Editorial - Change is a matter of perception

The municipality of Malay in the province of Aklan is prohibiting the use of “Bora” as a shortened term for Boracay. The world-famous island, known for its immaculately fine white sandy beaches, is made up of four barangays belonging to Malay.

Malay officials and residents have a valid beef against using Bora in reference to Boracay. The most obvious is that the island’s name is Boracay, not Bora, so why change it. Then it can also be argued that using Bora risks mistaking it for Bora-Bora in French Polynesia.

The prohibition can be successfully pursued as far as static use is concerned, meaning it is easier to go after billboards and other printed advertisements that use Bora instead of Boracay. Radio and television commercial can also be successfully banned.

Beyond these areas of potentially controllable mediums, however, it is very doubtful if the prohibition can be pursued as successfully. In the matter of language and expression by individual persons, the ban is in fact expected to fall very very flat.

There can be no regulating how people chose to express their preferences, especially in private communication. People can call Boracay Yacarob for all they care, and there is nothing the Malay local government can do about it.

Language evolves and evolves quickly because people adjust constantly to the different influences and factors that affect their daily lives. And while it is easy to understand the concern of Malay, it is always best to, well, just go with the flow.

And while no local government has officially allowed language or popular culture to affect and alter official names by means of shortening them, the same does not hold true in the field of commerce, where entities can be rather flexible and adaptable to change.

Two great examples of adaptations that worked quite successfully for those who allowed official change are Coca-Cola, which allowed people to shorten its product to Coke, and right here in Cebu with Foodarama, which gave in to Fooda, and found the change made it flourish.

Others tolerated “short-changes” but not officially: MCWD is still MCWD, even though people call it MC. Consolacion is still Consolacion, although jeepney dispatchers have long truncated it to Lacion. There so many more examples, but only Malay is complaining.