If only they really paid attention to the people.

Indignation is also commendable. But in my humble opinion expansiveness of perception and receptiveness to other ideas are tools to shape and better one’s own humanity.

Has anyone of you ever visited any congested prison in the NCR? I have, more than character-building efforts require. And it blatantly and sadly violates UN standards. Frankly, one may (as i have gently alluded to the GMA-Garci shenanigans) even venture to suggest to instead be indignant about the sad state of prisons in the same fashion and fervor displayed by each and every one of you for the comic strip. It could make a difference, maybe not. Maybe prison sodomy do not exist in the Philippines. I highly doubt that. But the situation of sodomy was taken as an extreme example to illustrate the terrible prison conditions we have. I invite this passionate lot to visit, hmm, maybe the Antipolo jail and perhaps channel your energies to more productive pursuits. Summer is quite perfect, for the prisoners suffer a shortage of water and their bodies punished by boils.

Perhaps the artist could have been more circumspect. Maybe a little sensitivity was in order. But this is a democracy folks, as crippled as it may be. Absent proof of corrosive tendency that could undermine public order, speech in all forms must be protected.

Alas, truth is sometimes a bitter pill to swallow. Unfortunately for the sensitive, more of these pills are needed by this ailing democracy.

I admit to having a very simple, one might say crude, way of seeing things. I never felt I belonged in this age where relativism is ironically seen to be absolute. And perhaps I never will.

In the world, yet not of the world.

Why just focus on the little things, when you can tackle the big and little monsters at the same time? It’s more difficult and proactive to our society. Smal problem. Big problem. Still problems.

So now you are equating this comic strip to the culture of corruption. That is strange! I am on your side but I fight in a different manner. this is how I channel my indignation, aslan.

About right and wrong, aslan, and the erosion of the foundation, might I invoke history that women who wanted to learn or study are seen as witches and burnt at a stake. Because that WAS how it was then, it was right to burn the strange or abnormal people and wrong for women to be educated. Educated women, then, are seen as an aberrant and an erosion of the foundation.

So the concept of right and wrong is all relative.

the thing with life, it is not black nor white but a rich range of shades of grey.

I’m on the government payroll. I FEEL those effects in my stomach. I feel the sting of their inefficiency and the emptiness of their promises quite personally.

Instead of channeling that indignation into writing, I channel that indignation into my work. That’s why I teach. And because I teach, I AM concerned about the example given to the next generation. I will gladly be called judgmental if it means telling the next generation what is right and wrong in a world that is quickly losing its foundations, in a world that thinks right and wrong are so stifling to its freedom, a world that gladly drags its freedom through the muck of licentiousness just so that it can experience random fleeting pleasures.

I nitpick these little things because I know Pinoys gloss over “little” things like these. This is why corruption so easily gets hold of our officials. They start with a little.

Just a little.

The reason why I become so incensed by the little things is because that’s where I go wrong too. The big, hideous monsters are easy enough to spot and keep away. It’s the little compromises that slip by, erode the foundation and make the fortress fall.