal hegemony.
The Bostonians has usually been interpreted as a depiction of a lesbian relationship, with Olive as the unnatural woman who ensnares Verena, who is in turn finally rescued from her lesbian entrapment by Basil. Interestingly, this current notion within 20th century interpretations of James’ work is that the relationship between Olive and Verena is not explicitly lesbian, and only a post-Freudian regime could vilify The Bostonians as a lesbian trouble. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, intimate and passionate friendships between women were deemed normal even as lifelong devotion and declarations of love along with nights spent together kissing in communal homes were committed. In the novel, the friendship between Olive and Verena and, to a smaller magnitude, that between Dr. Prance and Miss Birdseye could be categorized as such. Boston marriages during the period were not condemned inasmuch as the dominant assumption was that women-women love was asexual, women being believed to be devoid of sexual drive so the idea of a sexual activity between two women did not exist.
It may be recalled that throughout the century that spawned James’ novel, gender dynamics affected the way same-sex love and relationships were molded and promoted. The harsh gender roles and expectations in the early part of the period awakened the need for change during the mid-19th century. Such earnestness for change motivated the women’s movement to help alter the dynamic of female bonding, encouraging them to live independent lives with one another. As a result, the late 19th century stood witness to the female romantic friendships that sexologists concluded to have emerged from the correlations of sexual inversion and the feminist movement. Therefore, instead of being publicly condemned for their cohabitation, Olive and Verena were even possibly encouraged to carry on their romantic friendship, as it symbolizes the deeply-seated good moral values of society.
The feminist movement during the mid- and late 19th century introduced change in the form of female sex-sex love and relationships like the one between the female protagonists. Owing to the absence of support women discovered within the male sphere, they sought support among each other. Romantic friendships permitted strong bonds to shape between women that would help them construct the feminist movement. The women’s cause, in turn, would permit women to seek independent lives and relationships with other women. Before the movement, two women could fall in love with each other and desire one another. Their lack of independence, however, treated them like lesser human beings and rendered them incapable to support themselves financially, to the detriment of their pursuit of a shared dream life with another woman. During the Civil War when significant loss of American males intensified the movement’s demands for women to be able to support themselves, the “New Woman” was born in response to women’s longtime oppressive roles and expectations. It was the 19th century feature of homosociality that women got to coordinate with one another to effect social change, a leeway to the alternative lifestyle to heterosexual marriages that many of them sought, as is evident in the cohabitation represented in The Bostonians.
The writings of the late-Victorian sexologists mentioned at the onset provided the late 19th century discourse of lesbianism as a category of sexual behavior. During the period, sexologists published their findings on same-sex desire and behavior, in the process identifying lesbians in Western culture as a distinct construct, a recent designation that belied the visibility of homosexuality across culture and time. Men have historically entertained notions about what is acceptable for women in love, sex and family and owing to the invisibility of males in a lesbian relationship, usually protested the probability of lesbianism or dismissed it as a valid manifestation of sexuality. These sexologists came up with their characterization of lesbians on their principles that women who interrogated their strictly prescribed gender roles were mentally sick. In effect, women who became conscious of their new medical status created underground subcultures in both sides of the Atlantic, being unified by the discrimination and potential ostracism they confront from families, friends and other people. This shaping of a subculture according to gender role subversions was a reaction by many lesbians whose designation as immoral outcasts are regarded as threats to the challenge lesbians pose against traditional feminine gender dynamics. The link between the “New Woman” and lesbianism is fascinating in that the terms Havelock Ellis, for instance, employed to depict lesbian women were similar to those used to revile the spinster feminists of the late 19th century, the “New Women” like Olive. In 1897, Ellis described the typical homosexual woman in the same anti-feminist way that New Women were depicted:
“…[lesbian women] usually show some traits of masculine simplicity, and there is nearly always a disdain for the petty feminine artifices of the toilet...The brusque energetic movements, the attitude of the arms, the direct speech, the inflexions of the voice, the masculine straightforwardness...will often suggest the underlying psychic abnormality to a keen observer...There is also a dislike and sometimes incapacity for needlework and other domestic occupations, while there is some capacity for athletics.”
The conflation of lesbian identity with feminist identity was exploited by anti-feminists of the late 19th century to challenge women’s struggle for emancipation. Based on these claims, Olive’s feminism in the novel was the point of tirades by not a few 20th century critics. If she is not rightly portrayed as a “New Woman,” then her relationship with Verena is presented to be affirmative and favorable to the two of them. Verena is extremely pleased and fruitful in Olive’s company, and with her Verena “expanded, developed, on the most liberal scale.” It may be read from the novel that The Bostonians, in its sympathetic description of the friendship between Olive and Verena, appears to appeal for a more sensitive interpretation of same-sex love between women.
While The Bostonians does not qualify as a lesbian novel owing to its non-lesbian author (but a gay one, it must be emphasized), it has had a tremendous impact on the lesbian and feminist communities with its own portrayal of the central character as lesbian feminist. It helped define and continues to redefine the position of lesbians and feminists in society and offered a significant record of the cultural attitude toward lesbianism and feminism during James’ time. By describing a version of the lesbian and feminist experiences at the end of the 19th century, by interrogating gender norms and prevailing values and by arguing how a woman should define herself in society, The Bostonians has contributed to the constitution, enrichment and development of lesbian and feminist cultures.
***
Works Cited:
Auchinloss, Louis. Reading Henry James. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1975.
Buck-Morss, Susan. “The Flaneur, the Sandwichman and the Whore: the Politics of Loitering.” New German Critique 39, 1986.
Cohen, Joel. Boston Camerata’s Liberty Tree: American Music 1776 1861.
Ellis, Havelock. Sexual Inversion. Philadelphia: F. A. Davis, 1925.
Faderman, Lilian. Surpassing the Love of Men. London: Junction Books, 1981.
Felski, Rita. “The Gender of Modernity.” Political Gender: Texts and Contexts. S. Ledger et al, eds. Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1994.
James, Henry. The Bostonians. 1886 (e-text).
Rupp, Leila. “Reflections on Twentieth-Century American Women’s History.” Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 1981.

the memory-laden american self

Among the ways Contemporary American Literature course discussed late 20th century American literature is by way of looking at texts as “memory” texts, the self deemed not as an “empty self”, but as a “constituted self”, making sense of community, one that has a “collective history” and “a constitutive narrative” (Bellah, et.al.). How do these texts engage the American self and this “community of memory”, and how, and why, specifically does each do so?




The American self, like any other national self, may be identified by the history it has undergone. The past may be visited and from this visitation, the American self may figure its identity. This community of memory provides a clue to the way America emerged as a distinct entity as well as to the way it will direct itself in the future in its continued narration of itself as a nation. Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof captured the traditional American family during the context in which the play was produced. In such a family, lies, deceptions and hypocrisy are inherent owing to the milieu’s taste for consumerist materialism, rendering the family dysfunctional. Meanwhile, Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? also explored the previously mentioned dysfunctional family’s phony exterior that characterized 1950’s America, wherein success and happiness were measured shallowly by the possession of material things. Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” plays up the messianic complex of America, one in which it is ready to sacrifice itself for others, having turned into the world’s sole superpower such that it feels accountable to save others from sufferings and troubles. Robert Lowell’s “Skunk Hour” analogizes America with an animal that is considered extreme even within the animal kingdom, alluding to the nation’s defiance against a global cloak of conservatism. Despite its isolation from other animals, the skunk that is America is a determined rebel from which trait springs its self-reliance. Rita Dove’s “Roast Possum” speaks of the Other America whose voice is presented through the shapeless and reticent histories of individuals disarticulated by the dominant America known to humankind. Meanwhile, Richard Wilbur’s “Love Calls Us to the Things of this World” displays again the American messianic complex and materialism wherein the United States paradoxically gets to fulfill its spiritual mission by participating in the actual world for the purpose of putting things in order as well as by relishing the material world that can be ravaged anytime by war or any other form of disorder.

striking down gay stereotypes as media square pegs in parisukat

It is not uncommon for tabloids and, lamentably, even major broadsheets, to carry news stories whose titles alone are either misogynist or homophobic by temperament. Headlines that read “Lesbian Rapes Grade 5 Pupil!” “Sabik sa Balot, Tisay Pinilahan ng Anim,” “Gay Pimp Caught Peddling Minors,” “Atsay Nag-amok, BF at Dyowang Bading Ginilitan” and their ilk cast serious doubts on media’s credibility as an institution and on journalism’s supposed ethical practice. The patriarchal slants of such titles and their accompanying news stories evoke knowledge, veracity and ethics at the expense of the historically, culturally and politically oppressed females and gays.
At its surface value, Jonison Fontanos’ Parisukat seems to reinforce the aforementioned notion of the gay as victim with its teaser “Baklang Negosyante…Pinatay!” However, there is an attempt to subvert such an anti-gay stance with the unfurling of the crime’s least explored version (there are four, hence the titular allusion).
German (Toffee Calma) is a gay entrepreneur whose murder, according to police reports acquired by his former lover Jaime (Jobben Bello), was perpetrated by a “boylet” (loosely, a younger lover). Flashbacks reveal that not long after the two cruised each other in a café, Jaime discovered that his “Honey” was in contact with the boylet Hubert (Christopher Cañizares). In what appears as a trick of destiny, German’s lovers meet in the decrepit boarding house that Jaime rents out to the transsexual Xander (Darwin Taylo), who still obsesses over high school crush Hubert, and the newly-arrived nursing student Marcus (Jeff Tatsuro), whom Hubert introduced to his flesh trade.
German’s slaughter being entirely unsolved, the callboys accuse each other of having killed their common client, invoking two more versions of the crime. Running off anew from a misdeed he did not commit, Marcus slips away just before his landlord butchers the boylet that drove him to kill his businessman lover in a fit of jealousy, and the witnessing transsexual.
Of course, when the media scrambles over mayhem like this, the crime of passion fueled by such human emotions as jealousy and betrayal gets reduced to gendered documentations that treat the sexual orientations of the people involved as if these provoked the violation. Hence, irresponsible media portrayals of females as willing rape victims, and homosexuals as abusers, as exploiters and, in the cases of Parisukat’s German and Xander, as easy targets of mutilation, get perpetuated. Despite the overwhelming majority of crimes against humanity being executed by heterosexuals, banner news like “Straight Priest Fondles Devotees’ Breasts,” “Heterosexuals Collared for Human Trafficking” and the like remain invisible as opposed to macho-driven headlines mentioned at the onset.
More interesting than the possible depiction of the gay as crime perpetrator (yet again), Jaime’s character may qualify as a challenge to the gay typecasting as weak and cowardly because inflamed by grave circumstances, the gay—like any desperado—can kill. The initial indeterminacy of the accurate version of the carnage blurs the faces of the numerous suspects that the slain might have let into his room, a condition that eliminates the seemingly incapable gay from the picture. Therefore, what Jaime has massacred in the process are the stubborn, claustrophobic squares of stereotypes in which homosexuals are pegged by the gay-bashing media in particular and the male-dominated world in general.
Parisukat, which also stars Rosemarie Ibarrita, Hugot’s Alvin Espinoza and up-and-coming model Charlon Suerte, is still showing in Isetann Recto in Downtown Manila and in Cinema Eden in Cebu.

three enlightenment articles and their contemporary political relevance

Three articles written during the breakthrough Enlightenment Period have political insights that helped clear the ground for the lasting impact of the Age of Reason in contemporary times.
Immanuel Kant’s “What is Enlightenment?” is among his most influential works which explains the reason for the absence of Enlightenment in society. This lack, Kant asserts, is actually caused by the missing courage of the citizen to think. After elaborating why, Kant puts forth the requirements that an individual must fulfill in order to achieve Enlightenment. Because of its urgency for people to think in a rational way, this essay became controversial, serving as a critique not only of the church but also of the state in the late 1800’s.
John Locke’s “Of Paternal, Political, and Despotical Power, Considered Together” is an excerpt from his masterpiece Second Treatise of Civil Government. To begin with, this British philosopher and politician believed many things ranging from human nature and political power, but what these are and where do they come from had been interpreted in an entirely new fashion in his essay. For him, human beliefs were distinguished by tolerance and thinking. Owing to this determination, all individuals by nature were deemed independent and equal. In other words, humans are naturally free, lacking the need to ask approval from anybody else. They are all of equal worth, treating one another with mutual respect. Humans leave their nature when they are granted permission to participate in a community or society.
Lastly, Jean Jacques Rousseau’s “A Dissertation on the Origin and Foundation of the Inequality of Mankind” in his work On the Origin of Inequality discusses the emergence and existence of inequality in society. While man is different from animals through pity and necessity for self-preservation, his natural inclination for survival and self-actualization makes him monstrous for desiring to dominate others. The essay argues that inequality is generated by man’s selfish and self-actualizing nature.
Truly, these works by these major Enlightenment philosophers are ahead of their time for highlighting the ideas that thinking is a revolutionizing thing, that we are all born equal and independent until socialization creates our bondage and inequality, and that our thirst for power drives us to render others less of our equal. These three insights appear as truthful up to this time, making them all classical for capturing modern ideas of power within the reach of humankind.

queer love, actually

because love permeates the air of this gay planet, here is what the best in philippine independent queer cinema has to offer in celebration of the valentine's month (click image to enlarge):





















spread the love, everyone!:)

for borges

as the night wore on, i dreamed about the muse lying on a patch of evening meadow scattered with fallen fireflowers. Everything else spoke of stillness, but my silent muse seemed to have a story to tell in his lonesome silence. In that dream, I saw him dreaming about me too. The mutual dreaming began series of dreams of me dreaming of him dreaming of me and so on. That moved me to smile. Somewhere in this sleepless city, my dream took me to a place I have never been, but--because of my beloved muse--is always, always familiar to me.

kamatayan at kalayaan sa the death of ivan ilyich ni leo tolstoy

Sa The Death of Ivan Ilyich, ipinakita ni Leo Tolstoy ang isang lalaking winaldas ang kanyang buhay at walang kakayanang bigyang imahinasyon ang sariling kamatayan. Malinaw sa tekstong ito na ang paraan kung paano pinaiiral ang buhay ng tao ay mahalaga kung magkakaroon man ng pag-asang mabuhay sa dako pa roon. Makikita rin ditto kung paanong ang hindi iilan sa mga tao ay artipisyal lamang ang pamumuhay sa mundo.
Sa teksto, kamamatay-matay lamang ni Ivan Ilyich. Ilang tao ang magtipon upang makilamay: ang mga hukom, ang mga miyembro ng pamilya at mga kakilala. Lamang, hindi maintindihan ng mga taong ito ang kamatayan, dahil hindi sila naniniwala na mamamatay din sila. Napupuri nila ang Diyos na hindi sila ang mga namamatay, at nagsimula na silang isipin kung paanong magagamit nila sa kanilang bentahe ang kamatayan ni Ivan Ilyich sa usaping pera o posisyon.
Tatlumpung taon bago mamatay si Ivan Ilyich, makikitang nasa rurok siya ng buhay. Namumuhay siyang pinag-aaralan ang kawalang saysay. Nag-aral siya ng batas at nagging hukom. Samantala, buum-buo niyang pinurga ang kanyang sarili sa mga pansariling damdamin. Ginawa niya ang kanyang trabaho nang walang init at obhetibo. Naging istriktong tagadisiplina at ama-amahan siya gaya ng inaasahan sa kanya sa lipunang Ruso.
Minsang nagpapalamuti siya ng bahay na nabili niya sa pagkakuha ng bahay sa lungsod, nalaglag siya at nasaktan ang tagiliran. Hindi pa man niya alam nang mga panahong iyon, ngunit ang sugat na ito ang magbibigay sa kanya ng sakit na magpapadali ng kanyang buhay. Naging mainitin ang kanyang ulo at mapait ang tingin sa buhay—ayaw niyang tanggapin ang kanyang nalalapit na kamatayan. Sa mga huling sandali ng kayang pagkakasakit, may katulong siyang nagbabantay sa kanya na naging kaibigan at kasabihan niya ng loob.
Hindi mapipigilan ang kamatayan: ito ang ibig ipahiwatig ng teksto. Sa pagkakalapit ng kanyang kamatayan, nag-uunahan ang mga kasamahan niya para makakuha ng promosyon. Ni sa buhay o kamatayan, tila walang naging mabungang impresyon si Ivan Ilyich. Sa pagpapakta ng naunang bahagi ng buhay ni Ivan Ilyich, ipinakitang buhay na walang saysay, hungkag at hindi masiglang ispiritwal ang nagging buhay ni Ivan Ilyich. Dangan nga lamang, sa gitna ng seryosong pagkakasakit, nagging panghuling pagkilos ni Ivan Ilyich ang kilalanin ang sarilio niyang mortalidad at yakapin ang nalalapit na kamatayan.
Sa huling bahagi pa ng buhay ni Ivan Ilyich nagkawing ang mga ideyang “kamatayan” at “kalayaan.” Sa pagyakap niya sa kamatayan, doon lamang siya nagkaroon ng malalim na pag-unawa at pagtanggap sa kamatayan bilang isang posibilidad na hindi dapat katakutan dahil hindi naman maiiwasan ayon kay Martin Heidegger. Sa esensya, doon lamang masasabing lumaya si Ivan Ilyich samantalang hindi pa nararanasan ito ng kanyang mga kasama palibhasa ay wala silang malay sa kamatayan bilang pansariling karanasan.
Sa pamimilosopiya ni Heidegger, umiiral ang tao sa mundo sapagkat sa mundo umiiral ang kanyang kakayahang-maging ano kaya nga palagi siyang nakatanaw sa kanyang pagka-maaari. Lahat tayo, piliin man natin o hindi, ay palaging gumagalaw sa ating mga posibilidad ng pag-iral. Subalit ang katotohanan ay nagkakaroon lamang tayo ng di-maubos-ubos na pagka-maaari kung tayo ay may buhay pa. Patunay lamang na marami ang ating mga posibilidad at mayroon palaging alternatibong maaaring piliin. Sa kaso ni Ivan Ilyich, ang pamumuhay niya bilang hukom ang paggasta niya ng kanyang buhay habang hindi pa siya namamatay. Marami siyang mapagpipilian dahil nasa ruruok pa siya ng kanyang buhay tatlumpung taon bago siya nagkasakit.
Kapag wala nang buhay ang tao, nawawalan din tayo ng kakayahang umiiral, at sa puntong ito humihinto ang ating kalagayang may hindi maubos-ubos na posibilidad. Tapos na ang lahat para sa atin. Sapagkat habang buhay ang tao kulang siya sa kalahatan at kabuuan, at sa kamatayan natatapos ang pagkukulang na ito. Sa kamatayan nakakamit ng tao ang kanyang ultimong kabuuan. Naramdaman ito ni Ivan Ilyich nang maging dahilan ng pagkakasakit niya ang kanyang pagkalaglag. Naging posibilidad na rin para sa kanya ang kamatayan dahil ito na lamang ang hindi dumaratal sa kanya na siyang magbibigay-pruweba kung makukumpleto ba niya o hindi ang kanyang buhay.
Kaya marapat lamang kay Ivan Ilyich bilang tao ang magpakatao sa harap ng katotohanang ito bilang isang “umiiral-patungo-sa-kamatayan,” ayon sa mga salita ni Heidegger. Kailangan niya—nating—harapin ang buhay at ang ating kamatayan sa isang tunay na paraan. Naramdaman ito ni Ivan Ilyich nang maratay na siya sa higaan. Ang ating pag-aantabay sa posibilidad ng ating kamatayan ang tunay na pag-iral tungo sa kamatayan. Ang pagkakabahala, ang paggigipit sa atin ng sarili nating karanasan sa buhay ang nagdadala sa ating sa bungad ng pag-aantabay. Kailangan nating tanggapin na atin ang sarili nating kamatayan at walang ibang maaaring gumanap nito para sa atin, hindi ito maiiwasan kailanman, at ang ating kamatayan ay maaaring maganap sa kahit anong oras, kahit ngayon. Naging hindi man malaya si Ivan Ilyich sa mga panahong hindi pa dumarapo sa kanya ang kaisipan ng kamatayan, lumaya siya nang dumapo na ang posibilidad na maaari siyang mamatay dahil hindi niya ito maiiwasan.
Kaya ang nararapat sa atin bilang mga taong tunay na umiiral-patungo-sa-kamatayan ay gayahin si Ivan Ilyich: kabisaduhin natin ang ating sarili, ang ating sariling kinalalagyan, ang ating sariling buhay. Tayo mismo ang dapat mag-antabay. Tayo lamang ang mga nilalang na may kakayahang maunawaan ang natatanging kahulugan ng ating mga posibilidad. Tayo lamang ang may kakayahang pumili ng mga nararapat nating gawin at pumili sa mga posibilidad na nailalahad sa atin ng sarili nating buhay. Sa pagtalab ng katotohanan ng kamatayan sa atin, nakikita natin ang totoong posibilidad na buuin natin ang ating sarili, bumubukas sa atin ang tunay nating mga posibilidad, at nakakayanan nating pagpilian ang mga posibilidad na ito ayon sa tunay nating inaasam sa buhay. Tulad sana ni Ivan Ilyich, lumaya sana tayo sa kamatayan.

chasing lady luck: charlon suerte in focus

Blame colonial overload if up to now, the mestizo look still prevails as our social standard of beauty and with this domination subsists the investment of virtues and class. Sure, we have Nora Aunor, a morena, for a superstar and a host of fair-skinned contravidas who give Philippine cinema and television audiences some hypertension pangs, but the Spanish and American descendants and, of late, the racial hyphenates (Fil-Aussie, Nippo-Brasileiro, ad infinitum) remain entitled to the notions of “mukhang mabait” and “mukhang mayaman.”
Case in point: Charlon Suerte. This eighteen-year-old native of Southern Tagalog is admittedly good-natured, but he easily dismisses the preconception that he is rich. With excellent mestizo genes to thank his Capampangan mother and Lagunense father for, Charlon confesses that economic lack significantly fuels him to try it out in the big city. The escalating tuition fee in the University of the Philippines (where his elder sister studies and where his running-valedictorian brother is gearing for) prompted him, despite high academic standing, to enroll in a computer college with tuition fee afforded via scholarship grant. To cover other expenses, he worked part-time for a multinational food corporation and presently models on the ramp for local clothing companies. Then, the casting call for an independent film beckoned so he auditioned and luckily passed. “It’s a minor role, yes,” muses Parisukat director Jonison Fontanos, “but it’s an excellent springboard. Some of the big names in showbiz started out small,” ends Joni, whose debut film Hugot earned well enough to fund the homoerotic thriller that stars sexy stud Toffee Calma.
Charlon capitalizes on his mestizo features to break through an industry already awash with fair-complexioned wannabes to fifteen minutes of fame, but it will be a disservice to forget that he also banks on his talents in acting and singing and, as naming schemes would have it, “suerte.” He hopes that all of these rolled into the hotstuff that he is will help him finally bid goodbye to his rural hardships that seem drawn straight of One Hundred Years of Solitude’s pages: having to fetch water from the well (that, gratefully, built his muscles) and having to reach his forest home through the country staple kuliglig. He hopes, too, of being able to pursue his dream of putting up a pastry shop where acoustic nights, literary events and film screenings—his artistic inclinations—may be staged on a regular basis. Let us see if our starry-eyed mestizo promdi talent lives up to the fullest meaning of his Hispanic surname.
Parisukat will have its commercial run starting February 17, 2010 in selected theaters nationwide.

a prayer for the closing year and the approaching one

supreme being, the origin of all things and all nations, you have bestowed upon us the freedom to fulfill our destinies and the values to overcome the challenges that we encounter as we pursue truth, goodness, and beauty.
in times of desperation, you have bestowed hope upon us in order to make us look beyond our current predicaments.
in times of discord, you have bestowed love upon us in order to calm us from divisiveness.
in times of anxiety, you have bestowed faith upon us in order to encourage us to hold on beyond the bleakness of our situation.
once again, we gather all these virtues to direct and trust ourselves in order to continue seeking freedom, peace and solidarity for the facilitation of human progress.
we appeal to you to fortify these values you blessed us with, in order for us to construct a humane and peaceful society.
in return, we commit ourselves to the pursuit of goodness and righteousness. may your will be done.

the nation and ninotchka rosca's state of war

When Ninotchka Rosca’s State of War (Mandaluyong City: National, 1988) was published in novel form, the University of the Philippines-bred activist girl best known for her Marxist short fictions has embarked on imagining a larger picture of the NATION, a recurring topic for most if not all of the Philippine novels in English. Ninotchka and other Filipino novelists, because they are in the most privileged position to tell stories (of the country, for instance), make use of the subject Filipinas or what Filipino critic Bienvenido Lumbera coined in 1972 as “The Growth of the Nation” because in doing so, they all resolve at some extent the question of the Filipino as an exile—someone who cannot accept or change his history due to his country’s colonization by Spain, the United States of America, Japan and, again, the U.S.A. This way, Ninotchka (who was a literal exile, having been banished as a result of her criticism’s incurring the ire of Martial Law dictator Ferdinand Marcos) confronts the bedeviling problem of self-search by imagining a country in all its amalgam of Western influences and Oriental cultures. State of War is one novel that depicts the Filipino identity through the consciousness lent by its author.
Philippine history as a whole has a hand in shaping the boundaries of the novel because of its integration into the text—a powerful means of illustrating the Philippines. The mention of Philippine-specific details from the Spanish conquest to Martial Law regime crystallizes the text as an authentic evidence of Philippine imagination as Ninotchka describes it. The country’s history provides a rich material for Filipino authors to mine, and Ninotchka was successful in producing a masterpiece that will help Filipino readers identify themselves and their nation in Anna, Eliza, and Adrian and these characters’ spatial setting, the Central Philippine island of K—. The Philippines, if one must be reminded, is one such country that is always in the state of war against colonialism: colonialism by foreign powers, colonialism by poverty, colonialism by feudal, patriarchal and ethnic oppression, and colonialism by capitalistic imperialism.
Then as now, Ninotchka (she was christened a Russian-sounding name by no less than the literary giant Nick Joaquin, since this UP activist writer was truly endeared to him) championed the cause of the oppressed, organizing a labor union strike in her first job at the desk, criticizing the human rights violations of the Martial Law up to now, when she speaks around the world in behalf of Purple Rose, a global network tasked at stopping sex trafficking of Filipinas the world over. Her activism is obviously infused in the novel in question as well as her other literary works. For a few months, Ninotchka was included among those held presumably because of sedition or rebellion at Camp Crame. She declared to having sketched her second story collection there, an anthology that was to be published in Australia ten years after. She saw to it that her half-life in Camp Crame detention was congruent with the larger prison of the nation in general.
State of War is similar to Ninotchka’s short fiction anthologies like Bitter Country and Other Stories (1970) and Monsoon Collection (Brisbane: University of Queensland, 1983) and her follow-up novel, Twice Blessed (Manila: St. Scholastica/Gabriela, 1988), in that all her fictions reflect her Marxist ideology (class struggle) largely informed by her radical upbringing in the State University, renowned for being a bastion of student activism. On one hand, she is being criticized for coming on too strong with her hard-fisted political fictions that intensely batter the Philippine macho ideology. On the other hand, she is said to interpret nationalist and feminist power in the context of the country’s colonial history through pessimistic protagonists who take risks in order to survive.
Ninotchka strategized a narration that spawns an analysis of palpable social conditions. Fittingly, this analysis maps out the subsequent tactics: the use of female sexuality to injure the totalizing patriarchal hegemony, the insight of power relations in terms of class struggle rather than the social equilibrium, and the establishment of these means of intrusion towards larger-than-life proportions to strengthen the faith and ardor which lead to liberation.
State of War ambitiously attempts to encompass centuries of Philippine history through the intertwined lives of Banyaga, Villaverde, and Batoyan families, and it is noteworthy for its familiarity through the development of vivid details, its flowery language, and its ironic worldview reminiscent of Filipinos’ comic perspective about tragic events. State of War signifies much about the Philippines as "a singular and a plural place."
Ninotchka employs history to imply the infiltration of foreign powers into the Filipino people’s lives. She weaves her time setting from the late era of Marcos’ dictatorship (who is simply referred the Commander), during The Festival (supposedly the Ati-Atihan) celebrated yearly on the Visayan Island of K—, to a narration of centuries of colonial paralysis of Philippine bloodlines, visible in the Banyagas, Villaverdes and Batoyans, with the ultimate comeback to The Festival as it gets reduced into a frenzied yet aborted assassination try. The purpose of this strategy is to suggest that Filipinos have been shackled in a recurrent state of war against military, economic and cultural conquests dating back to Magellan’s intervention in Lapu-lapu's tribal affairs and loss of his life in Mactan; henceforth, the author provides an indirect yet dramatic plea for a wholly nationalistic independence.
The lead characters Eliza and Anna, sun and moon deities respectively, infuse color from and shower color to The Festival. They are an alluring duo. Both aged 27, Anna Villaverde is the depiction of vengeful widowhood while Eliza Hansen is the depiction of frivolous independence. Meanwhile, Adrian at 23 is sketched as a rich scion who discovers Anna as his employee who would be his love object. Eliza’s feelings for Anna appear sometimes to be shared consciousness, other times sentimental sisterhood, or even latent lesbianism, yet never quite acknowledgment of their kinship as cousins. The nuns have discoursed Mayang to be sexually docile even with her husband; however, it is lust at first sight with Hans. When Manolo tries to slay Rafael, his wife Anna stabs her knife into his head’s back. Eliza dies in the melee in a melodramatic manner. Later, Anna listens to her husband, amazed at his tapes and whether this decision rendered him heroic or not. Anna does not think about such queries and, yes, will sire a son to her. Here is a son in a literary production where women seem more invulnerable than the opposite sex.
Anna and Eliza are beautiful representations of 20th century women, but holistically for prospective extents sadly left shapeless. There are other things presented but not discussed which might have permitted Ninotchka a way out of her characters' or culture's matrix. Anna listens to Guevarra say, "We begin as accidents and end as the sum of accidents. The rites of this land seize us by the hair ad force us into a design begun a long long time ago." Anna fails to reflect in that text or is incapacitated to do such. How is Anna able to digest Guevarra’s words? How is her interpretation parallel with the notion that her forthcoming son will become "the first of the Capuchin monk's descendants to be born innocent, without fate?" Her statement is simply one more romantic dream, timely in the heel of tiredness after so many lives lost in The Festival. It is deemed only the compulsory solitary silent note, like skylark atop the forest after an earth-shaking sound play.
In both the Monsoon Collection and State of War, to juxtapose two of her works, her protagonists seem incapable of finding love and loyalty compatible and, under pressure, are ready to sacrifice the beloved to a generalized ideal. This penchant of supplementing to natural double-bladedness by cutting characters short is evident in the short fiction anthology, while the abandonment of the alleged beloved for some undefined principle pictures the central development in the novel in question. The ideal in its elusiveness may crumble into a justification for self-congratulation. If persons are instantly disposable (Guevarra's wife and son, for example), then why exclude characters? It does not matter if sympathies become artificial or transferable at own volition, for as long as the author remains to be perceived as sympathetic in her portrayal of the characters.
Ninotchka never misses a beat in the course of her fluid narrative as she profiles the lives of leads Anna Villaverde, Adrian Banyaga and Eliza Hansen, molding a concoction of plots and subplots, of libido betrayed through history, how the names and faces get altered but never the circumstances. Finally, the state of war being manifested here is the isolation ubiquitous in life, however intertwined people’s lives may look.
The author is most sympathetic to the character of Anna, whom one might consider as Ninotchka's alter-ego. Anna is an underground person on the island of K—, requested to help implement a conspiracy to bomb the stage where some political stalwarts are about to explode into bombastic speeches. She is the daughter of the last foot-bound Chinese woman and Luis Carlos Villaverde, a man obsessed with a saxophone. She survived the sexual molestations of her military captors while detained, as well as the electrocution on her nipples. Anna's presentation is that of survivor.
Eliza Hansen is a lady who defies pigeonholing: she is gorgeous, yet elusive as ever. She traipses about with transvestites in the town square doing the hala-bira rhythm, and acts as buffer to the "stormy relationship" of Anna and Adrian. She has this liaison with a high-ranking military officer, whom she uses to cover the tracks of Anna. In more ways than one, she is the other woman, and her frailty is the cause of her doom: she ends up as the festival's sacrifice to the sea, representing the only deliverance from her chained existence.
There is no lack of humor, either, as in the oft-repeated phrase about how “Magellan, crazy old coot, took some ships and circumcised the globe.” There is the ever-present image of the cock, the protruding symbol in a patriarchal society such as ours where, ironically, a woman is the central figure. There are the sexual interludes that Ninotchka seems to revel in, relationships based on equal parts caring and suspicion.
Anna is irresistibly lured into the festival mob dancing around the village plaza-"her feet found their niche in the drumbeats...the intricate pattern they wove on the asphalt, a pattern of small steps and halts"—and through her mind occurs "the disquieting thought [that] she was dancing the pattern of her life." Dance is translated into a metaphor for the process of one's life or, since this is inside a novel, narrative.
Ninotchka stitches together the novel's three movements by the use of an ostinato, a recurring popular song “Skyboats” which describes “a boat in the sky bearing a woman who said no, she'd rather not, thanks but no.” This image initially refers to Anna's grandmother Mayang, who becomes emotionally estranged from her husband, but later refers to Anna herself, as she joins the anti-government resistance and then endures police torture.
Ninotchka is relentlessly postmodern: her characters are assailed on all sides by the crushing forces of society, the schizoid montage of late-twentieth-century life, the haunting, double-edged beauty of an endangered world. Against such a tangled backdrop, the drama of State of War is embodied in questions of individual physical survival and, by extension, moral revival—questions which revolve around the person as well as the body politic, the singular as well as the plural.

of sainthood and humanity

Francis, Ignatius, Therese, John Paul and Mother Teresa were able to show the humanity of the Church through their relationship with family, friends, and the society. When they felt the calling to serve God through their service to the poor, most of them became in conflict with their human relations. For example, Francis’ family ties sagged when his parents thought that he was not only wasting his time but also throwing away the money for which they labored hard in order to amass. He also became in conflict with his friends who stoned and threw mud at him for doing charity works and for reducing himself to being a beggar. Francis seemed a disappointment to his parents and friends since they expected him to do anything other than distribute clothes, goods and money to the poor. Meanwhile, Ignatius suffered persecution for converting young people into the Christian fold. He courageously took up his jail term when he was accused of harboring beliefs that were not of the Church. On the other hand, Therese had a mild human conflict when she was not allowed to become a novitiate because she was still underage. She already felt the calling at a tender age, but was not permitted to join her sisters in the convent until the pope interceded in her behalf. Meanwhile, John Paul had a contradiction with his Polish society since his Christian beliefs were not necessarily compatible with his country’s Communist stance. Besides that, his threatened deportation to Germany during the war could have spoiled his chance of becoming a priest. Even when he became a pope, some nonbelievers attempted to assassinate him, a proof that no matter what good Christian relationship he wanted to build with the society, some did not share the same advocacy. The same was true with Mother Teresa, whose country of destination, India, is a study in contrast. While she helped many poor and sick Indians, the social neglect continued. Even her venture into the outside world took time, since she was bound within the four walls of the convent and she had to face the Church’s refusal to establish new religious communities. It was a difficult process for her to gain approval to leave the cloistered community to join the poorest of the poor in the streets and trade her habits into the less inconvenient sari and sandals she wore while ministering in Calcutta.
On the other hand, all five showed the divinity of the Church by enduring the mockery, rebukes, the discomforts and all sorts of contradictions made by the people they loved since they had the noble tasks of following the ways of Christ and doing charitable acts to the poor. Francis departed from his free-wheeling ways in order to renew himself and to adapt more to the Christian way of being a man for the poor and the needy. By being spiritually inspired to be resilient, he sanctified himself with all the meditations and fasting he had undergone to suit the sacrifice that entails becoming one with the poor, the sick and the hungry. The same was true with Ignatius, who turned away from a life of privileges and turning to extreme poverty and fasting in order to become one with the social outcasts. He renewed himself by embarking on pilgrimages that will proclaim the gospel. He bounced back despite being persecuted for his missions because he believed that bearing the anguish that resembled that of the persecuted Christ was part of the spiritual heritage. Meanwhile, Therese had a renewal each time she produced her testimonies of God’s goodness despite suffering from a terrible illness. While bedridden, she went on and on about writing the miraculous ways through which her life was being blessed by the Lord. On the other hand, John Paul did not waver in his papal duties although the world becomes increasingly negligent of its Christian duties. Instead, he continued to fulfill his duties by always turning his country visits, his book publications and issuance of holy documents as opportunities for Church renewal. Finally, Mother Teresa found spiritual renewal in the company of the poor, the ill and the starving whom she served in her parallel service to God. She became increasingly selfless in her mission of helping the neglected people.
All these saints have influenced the history and life of the faithful by showing that their lives can pursue Christian perfection despite hardships, trials and sufferings. Francis, Ignatius, Therese, John Paul and Teresa had varying degrees of setbacks throughout their respective missions but these did not stop them from fulfilling their duties however daunting these problems may appear. They endured through them all and did not surrender even in the face of the devil’s temptation or of social persecution. They transformed the problems into opportunities to grow more as Christians. They produced permanent legacies in the forms of books, meditations, movements and foundations which can attest an undying Christian devotion despite their brief, earthly lives. These, along with their very lives, leave an impression of the infinite possibilities of serving Christ and humanity in the face of persecutions or other such obstacles. For the faithful who are aware of how fellow humans before them had achieved saintly status through sheer faith in God and courage of spirit, the impact of these saints’ lives will inspire them into taking up their own crosses and into becoming active participants in the quest for salvation. The saints had made it possible, so the faithful can also create history by drawing the Christ-like out of their very lives with the greater consciousness for emulating God’s humility, compassion and love for the community, and helping the Christian brethren.
All five saints reflect the identity and mission of Jesus Christ by turning their lives into replicas of Christ for others. Dismissing human and circumstantial limitations, Francis took Christ’s humility, became one with the poor, and taught and shared with them the blessings coming from God. It did not matter that his own close relations shunned him for Francis pursued his love for the brethren and other living things the way God loves all. Ignatius imitated Christ’s endurance during trying times for he did not surrender his faith even though authorities have imprisoned him for supposedly corrupting his newly-converted Christian brothers. He bore his persecution with the dignity of Christ, believing this was insignificant next to the greatness of spreading God’s love. Meanwhile, Therese had to die young and had to endure bodily suffering but these did not matter in terms of her mission of living a life in the approval of God. Her disease did not stop her from continuing her call to God’s service, up to the day she died. On the other hand, John Paul had a relatively long life replete with the mission of sustaining the flock of God. Like Christ, he served as a shepherd of this Church community so that the latter continued to mature despite the challenges of the modern times. Even in sickness and old age, he went on to spread the Word of God so that his duty can fulfill the objective of providing humanity with salvation. Finally, Mother Teresa took on the mission of helping the poor and the needy because Christ Himself cares for them more than the privileged ones. She mimicked Christ’s humanitarian ways in fulfillment of His second greatest commandment that’s love for others. She could have chosen to stay within the convent but she ventured out into the world to suffer other’s suffering, and to save the neglected. All these saints lived their lives the way real Christians ought to be: compassionate, enduring, redeeming.

the life of saint ignatius of loyola in a nutshell

Born in Loyola , Spain in 1491, Ignatius worked in the king’s court until he was 30. A cannonball injury almost cost Ignatius his life, but a miracle of dreaming about St. Peter touching his wound made him well. While recuperating after three operations, he discovered the books The Life of Christ and Lives and of the Saints, which inspired him to devote his life to God. Like Francis before him, Ignatius cared for the sick, practiced austerity measures, fasted, and became prayerful. One night, after witnessing a Marian apparition, he went on a pilgrimage to Montserrat wearing a long habit and a sandal for his limping leg. While on the journey, he tended the ill, fasted with the bread and water given him as alms and knelt for hours in complete meditation. He himself fell ill, so he bolted out of his great penance and regained his peace. It was during this time that he produced his Spiritual Exercises for those on retreat. He attempted to go on a mission to the Holy Land but was obliged to return to Europe by the Provincial of the Franciscans. He continued to convert Spanish people to the faith, to teach catechism, and to reform juveniles in Alcala. He also got to study in Paris in extreme poverty, joining the poor in their meals at the hospital. He and six of his young disciples established the Society of Jesus, which aimed at serving the Church and saving lost souls. They continued to live in dire poverty while following Christ’s Passion and suffering persecution from nonbelievers. He landed in prison in Salamanca on suspicion of heresy but until his life full of love for Jesus Christ was taken away from him, Ignatius confronted the persecutions with Christian courage, which became the quality of the Company of Jesus that he founded.

the life of saint francis of assisi in a nutshell

Born in Assisi , Italy in 1182, Francis was friendly and pleasure-seeking as a young boy. Once, when a beggar asked for alms from him, he realized life’s poverty and misery. While he gave all his money to the beggar, his friends and own father rebuked him for his charitable act. After sometime, he became very ill for several months until his prayer and vow to serve other people gave way to his miraculous recovery. Notwithstanding his parents’ disapproval and friends’ mockery, he determined to surrender his old ways for God’s service. He became a recluse by living in the hills and meditated for all of two years. While he sometimes received food from sympathizers, he often went hungry. However, he was undaunted since he wanted his body to be under strict discipline and control despite the frequent deprivation of food and water. Francis loved not only the outcasts and the depressed, but also the birds and the beasts, which he treated as he would treat humans. He preached, taught, cured and distributed wealth in all of Italy and encouraged people to follow his example. Soon, the good news of Francis’ love and kindness became renowned in Europe . Before dying in 1228, he was able to organize the Order of Mendicant Friars or Franciscans, who promised a life of poverty, chastity, love and obedience.

a look into guiseppe tornatore’s cinema paradiso and malena

Cinema Paradiso’s theme, “Life is not like in the movies,” may be integrated into the following symbolisms: the rusty anchors by the sea which are Toto’s collective force pinning him down in his non-progressing town and the deep blue sea beyond which is an opportunity-rich place that is always farther away sum up Toto’s boring, tragic life, so unlike hopeful, happy-ending movies. Meanwhile, the unwinding yarn knitted by Toto’s mother which is Toto’s untangling opportunity to destroy the past he visited and his gained recovery when he left Giancaldo synthesizes Toto’s life’s unbraided yet flawed self-return and self-rediscovery, so unlike the neatly-wrapped up, crafted movies. Lastly, the demolition of Cinema Paradiso which is a signal for moving on to reality is an anti-thesis for life as a fairy tale, so unlike the fantastic, perpetually ideal movies.
Sensing that the projectionist is a frustrated man, I think Alfredo was not right in breaking up Salvatore and Elena’s relationship just because he did not want Salvatore to tread the same fate as he did. Salvatore might have been successful in his career when he left Giancaldo and his girlfriend; nonetheless, his success was bittersweet because his love life was compromised and his jagged, insecure relationships were eventually put at expense. Alfredo had no right to impose on Salvatore the destiny he should fulfill, and for this, I assess that Alfredo is a miserable man desperate for a company in the embodiment of the love-disappointed Salvatore.
Teary-eyed Salvatore’s lingering look while watching the collection of kissing scenes is one of longing for a love that never was. There flashed movie scenes of passion that might well have been consummated in his own life, but his life is different from the movies—he was deprived of all romantic opportunities by trading these to the professional victory he savored at the moment. All he could do now was envy the kissing couples because he could have had a girl to exchange kisses with, yet he could not.
Compared to Salvatore’s character, Renato’s is, for me, the more sympathetic because he has seen his love Malena at her best and worst, and yet his passion for her did not diminish. While the successful Salvatore still came out a lonely man due to his dejections on love affairs, Renato evolved into a mature man for the love of Malena, despite all those liaisons with other girls. Whereas Salvatore was stuck in the past, Renato moved on by learning lessons on love.
I spotted the following symbolisms in Malena: The burning of the ant under the magnifying glass is the personification of Malena and her suffering under the scrutiny of the town. The people made Malena their subject, enslaved by the words people say against her. Eventually just like the ant, she got burned out too. Another is the hair that was Malena’s pride, beauty and life. It was the pride that rendered her formidable against the townsfolk’s scrutiny, the beauty the women of her town envied, and the colorful life she led as a mysterious wife, a reluctant prostitute and a battered victim of women’s wrath. Lastly, Renato’s throwing out into the sea of the record of Malena’s theme song for her husband is indicative of Renato’s letting go of Malena, who left her town in order to save face after her castigation by the women.
I think that Malena’s becoming a prostitute is well motivated because her basic need for food is at stake. While it is understood that she has to keep her dignity and morality intact, it was not beyond her to use her charm, albeit reluctantly, in order to feed her stomach and save herself in the process. For women like her who can see no brighter prospects in acquiring daily bread but through selling body, Malena does not meet any reason why she would not go to the proportions of surrendering herself to male objectification in exchange of something to eat. Her character is realistic enough for anyone of us to meet Malena in actual life: she is a human who is willing to shed her dignity and morality if her physical satisfaction is endangered.
Of the two movies, Malena touched me more because of the disturbing happenings in Malena’s prostitute life which is somewhat of a contrast with the relative lightness of Salvatore’s twisted love life in Cinema Paradiso. Malena taught me to be humble because I am blessed to have more than what I need while some people like Malena would go as far as be reduced to whoring in order to fill her stomach. Also, it taught me to love unconditionally, like Renato whose love for Malena did not expect to be returned as when the movie ended with his note, “The one I’ll remember is the only one who never asked.”

ang tula at nobela ng panahong kolonyal: isang pasada

Hinugis ng patakarang kolonyal ang tula bilang anyong pampanitikan sa pamamagitan ng relihiyosong ideyolohiya na pinapairal ng mga prayle upang papaniwalain ang mga katutubo. Dahil sa aroganteng perspektibo ng mga kolonyal na mga Kastila na ang mga indio ay ‘di-sibilisado at, parang “lost sheep,” naging sintomas ng kamalayang ito ang mga relihiyosong tula na nagsasaad ng pagkakatagpo at kaligtasan sa pamamagitan ng pagsamba kay Kristo. May anyo ang tula na nagpapakita ng pagkaapi at sakripisyo ng Panginoong Hesu Kristo kaya dapat, ang mga indio rin ay sumailalim sa mga sakripisyo na isang dahilan sa pagiging kolonisado ng Espanya. Naging predominante ang pagtuturong Kristiyano sa tulang kolonyal kung itatambis sa pagtuturong “paganism” sa tulang tradisyunal, at sa bisa ng mga tulang kolonyal, ipinagmalaki ng mga taga-Kanluran ang kanyang ilusyong kagalingan at kabihasnan kumpara sa mga Oryental.
Nahugis ang nobelang El Filibusterismo ni Jose Rizal ng mga subersibong kondisyon na unti-unti nang naiipon at pagkatapos ay nagbunga ng pambansang himagsikan noong 1896. Itinuturing na pulitikal ang anyo ng nobela dahil sumipot ito sa panahong ang mga pagpapahirap, pagkawawa at pang-aabuso sa mga katutubo ay hindi na kasugutang pantao sa mga sakripisyo ng Panginoon kundi ay nagsisimula nang manggising ng damdaming makabansa sa mga indio sapat para isiping makalaya sa mga represibong gawa ng kolonyal na pamamahala ng Espanya. Sa Kabanata 7, kinuwestiyon ni Simoun ang implikasyon ng panukalang Academia Hispanica nina Basilio at kapwa mag-aaral dahil sa paghingi ng mga katutubo ng “assimilation” sa Espanya, pinapatay umano ang pagkakataong magkaroon ng pambansang identidad. Kung gayon, subersibo ang kondisyong ito dahil inaayawan ni Rizal ang pagdagdag pa ng Espanyol bilang wika sa napakarami nang wika sa Pilipinas at dahil may suhestiyon ng paghulagpos mula sa kolonisasyon upang sa kalayaan ay magbuo ng sariling identidad.

musings on marriage

Marriage is a term that is not really common to daily conversations. There are just lots of other subjects under the sun to be tackled at length and marriage is perhaps the last to cross the chatters’ minds. Often, this topic is brought up only when two people in love feel that it is already time for them to be joined by their faith with each other. Before this gut feeling occurs, love usually passes by the couple. Hence, my definition of marriage is the occurrence of that certain gut feeling when love passes by.
Marriage is compared to many things. Some people compare marriage to a tree that makes the impression of bearing a lot of fruits. Other times, marriage is compared to freshly cooked rice which can be easily spewed out when its hotness scalds the mouth. Sometimes, marriage is compared to Cupid’s arrow hitting two persons at the same time in such a way that they feel mutually bound for each other. For me, marriage is the time and place wherein the best of two families meet in front of God and promise to make this world a better place for each other to live in.
Marriage really is a very controversial topic. The few who take it lightly joke that instead of the customary settling for good, the settling turns for bad. More often, people change their mood set when talking about marriage. Usually, they become more serious because marriage is a life-changing phase in the first place. The conversation becomes intense since the life changes involve not one but at least two persons’ lives, not to mention their respective families’ lives. People who get that marrying impression try either to think about their personal virtues and ideals which will be acquainted to the partner way into the married life. Marriage often reveals to the partner the true character of a person he or she swears to stay united to, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health.
Early marriages are the paths some young loves eventually lead to. Youthful couples who are barely legal fall insanely to intimate passion that they swear to trade anything in the universe for the union of their livers to one another. These days, early trigger of Cupid’s arrow amongst the young ones initiates a decision regarding marriage even if they are not yet ready physically, materially, psychologically, and spiritually. In the heart of young people, they sense that they can really have a fulfilling life already with someone else. They argue that with love in their hearts, their married life heads the direction of bliss, till death do they part.
Will love alone lead to a successful marriage?

epikong kolonyal: isang pagsusuri sa florante at laura

Halaw sa panahon ng pananakop ng mga Kastila noong 1521 hanggang 1898 ang Florante at Laura, isang mahabang pasalaysay na tula ng katutubong si Francisco Balagtas. Dahil sa pamamalakad ng mga dayuhan, nagkaroon ng maraming pagbabago at karagdagan sa katutubong panitikan lalo na sa uri at paksa. Sa kaso ng Florante at Laura, isa itong karagdagang uri sa katutubong panulaan sapagkat isa itong awit (na binabalatkayuan ang totoong katutubong porma nitong epiko). Makikita rin sa awit na ito ang mga pagbabago sa paksang panrelihiyon, pangmoralidad, at pangromansa na mga katangiang palasak na sa Europa noong panahong iyon.
Samantala, awit man ang Florante at Laura, nasa nakalimbag na porma na rin ito sapagkat inangkat dito sa Pilipinas ang sistema ng imprenta. Sa pananalasa ng mga hiram na panitikang Europeo, masasalamin sa akda ang mga dayuhang kaharian at tauhan sa halip na katutubong kalikasan.
Samantala, dahil sa kolonyal na kaligirang bumabalot sa pagkakaakda sa Florante at Laura, masasalamin dito ang dayuhang tradisyon ng pulitika, pamamalakad ng kaharian, pagtrato sa mga di-Kristiyanong lipi, pag-aaral, kaisipan ng katarungan, Kanluraning kaisipan ng kagandahan, Kristiyanong pananampalataya at pagpapahalagang naiimpluwensiyahan ng mananakop.
Tungkol naman sa diwang sinasambit ng Florante at Laura hinggil sa indibidwal, mahalagang isakilos ng bawat mamamayan ang paggawa ng kapalarang nasa awa ng Diyos. Sa kaso ni Florante na bida sa awit, mahusay siyang mandirigma ngunit nang sakupin ng traydor na si Adolfo ang kahariang ipinagtatanggol ni Florante, nadakip ang huli at iginapos sa kagubatan. Kahit patraydor ang pagkatalo ni Florante kay Adolfo, hindi nito naisip na paghigantian ang taksil bagkus ay nanawagan ito sa Diyos sa malaking bahagi ng kanyang hinagpis sa gubat.
Tungkol naman sa diwang sinasambit ng Florante at Laura hinggil sa kolektibong mamamayan, ipinapakita na kinakatawan ng bayani ang pagpapanatili ng sarili sa kabila ng pananakop. Sa kaso ni Florante, nananatili siya sa kahinahunan kahit dapat niyang paghimagsikan ang pananakop ni Adolfo sa kaharian ng Albanya. May paghihimagsik man, hindi dahas ang kinasangkapan ni Florante para labanan si Adolfo bagkus ay ipinagkatiwala na niya sa Poong Maykapal ang kapalaran. Dahil dito, masakop man ang bansa ng kung sinu-sino, mananatili ang sarili alinmang pagkakakilanlan ang kinamulatan.
Nanggagaling naman ang Florante at Laura sa konteksto ng Panahon ng Pananakop kung kailan naipapamalakaya na ang mga buto ng himagsikan. Dahil hindi na eksklusibo sa mga imprentang pansimbahan ang mga palimbagan, nakapaglimbag na rin ng mga akdang hindi nauukol lamang sa mga Kristiyanong ritwal at panalangin. Nag-umpisa na ring makapaglimbag ang mga katutubo ng mga akdang panromansa, anti-Kristiyanismo at anti-Hispanikong imperiyalismo at isa na sa mga iyon si Balagtas sa pamamagitan ng kanyang obrang Florante at Laura. Gumamit man si Balagtas ng mga dayuhang tauhan at tagpuan, ginawa lamang niya ito para pagtakpan ang paghihimagsik sa pananakop ng mga traydor na Kastila sa kahariang walang iba kundi Pilipinas. Sa adaptasyong ito rin ni Balagtas ng maraming dayuhang sangkap pampanitikan, ipinapamukha rin niya na kaya rin ng mga indio ang gumawa ng obara-maestrang nahahawig o nalalagpasan pa ang mga Europeong akda.
Sa kaso ng Florante at Laura, para sa mga indio ito na nagsisimula nang magising ang kamalayang makabansa. Ginawa ni Balagtas ang kanyang subersibong awit upang ipakita ang pagkakagapos ng mga mamamayan habang nasa pananakop ng mga Kastila ang kanilang bayan. Naghahari sa bayan ang kasamaan ngunit sa pagpapakitang ito ng kahima-himagsik na kalagayan ng bansa, ipinagpapasa-Diyos ang kapalaran dahil darating din ang panahong matatapos ang pananakop, gaya ng pagtapos ng armada nina Florante at Aladin sa pananakop sa Albanya, dahil magtatagumpay ang mabuti para sa Pilipinas.
Sa ngayon, matutunghayan pa sa kasalukuyang panitikan, lipunan at kasaysayan ang natirang impluwensiya ni Florante. Sapagkat maraming aspeto pa ng lipunang Filipino ang hindi nakakalaya matapos ang apat na dantaon ng pananakop, lumilitaw pa rin sa panitikan ang mga bayaning rebolusyunaryo na kinokondena ang pananalasa ng kapitalismo, neokolonyalismo at imperyalismo. Halimbawa ng mga akdang ganito ang Zsa Zsa Zaturnnah kung saan nagiging superheroine ang baklang bida upang kalabanin ang mga dayuhang Ingleserang pseudo-peminista. Sa lipunan naman, lumilitaw pa rin ang mga kabayanihang nagpapakita ng taglay na katapatan, kalakasan at pagkabansa sa pamamagitan ng mga Filipinong manggagawa sa ibang bansa na napagkakatiwalaan ng kanilang mga amo, ng mga taong nagsasauli ng kagamitang hindi sa kanila, lakas ng ‘di-matinag-tinag na ispiritu ng mga mahihirap na nananatiling may pag-asa sa kabila ng karukhaan at mga mamamayang nagsisilbi pa rin sa loob ng bansa kahit maraming oportunidad ng pag-unlad sa ibayong-dagat. Nasa dugo pa rin nila ang mga katangian ni Florante. Sa kasaysayan naman, makikita pa rin ang impluwensiya ng mga akda sa bisa ng mga Rebolusyong EDSA na nagtaboy sa mga abusadong Presidente upang panaigin ang demokrasya sa bansa. Tulad ni Florante, bayani ng bayan ang mga bayani ng EDSA.

the good, the bad, and the ambiguous: americanization and the thomasites-sponsored philippine education

Before the turn of the twentieth century, shortly right after the military loss of Spain to the United States of America over the colony known before as the Philippine Islands, the U.S. Army established the first public school in the historic Corregidor Island off Bataan Peninsula. Without formal training in teaching, the soldiers nonetheless could be credited for having laid the bricks of the Philippine public school system via teaching English to the natives less than one month after their designation in the archipelago. The first batch of real teachers arrived—all 48 of them—aboard the “Sheridan” to teach not only English but also basic education to the Filipinos.
These were the precursors of the teachers called “Thomasites,” who were in turn the forerunners of the present-day U.S. Peace Corps. What these American mentors and those that followed them became known for was the vessel that transported them to the Western end of the Pacific—it was a former cattle ship called USS “Thomas.” Numbering 530 of whom 365 were male and 165 were female, the Thomasites docked at Manila Bay on August 21, 1901 and after two days of quarantine, were permitted to disembark the ship. They were subsequently deployed in provinces as far off as Cagayan, Zambales, Batangas, Masbate, Negros, Cebu and Sulu. Thus began the education that reached beyond the privileged classes in post-Hispanic Philippines.
Establishing public schools that attracted the Filipino masses, the Thomasites taught basic education using English as the medium of instruction. The attraction factor was mainly due to the opportunity seen by the underprivileged to become part of the elite once educated. Centuries before, the Spanish priests taught the natives no more than religious prayers and rituals and, rather belatedly, the Spanish language in mid-19th century. The teaching of English was a revolution away from the Spanish-sponsored teaching which was primarily done in the indigenous languages. With the American-sponsored public education, the average Filipino was now capable of attending school and had an equal academic footing with the elite. Effective education of the masses, however, did not come as easily since the pupils tended to attend classes at random and be absent during, say, town and other such festivities. The elementary schools were followed by vocational schools which the American teachers deemed as preparatory institutions for Filipinos pursuing their respective careers. The founding of the country’s only national university, the University of the Philippines, opened to Filipinos further American-sponsored primary courses in the tertiary level.
Aside from the more pronounced basic education on English, grammar, reading, mathematics, geography, practical arts and athletics, the American teachers also taught their culture, values and their homegrown style of democracy to the natives. The pioneering batch of the Thomasites was succeeded by other Thomasite missionaries that educated the Filipino people. Those taught by the Thomasites with brilliant academic showing were further honed by being sent to the mainland US as pensionado students. These predecessors of the Fulbright scholars studied in the mother country and then returned to the Philippines to apply what they learned there.
The American-sponsored education in the colonial Philippines is an amalgamation of the good, the bad, and the ambiguous. It is good in that the Filipinos were given the chance to study, a fact that was denied to the natives by the Spaniards. It is an accepted truth that education liberates people by the acquisition of empowering knowledge, and with the teaching of the Thomasites, the masses’ dream of upward mobility was closer in reality. Hence, this explains why most Filipinos treat education as a significant element in their lives. Furthermore, the establishment of the public school system in the Philippines was also good since education was not any longer limited to the wealthy or elite classes; rather, it catered to the masses which case advanced the literacy movement in the Philippines. In this light, the American sponsors of this institution brought social change in the Philippine landscape.
This very alteration in the Philippine society spawned the bad side of the colonial education under the Americans. The manner in which the Americans taught their homegrown education was such that it planted seeds of Americanization in the minds of the Filipinos. By imbuing American values and culture to the locals, the Thomasites displaced Filipinization that the youth needed to identify themselves with their motherland and, worse, made any other culture as inferior compared to the Americans. This accounts for the lingering “Stateside” mentality among Filipinos whether they actually set foot in the US or they were further corrupted by the imperializing powers of Hollywoodization, McDonaldization and other such neocolonialisms.
The ambiguous comes in the form of the Philippines being the third largest English-speaking nation in the whole planet as a result of the American-sponsored education. On the one hand, the proficiency in English comes handy in landing professional positions here and abroad, especially in consideration of the increasingly globalizing world. With English as the dominant language of business and information, how can an Anglophilic Filipino lose? On the other hand, it is this love for the English language that contaminates the Filipinos’ sense of identity, for in the process of placing status symbol in English, the Filipino language languishes in its derision as a mother tongue associated with the bakya or the jologs. This ambiguity places the American-sponsored education in the middle of a tightrope wherein the question of the boon or the bane of this colonial legacy remains a debate among the colonialists and the nativists.

seizing the moment

There are many ways through which I may seize the day. I may do now the things I have been postponing to do or have not been able to do in the past for one reason or another. I want to seize the day by visiting the Philippine countryside. I want to travel to Baguio to experience the cold again without having to go to wintry countries. I also want to go to Boracay to experience the sugar-white beach that bewitches local and foreign tourists. I want to see the amazing rice terraces to feel proud of a world-class Filipino heritage. I likewise want to visit Bohol to marvel at the chocolate hills and the tiny yet adorable tarsier. Seizing the day by seeing the best of the islands is something I have been raring to do, given the chance to pursue my plans. I may also spend quality time with people I rarely keep company to or I want to meet. I want to spend recreation time with my family in any part of the countyside. I also want to spend leisure time with my inang in amusement centers, the way we used to be together years ago. I want to be with my friends for some bonding time at the mall, the way we used to when semestral breaks allow us. I want to meet any national leader and gather tips on how to run country affairs effectively. I likewise want to be with my literary idols in order to learn a thing or two about becoming top-caliber artists. Seizing the day by spending quality time socially is something I ought to do, given the free time for everyone involved. Finally, I may savor the time I have now as if these are the last hours I have on earth. I want to finish my plans of action as is expected of a leader fulfilling his duty. I likewise want to do charity work outside the academe's mission so I may share my personal blesings to the less fortunate. I want to make more friends in order to learn more lives before earth time expires. Lastly, I want to experience playing nonstop, dancing in the rain, or perhaps hiking the mountaintop just to get some baptism of fire. Seizing the day by doing what I intend to do before the world ends is something I look forward to, given the opportunity. Not everyone is lucky to maximize the miracle that's time.

negative ethical, social and environmental effects of genetic counseling

While there are positive implications that may be drawn from genetic counseling, there are also negative ones which consist of the foregoing:
Genetic counseling is not advisable since the tests that frequently accompany it is found by consensual researchers to be inaccurate in diagnosing illnesses. For example, genetic counselors may tell a patient that he has a certain disease which gets him the label “at risk” due to a tested gene factor. This will make the patient anxious since uncertainty will loom in the picture. He may not be even told that it is one factor to have an “at risk” gene and another to have the environment to aggravate the prognosis of diseases.
Genetic counseling also creates a leeway of false hopes for patients. It does not give any comfort for a patient to know that he will acquire an incurable disease. It does not help in making one live a normal life devoid of pain and suffering. For instance, genetic counselors may tell a patient that they are at risk of getting ill, but not when the disease strikes, how severe the symptoms are, whether the disorder will progress over time or if treatment can still be made. It becomes harder then to have that patient have his children tested if they inherited his illness and will die a young death as he will. Genetic counseling provides a backdrop for a difficulty of having the patient's children know or not know whether they will suffer from a potentially inherited disease. This places excessive accountability on the patient, who may feel his anxiety, anger, frustration, depression, tension and guilt increasing all because of a counseling aftermath. The same feelings may be felt toward family members when information coming from the genetic counseling need to be revealed to them.
Whereas an unknowing patient may live long enough to survive a potential disease, a patient who gets advised that he is at risk of acquiring a diease may become psychologically assailed that he will inevitably develop such a disease. When a patient notices this illness, he may eventually heighten the risk. A patient may have a genetic trait that leads to a disease, but this is not a guarantee that the patient will get it. The patient may only have a higher risk if not counseled, but the very act of counseling may put the patient in a psychologically-torturing decision whether to pursue the advise to reduce the risk.
Also, genetic counseling can push nature to the limits by rendering science into messing with nature, especially when done the wrong way. To illustrate: parents can be advised by geneticists to abort an unborn fetus if it is discovered to have undesirable features like deformation, disease or maternal threats. Genetic counseling, then, reduces conception down to selective breeding. This may also result to prenatal anxiety that runs the risk of miscarriage because of psychological consequences.
In relation to the aforementioned, pregnant women advised by geneticists to have undesirable fetuses may run the risk of being blamed and guilt-ridden for their pregnancy result. The counseling made on them may create a negative impact in such a way that these women will suffer disrupted ties with their family members and community. Also, if they risk to bear their children, the counseling may pose an interference in the bonding of the mothers and children, who may be diagnosed to have disabilities. Meanwhile, genetic counseling may also discover false paternity, which will possibly tear apart marital ties.
Likewise, genetic counseling can be disadvantageous to job seekers, as they may suffer employment discrimination. If advised to have the potential of acquiring hereditary diseases which case appears as medical information, the potential employee may not be hired because the company does not want to invest time and money training the person who is predetermined for an illness.
Genetic information can also be used by insurance companies against a person. The result of genetic counseling may be used by paying insurance companies to deny coverage to high risk clients. In order to avoid paying for expensive treatments and hospitalizations, insurance companies may use genetic counseling outcome to declare that the client's high risk status is a pre-existing condition.
The same information gathered from genetic counseling can create privacy, social stigma and confidentiality issues. There is the question of who may access the information. Many people would not want anyone to see what their genetic makeup looks like. People themselves would be concerned about being counseled on their genetic status. Without intending to, their privacy may be intruded as well as their family's.