Where has respect gone?

It’s been a long time since I’ve stopped to look observe my surroundings and the people around me. I recently started to pay more attention to life, rather than letting it simply unfold before me. Everywhere we look and in almost everything we do or believe, it seems that we are losing our sense of respect. I believe that many people actually see this loss but are blasé about it.

I vaguely remember my Filipino classes in grade school but I do recall being taught about Filipino traits, values, and practices. As I was putting my thoughts together to write this piece, my uncle asked me what I was writing about. Apparently his son, my little cousin was being taught the same topic last school year. Most of the traits and practices mentioned in his class topic had something to do with respecting elders and others in general. For example, the Filipino practice of making mano as showing our respect for elders. There is also the practice of saying po and opo when one talks to another with respect.

In the last two years, I have traveled a lot around our country going to different places from north to south and I have found that a number of people still continue these practices.

However, many families continue these practices because it is a cultural heritage that they would like to preserve. Preserving these practices might sound like a good thing but if you delve in deeper, you notice that there is a negative aspect to this, too. A great number of the people, who try to preserve these practices, try because it is something that is actually disappearing.

Respect isn’t something that can be seen in what we do. Respect is part of a person’s values and must therefore be seen in everything that he or she is. Ergo one has respect for – elders, privacy, authority, the environment, another person’s belongings.

Respect for privacy, hmmm really now?! Who are you kidding? Does privacy even exist in the Philippines? Many of us treasure our own privacy, however, unconsciously and sometimes even consciously, we outwardly disregard the privacy of others. It’s been said time and time again that gossip is a local pastime. The more private the issue or concern, the juicier the story is – the more we have to tell! I’m sure you’ve heard this before, "I promised not to tell, but if I tell you, you promise me that you won’t tell." Or how about, "Come on, just tell me. Who am I going to tell?" Yeah right, there are about 80 plus million other Filipinos to tell. Also, people here don't just pry, they investigate. What makes this all so sad is that it’s bad enough that we sometimes can’t keep our mouths shut, and to make things worse, we don’t even deliver the story accurately. This may be the reason why the game pass-the-message can actually be played here. I would think that that game would be so lame, but it can be one of the most exciting ones in this country cause of all the twists and turns the story develops before the story gets back to the source.

I think we can now move on from respect for privacy, to respect for the environment. Before I go on, I would first like to thank the many Filipinos who are working hard, putting all their efforts in trying to preserve the Philippines’ flora and fauna. Good job, keep it up! Back to our topic, there is an obvious problem when it comes to a Filipino’s respect for his environment. Whether we talk about how we dispose of our trash, how we take care of our waters, or how we use our natural resources, we will find that we are slowly killing our environment. However, I believe that in a warped way Filipinos can’t totally be blamed because our country is resiliently beautiful and we are spoiled by the bountiful nature that surrounds us. When it comes to respect for the environment, I think we have a lifestyle problem. Because we’ve been so spoiled by our environment we take it for granted. We can only change through educating the people on how to live with and take care of the environment.

Regarding our possible loss of respect for authority, I would first like to give the example of a typical Filipino driver. Whether rich or poor, the road’s main rule is pretty much, every man for himself. I do have to say though; I have noticed that in the last years, certain government rules are being implemented more and more efficiently. For example, even with much hullabaloo before the color code scheme was implemented. Now traffic enforcers are more strict on people who don’t use the seatbelts and people who use cell phones while driving.

The problem however of implementation of the law is not really what I’m focusing on. What I want to get across is that even if the laws are actually implemented more efficiently, it is the Filipino’s mentality that we have to adjust before we get anywhere. I say this because a great number of Filipino drivers just try to get from point A to point B as fast as they can and in whatever way they can, even if it means breaking a few laws. Mentality: Why not? They won’t catch me, and if they do, then I can resort to bribery. Yes, sad, but many times true. To prove my point, just get in your car and drive during rush hour.

If the driving here can show you a loss of respect for authority, more so can how people behave in church. I have also committed this disrespect and was reprimanded once, then I saw how rude I was and stopped. I am talking about people who leave the Mass before the priest/celebrant has left. It is common courtesy to wait for the priest to go before the mass-goers leave. Think also about the choir that is still singing while their audience has, left. I think that an audience leaving a performance of any sort is one of the biggest insults to a performer.

I believe that there are decent politicians, which may sound like an oxymoron to some, nevertheless still true. Still, I also think, and I am not alone in thinking this way, that there are a good number of bad apples in the government tree. So when people don’t like who they see in the government sometimes, they go patriotic bordering on fanatical and put their efforts in trying to pull the person in power down, figuratively and literally. Sometimes, we must go to the extreme to get what we want, but at the same time, we shouldn’t go overboard. There are proper, civilized, well-mannered, respectable ways of doing things. They say, "Respect is earned." But it doesn’t mean that because someone is your adversary you must treat them with disrespect.

There is something else I noticed with our respect for authority, particularly our government. Basically, there are those who don’t like what they see and do what they want. But and at the same time, there are also those who follow and obey. It doesn’t necessarily mean that because people follow and obey, that they do so because they respect the authority. Many people simply follow because of fear. There can be a very thin line between respect and fear. Obviously, you want someone to follow you and you want to be followed because of respect and not because of fear.

Are Filipinos losing respect? I think that in many ways they are. This is something that I believe we should address. It’s not at all that we don’t know how to respect, but for one, there are some things that need to prove to be respectable. Second, we should always check ourselves, sometimes when overwhelmed by emotions, and having many things in mind, we tend to forget how to behave properly. And finally, I think that we should all always remember that we live in a world with other people, we should stop thinking only about ourselves, and think of others. The thought of taking into consideration another person's feelings could be the start to respecting him.