Emotions for Filipinos were running high last week because of the botched Manila hostage situation (and the disappointing loss of Miss Philippines in the Miss Universe pageant).
Almost everyone had an opinion on what should have been done instead on both events. From sending in the military instead of the under-trained SWATs to firing and making examples out of the people who misanalysed and miscalculated the hostage situation to how Venus Raj should have just cited one mistake she's made instead of saying "there is nothing major major i mean problem that i have done in my life". After all, not having a major major i mean problem is an impossibility as no one is perfect.
And now that things are settling down, we seem to just fall back into the same old routine that we had before last week. It feels like nothing has changed.
Not that I was expecting drastic changes to happen, but I was hoping that we'd learn something from the events of last week to help reshape our country and give our people a better tomorrow.
What changes were I expecting? Oh I don't know. I was expecting a show of taking responsibility to give justice to the victims of the hostage situation instead of the usual finger-pointing and bickering. I was expecting proposals to better train and equip the Philippine police instead of having other armed groups stress how the MPD really messed up and how they could've done a better job instead. I was expecting the Filipino people to realize the height from which we've fallen.
But reality almost never comes close to expectation, does it?
Daniel Wagner wrote an article at The Huffington Post and said:
...in spite of all the things the Philippines has going for it, its people didn't demand enough of themselves, or of their government. Political apathy and a willingness to accept a low common denominator of performance have taken their toll on the psyche of the Philippine people.
In spite of advertising ourselves as the happiest and most optimistic people in the world, we have been living without hope. We've been living our lives sub-consciously thinking that this is it. Things will not get better so we may just as well get used to it.
People do not participate in national elections because they believe that all politicians are the same. That no matter who sits in power, the lives of the common people will just stay the same.
The younger generation go to school to learn English so they can work as domestic helpers and caregivers overseas. Most Filipinos leave the country soon after finishing school because most of them think that the grass is greener somewhere else and that you cannot achieve progress by staying in the country.
Our people have experienced so much disappointment that we no longer reach for the stars. We no longer dream. We no longer try to achieve big things. We stay where we are and we deteriorate. We stagnate.
Unless we, as a nation; we, as a people, wake up and start demanding more of ourselves, nothing will change and we can all keep going around in circles while our race deteriorates.