Devil’s advocate

Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat says another female passenger from the United States skipped quarantine and even posted on Facebook about getting a massage on the day she arrived.

“Somebody gave the name, even gave pictures that on the day she arrived she even got a massage, as in she was even posting it on her Instagram stories. She was very proud that she was skipping quarantine,” Puyat said.

This is the second female passenger from the US to jump the required isolation period and allegedly boast about it.

The first, Gwyneth Anne Chua, is now reaping the bitter fruits of her misdeed.

But wait! Why did Puyat name Chua but withhold the second female quarantine violator?

Why is Chua being shamed in public while the second woman is being spared the embarrassment of her misdeed?

What’s so special about the second woman?

*      *      *

Many readers have bashed me on the Internet for playing the devil’s advocate in the much-publicized incident involving Gwyneth Anne Chua, who skipped quarantine and attended a Christmas party at a bar in the Poblacion district in Makati.

Most readers thought I was defending Chua who, as I said in Tuesday’s column (Jan.4), I didn’t know from Eve.

Guys, if you reached the college level in education, you would have understood that a “devil’s advocate” is a person who champions the less accepted cause for the sake of argument (Merriam-Webster’s definition).

So, dear reader, if you are dense enough not to know the definition of devil’s advocate, I pity you. You probably were absent in class when that term was taken up in philosophy class.

Devil’s advocacy makes for better discussions on controversial issues. A coin always has two sides, so to speak.

And, by the way, I thank readers for bashing me for my opinions that they abhor.

It means a lot to me because they read me.

Tell you what: the more you flog me, the more I’m elated, so elated as in having an orgasm.

*      *      *

Individuals who have not been vaccinated in Metro Manila will not be allowed to go to enclosed public places.

Local ordinances in every city in the metropolis will soon mandate restricting movements of unvaccinated people.

However, there is no longer any need for the proposed ordinance.

Almost all restaurants, stores and malls in the metropolis demand vaccination cards from their customers.

People who refuse to be vaccinated have no right to go to public places and mingle with those vaccinated as they might be carriers of COVID-19 virus.

In these critical times, one can’t invoke freedom of movement.

The good of the majority supersedes the right of the individual.

It’s a source of wonder why some people refuse to be inoculated against COVID-19 when vaccines are already available.

It’s even dumbfounding for people to try to evade vaccination when 85 percent of COVID-19 patients in the intensive care units (ICUs) of the various hospitals in Metro Manila did not get vaccinated.

Even in the United States, hospitals are overwhelmed by the big number of patients who are unvaccinated.

*      *      *

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) is looking at the possibility of having the man-made dolomite beach on Roxas Boulevard swimmable.

Jonas Leones, DENR undersecretary for policy, planning and international affairs, said: “We are working hard so that the beach can be swimmable once more. That is why the water treatment of Manila Bay is being continuously monitored.”

Leones has got to be kidding!

Decades of throwing their waste by people living along the seashore in Tondo and Cavite and the oil and waste from ships anchored on the bay have made Manila Bay probably one of the most polluted in the world.

In the late 1970s, I dove into the bay on a dare from a friend at the side of the Cultural Center of the Philippines complex; I was in a drunken stupor. It took me a week to wash off the grease from the bay despite bathing with warm water twice a day.

It was a good thing I didn’t accidentally drink the seawater from the bay; otherwise, I could have gotten sick.

In early 2001, a Tsinoy friend and I ran a restaurant that jutted into the bay at the Luneta or Rizal Park.

After every typhoon, the water under the restaurant collected tons of garbage, including carcasses of animals (and at least once it was a human being). The garbage was washed ashore in the Luneta area.

Our restaurant – it’s gone now – was located a few kilometers from where the Dolomite Beach is now.

Dolomite Beach swimmable? Ugh!

*      *      *

President Digong Duterte is probably the only Chief Executive in the country who enjoys high approval ratings a few months before the end of his term.

All of Digong’s predecessors, starting from Corazon C. Aquino to Noynoy Aquino, saw their ratings dip considerably toward the end of their terms.

Mr. Duterte’s rating, according to the latest Pulse Asia survey, showed 72 percent of the respondents approving of his performance, up by eight points obtained in a similar survey in September.

What’s Digong’s secret?

The poor, who make up the majority of the population, identify with him.

The poor like his propensity for cussing, his irreverence and his groping for words in Tagalog to convey his message.

Digong is Cebuano-speaking, the second biggest ethnic group in the country next to Tagalog.

Methinks the only other president who could match Digong’s popularity is Ramon Magsaysay.

But then, during Magsaysay’s time, SWS and Pulse Asia did not exist.