Instead, they need to step up and substantiate such pride with actual accomplishments that collectively, they can be proud of.
The Pinoy Pridists, as fellow GRP author ChinoF likes to call them, descended en masse upon his article “Why Pinoy Pride will never save the Philippines”. The nature of commentary left there brought to light that many Filipinos are apparently confused as to what pride they should have and what they should not.
They consider Manny Pacquiao winning a boxing match, Jessica Sanchez or Charice earning accolades, Erik Spoelstra’s team winning the NBA Finals, or Lorna Schofield becoming “the first Filipino American federal judge in U.S. History”, all abroad, as sources of good pride. On the other hand, instead of ignoring statements that are supposed to mean absolutely nothing, Filipinos react with rage to jokes from Katherine Ryan, observations about the Philippines from Claire Danes, Jimmy Sieczska, Marion Barry, Alec Baldwin, and even statements that weren’t even made in disparagement from Lucy Liu, Taylor Kitsch, and Justin Bieber, just to name a few.
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Even the article itself was perceived as one big FU to Filipinos as a whole.
If the statement describes something true but undesirable about Filipinos, analyze it, do something about it, other than whine. If it’s not true, simply ignore it.
Pinoy Pridists will claim that Pinoy Pride makes them feel good, and that it inspires them to strive for more. Ok, then what? Where are the results of such “inspiration” derived from the “accomplishments” of their countrymen? How come despite such numerous opportunities to be “inspired”, Filipinos have yet to refine their society and culture to minimize the effects of their dysfunction?
Pride gets you only partly to your destination; the rest of it is achieved through working smart. Predictably, Filipinos have been shying away from the work part for quite some time, much less work smart; and they’re still looking for that hero who will lead them to the promised land, yet they expect said hero to spoon feed them and do everything for them too.
In case no one has noticed, Pinoy Pride is held up by accomplishments of individuals, and it is being masqueraded as one big achievement that applies to all Filipinos as a whole.
Yet Filipinos still scream for validation from non-Filipinos that they possess good qualities.
Such Pinoy Pride bolstered by numerous small achievements does not make a big one. Nick Joaquin had already expressed such in his seminal work A Heritage of Smallness that a collection of small things made out to be a whole does not equal a colossus with an inherent structure:
We could bring in here the nursery diota about the little drops of water that make the mighty ocean, or the peso that’s not a peso if it lacks a centavo; but creative labor, alas, has sterner standards, a stricter hierarchy of values. Many little efforts, however perfect each in itself, still cannot equal one single epic creation. A galleryful of even the most charming statuettes is bound to look scant beside a Pieta or Moses by Michelangelo; and you could stack up the best short stories you can think of and still not have enough to outweigh a mountain like War and Peace.
To quote GRP webmaster benign0, a litany of little achievements perhaps stands tall like a pile of sand that crumbles when taken to the task of bearing a load. Compare that pile of sand to an engineered structure of trusses of equal height — perhaps one tenth the mass of said sand pile, but 100 times more stable. And in the same vein, pride built on a pile of individual achievers stacked on each other can never be truly equal to pride based on something that was built through a collective effort.
No wonder Filipinos cling to Pinoy Pride; anything bigger than that goes against their renowned heritage of smallness and is too hard for them. Ask them to account for what their pride has accomplished collectively, and you will get head scratching (kamot-ulo).
As examples, Japanese can be proud of building a disciplined society, Germans can be proud of their engineering prowess, Singaporeans can be proud of building a prosperous society. When it comes to the Philippines, what have we collectively built up on a grand scale, that we can show proudly to the world?
So far, what Filipinos have built collectively is easily defined by three (3) pillars:
1) Pwede-na-yan, the mediocrity mindset;
2) Bahala na the fatalistic approach to life, and;
3) A culture of impunity
Is this what we want to be proud of?
Pinoy Pride is but a patchwork, temporary distraction to the Filipinos’ problems; it cannot be considered a solution because part of it involves rejecting any and all attempts to improve. Thus, like ChinoF has pointed out, it is part of the problem.
Pride can keep you going, but working smart and self-respect will get you even further.
[Photo courtesy: Bahay Kwentista.]
А вы, друзья, как ни садитесь, все в музыканты не годитесь. – But you, my friends, however you sit, not all as musicians fit.
Thanks, man. I’ve got a follow piece coming up, too. By the way, who knows if all those commenters who attacked me are composed of one person pretending to be many?
Never expected your latest article to be Zerg Rushed…
Keep ’em coming, Chino. Time to make the pridists bleed 😛
Great article fallenangel! I always like what you guys are posting here at GRP. More power. Looking forward for new articles.
I fully agree with this.
Kudos to FallenAngel.
I tried playing Word Association with some Filipino friends. I said ‘I’ll name a country and you say the first thing that comes to mind.’
Japan: sushi, clean, strict, import cars
England: cold, royal, white, historical
Korea: K-pop, good food, Samsung, bar owners
Australia: kangaroos, beer, surfing, Outback
China: everything made, dangerous, big, good food
Philippines: corrupted, shopping, crowded, women
You can pretty much draw your own conclusions about that.
Come at it Pinoy Pride people.
As real as it gets. Thank you very much for posting this.
No, really.
Really, what use is the trivial like Glee, American Idol when we voted in a major league, first class doofus to represent our country? Who does not even wear our flag but instead the symbol of his family. Like it or not we voted him in there. Is it something to be proud of?
It’s the collective pwede-na-yan mindset at work, Ed.
love how this post and chino’s mesh to point out in no unclear terms how pride is earned and has a proper place. pinoy pride is empty, self-deluding, and most certainly profitable to the media peddling it. butthurt idiots will not get it despite the clarity of your posts. great work, fallenangel and chino. 😀
Correct. Filipinos tend to believe what is right, good and pleasing. That is the very reason why PRIDE is the worst of the deadly sins simply because it hinders someone’s growth and understanding. The Filipino mentality has not change even a bit, actually it is worst today. They don’t really want to listen to any correction and instead they defend their faults. That is the very reason why criminals can run away from their crimes and truths are concealed right in front of Filipinos. When there is a significant topic that needs to be discussed but shows the negative side of the Philippines many people will divert to another topic instead on focusing to correct the other one first before jumping to another one. There had been a lot of problems, none was solved. They’ve been pointing out a lot of reasons why the Philippines had never reached the peak of success or never even jump up to higher level, they pointed out a lot of things but never realized they should point to their self. The Philippines is currently facing a lot of problems but did not face the BIGGEST and the root of the problems; the PEOPLE.
Just a thought: I reviewed the lyrics of our national anthem and saw – “Aming ligaya nang pag may mang-aapi.”
Doesn’t that mean we should be happy when we’re “oppressed?” Then why should we scream in anger when we’re the butt of jokes or someone criticizes us? We should love it when someone “makes api” us. hehe
Haha, I think, though, without the second half of that stanza it is easy to misinterpret it as such…
“Aming ligaya nang pag may mang-aapi
Ang mamatay nang dahil sa iyo”
Basically, “it is our pleasure to die (for you, our country) when it is threatened.”
But dying for your country is so passe; it’s much better to get the other basterd to die for his! 😛
I know that quote! It’s from General George Patton! 😀
I believe what Patton said was, and I’m paraphrasing here, it’s his job to make sure the other guy dies for his country.
There you go. It’s smarter to make sure the other guy dies, provided there is a real threat.
My observation after all this: Most Filipinos scream murder at the person who tells them they have a pimple, but will smile and stay quiet when someone tells them they are very beautiful despite the pimple, or while ignoring the pimple. And people who want a sugar-coated message usually do so because they actually have a closed mind.
“There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud… not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God… to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.” (2 Tim. 3:1-4,4:3)
I was wondering what triggered this “PINOY PRIDE” in the first place. Maybe it’s our nature as Filipinos and even our ancestors to be prideful.
“As examples, Japanese can be proud of building a disciplined society” –you mean building a society of slave robots instead of humans? 1984?
Maybe you should ask a Japanese about it. Here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dic7k9HNZH4
If you desire a conformity prison, then maybe you need an electric leash/collar around your neck so that the government could automatically exterminate you the moment you break the tiniest rule that the elites or the ruling class of society desire to impose.
Oh by the way, don’t be late. You are a prisoner of time. A minute late means grave disobedience. You ought to obey Time instead of being a human. You are nothing but mechanical livestock, a societal lab-rat that must always be punctual. Forget about anything else, just be on time. Forget about the universe, in our system we have everything figured and measured according to our clocks and 24-hour gears. Don’t worry, if you get sick and die out of stress, you can be certain we too will be punctual for your funeral. Enjoy!
That’s a slice of discipline that you like. Conform or die. The police will be in your apartment in awhile.
What’re you smoking/shooting up, dude? Yikes. Whatever it is, methinks I need me some of that (instead of the sub-par molly pills that my dealer supplies me). Hehehe.
This is so true… sad to say, hindi maiintindihan nang mga karamihan sa ating mga kababayan na sobrang tataas ng pride pero wala namang ipagmamamlaki.
I fully agree with this article 100%. Do you have a list of suggestions of projects Filipinos can work collectively. We can start with the ones that can give us easy wins in the short term. Then work on the long term goals. ITS ABOUT TIME FILIPINOS DO SOMETHING!!!!
An elitist Crab who is so pessimistic about his race. After reading your Article/whine. I am convinced na Pinoy ka nga LOL!
Pride? I’ve always said it, filipinos are the most narcissistic people I’ve ever seen. Only think about their own little world and will only converse with someone if they need them. Never before seen it like this before. Dont believe me? How long have your friends from the Philippines ever randomly talked to you on facebook? Just sent a random message asking how you are doing?
ulul mo tanga. pinoy pride pa rin. gago. PFhroud to be pinoyz foh! ..|.. ^_^ ..|..