Twisted logic

We Filipinos have a unique way of justifying wrongdoing by using some injustice we experienced or some Robin Hood notion of right versus wrong to defend our own actions that are essentially wrong or criminal.

The tragedy about the whole thing is that we have integrated this behavior and “Twisted logic” into the very fiber of our culture. While we send our children to school and church in order to receive proper training about morality and integrity, we the adults go about committing acts that are criminal or sinful.

Even worse, we tolerate the behavior of others, if those people happen to experience some injustice we ourselves have witnessed or experienced. It becomes easy to relate and be “understanding of wrongdoers simply because their enemies are also our enemies.”

Whether it is politics, regionalism, religion or plain and simple “Pinoy versus the world”, we automatically lose our minds and replace it with our coping mechanism that I call “Twisted logic.”

This week for instance, two officials from a bank that has long served the UP Diliman community disappeared under a cloud of suspicion. The guess is they split with several millions in time deposits etc. While people were trying to understand the why and how, it was suggested that one official flew because she was so discouraged at never ever being promoted and the disappointment eventually took its toll.

Does that mean that all employees who don’t get promoted and become disappointed now have the right to rip off their employers and customers? While it is alright to commiserate with the injustice, it does not justify the act and we certainly should not honor it with our sympathy.

I am reminded of a man who once said: “I may have several families, but I recognize all of my partners and all of my children by them. In fact, unlike my enemies and critics, I also support them. My critics on the other hand pretend to live such moral lives, but have mistresses and affairs in hiding.”

The honesty is refreshing, the public confession is admirable, but again it shows us our “Twisted Logic”. Just because someone does right in those he did wrong does not make him right. Yet many of his friends use the very same “twisted logic” to explain or excuse away the man’s sins.

As a people, many of us commit the crime of tax evasion annually by using the excuse or justification that the money we pay will only be stolen by government employees and officials. Perhaps we should also put up signs in all government offices saying: “IF YOU DON’T PAY TAXES, YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO CRITICIZE THIS GOVERNMENT OR EXPECT TO BE SERVED.”

I decided to write about our “Twisted logic” when a friend explained to me how a woman committed a crime because her ex-boyfriend no longer supported her financially. My friend was actually defending the woman because of a perceived injustice but failed to see that a crime was committed.

We could have gone into the details about how no injustice took place, but what really struck me was how many of us who are certainly rational, intelligent people simply become irrational with our “Twisted logic” because the person claimed to be a victim, was a woman, was a Filipina, had been abandoned.

Does any of that justify stealing or cheating, or make it OK?

In many villages and barangays in the Philippines, a husband, or a parent or an older child will slap someone weaker or smaller because they answered back. But instead of confronting the abuser, many neighbors simply turn away and justify their fear and their weaknesses by saying “it wouldn’t have happened if the weaker or smaller person did not answer back.”

The barangay officials and the police will say it’s a private matter or a domestic affair. What it is is a crime. It’s domestic violence that we will never see because of our “Twisted logic”.

Perhaps there is no better proof of such “Twisted logic” as the unexpected vote that went to Antonio Trillanes. Many people call it sympathy vote, others call it a vote of indignation.

It may be all that but what it all falls under is “Twisted logic”. The Trillanes vote is all about supporting someone who is as rebellious as we are, hates Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, and also wants to somehow get even with the current administration.

I interviewed many people who voted for Antonio Trillanes and the one common response they had was a desire to watch Trillanes interrogate the AFP Chief of Staff and hear the Chief refer to Trillanes as “Your Honor”. Now that’s “Twisted”.

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I can’t claim this story to be accurate but my source who hails from Ozamis City swears that it is highly reliable.

As many of you know, there is a mythical 11th commandment which is: “Thou shall not push thy luck”. It seems that an aspirant for mayor never heard the 11th commandment and tried his luck by filing his candidacy in the hometown of the notorious Kuratong Baleleng gang.

No one until then had dared to challenge the gang’s will and chosen candidate. So the would-be challenger sent his lawyer to file the candidacy. It was an uneventful drive to town where no ambush or blockade took place.

Upon arrival at the election office, a small crowd was excitedly waiting for the challenger’s lawyer. The welcoming committee quickly surrounded the lawyer who was met by a “youth leader”.

Unfortunately, they were all from the other camp and while the youth leader pointed a colt .45 at the lawyer’s face, the poor guy could only think of Dirty Harry saying: “Go ahead, PUNK, Make my day!”

The lawyer was made to tear up the application for candidacy, the gang candidate won unopposed as Mayor of the Kuratong Baleleng. There was surely no cheating, but was there an election?

The last gang meet was about having candidates for Mayor, Governor, and Congressman in 2010. I actually thought they qualified as a party-list since Ping Lacson marginalized them during the Erap administration.

Talk about criminal institution!