Michael Tan: Pinoy Kasi

Pinoy Kasi: the UNOFFICIAL website of anthropologist Michael Tan's Philippine Daily Inquirer opinion column. For more information, visit his official web site at: http://pinoykasi.homestead.com/

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Saturday, September 09, 2006

A good life

PINOY KASI

A good life
By Michael Tan
Inquirer
Last updated 02:00am (Mla time) 09/08/2006

Published on Page A11 of the September 8, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


THERE have been no easy answers to the controversy around the leakage of questions in the recent nursing licensing examinations. Wouldn't a retake be better for all of the batch 2006 examinees, to remove the cloud of doubt around their competence? But wouldn't a retake mean more expenses, some families selling, literally, the last carabao? And after all's said and done, who should be punished for the leakage?

My sense is that we're having difficulties with these ethical issues because "ethics" is complicated. Moreover, ethics hasn't quite made it into our consciousness, at least not in a formal sense. Like when I tell people I don't eat meat as an "ethical" choice, I get confused looks. People think it has to be reasons of "health" or "religion" rather than,
quite simply, "doing something that's the right thing to do."

Slowly though, we're bound to see more discussions of ethics. At the University of the Philippines, the College of Social Sciences and Philosophy has a joint bioethics program with the College of Medicine, with the bulk of students coming from the medical profession. These health professionals train in bioethics so they can help their institutions to confront ethical questions around medical research and clinical care. The bioethical issues can be quite complicated, spanning an entire lifetime from the "beginning" (is a fertilized ovum a human being?) to the "end" (when is a person dead?).

'Bawal'

I've been handling one of the courses -- Culture and Ethics -- in the bioethics program and while the bulk of the class discussions deals with medical issues, we inevitably go into more personal issues. Each class I've been impressed with the way the students (physicians, dentists, anthropologists, psychologists) think the issues through, often expressing personal anxieties and turbulence.

Teaching the course has made me realize the importance of making ethics more relevant to our daily lives. We don't have a word for "ethics" in Philippine languages, but it doesn't mean we don't have a sense of right or wrong. We do, but the problem is that our notions of right or wrong are hemmed in, trapped in rigid and moralistic definitions that revolve around "bawal": the forbidden, the sinful.

We've relied too much on religious doctrines and precepts for the answers, passed on to us by priests and other persons of authority. I remember that back in grade school and high school, we had to go to confession each week, and had a printed guide for our "examination of conscience," with a long list of sins conveniently classified as venial and mortal, the latter in bold print.

To some extent, basic religious precepts, such as "Don't do unto others what you don't want them to do unto you" (found, incidentally, in all the major religions), are still good guides, but life has become much more complicated in the 21st century and we now need to deal with more substantive issues. For example, even in high school, I used to wonder why missing Mass on Sundays was considered so serious -- a mortal sin -- for which, one of my religion teachers claimed, one could go straight to hell.

Fortunately, I eventually found the more exciting, and kinder, world of ethics, one that emphasizes what we should and can do to create a "better" world. Ethicists have come up with much more complicated criteria for dealing with moral issues, the questions guided by principles like autonomy (Are we violating an individual's right to choose?). "Doing good" and "avoiding harm" take on new meanings: Whose good is served here and
what do we do, as in the nursing examinations, when there is a conflict between individual "good" and that of the community? What harm comes about without a retake, for the nursing students as well as the nursing profession?

Ethical audit

The British newspaper The Guardian regularly carries a column called "The Good Life," which poses common ethical dilemmas people face, and then presents an "ethical audit" consisting of opinions of experts from particular fields. The columns have been so popular that the writer, Leo Hickman, has compiled several of his articles into a book.

Hickman's ethical audits often deal with issues of personal food choices. A vegetarian diet is still considered the most ethical because it doesn't cause any suffering to animals. For those who do choose to eat meat, chickens are a bit more ethical than beef because, to get beef, you need to use large tracts of agricultural land for the cows. (But, I've argued,
chickens raised in cages suffer more than cows grazing on a range.)

Mind you, even a vegetarian diet has its ethical challenges as well. When choosing vegetables for example, buying those that come in from overseas means you're neglecting local farmers. And the further the source of the produce, the more you're contributing to polluting the environment because of the transport.

Hickman's columns are just so packed with ethical concerns. Once he wrote about how proud he was purchasing Quaker Oats, healthy non-meat food, until one of his consultants pointed out that Quaker Oats is owned by Pepsi Cola, which doesn't exactly have the cleanest record in corporate ethics.

Governance, groceries

Does this all sound like academic nitpicking? Nope. I think ethics is quite practical in the way it makes us think more broadly, of the greater good, of the future, at all levels, from a nation's governance, down to our groceries.

All too often, we've allowed little "lapses of judgment" to pass in the name of convenience, or even of the "greater good." I'm sure that the people who cheated in the nursing exams were rationalizing: "I'm doing this so I can migrate and provide a better life for my family."

The little "lapses of judgment" of individuals add up, until entire communities, maybe even nations, lose their moral compass. I see it even in the university, where impunity is tolerated, even rewarded, all in the name of preserving institutional harmony. Should it be surprising that we let the President get away with her lapses, thinking, anyway, all this is
for the good of the country? Hey, look, the peso is so strong; hey, look, so many Filipinos now have jobs (albeit in war-torn areas and in call centers). Be patient, the good life is just around the corner.

Ethicists don't go around saying, "That's wrong" or "That's a sin." Ethicists are there to remind people that we need to perform quick audits in our daily lives, whether using the Rotary Club's "4-way test" or the fancier stuff discussed in ethics courses.

I love the name chosen for Leo Hickman's column because of the way it captures the whole essence of ethics, underscoring how the good life must come by leading a good life.

Shark's fin soup

PINOY KASI

Shark's fin soup
By Michael Tan
Inquirer
Last updated 01:00am (Mla time) 09/06/2006

Published on Page A15 of the September 6, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


Before he joined the Houston Rockets and shot up to mega-celebrity status, Chinese basketball player Yao Ming played for a group called the Shanghai Sharks.

So, maybe it's appropriate that this former "Shark" has joined a campaign, launched by WildAid, against the consumption of shark's fin soup. Environmental and animal welfare groups claim that sharks are sometimes caught and skinned just for the fins, and then thrown back into the sea.

The campaign against shark's fin soup is a bold move, but it's going to be a long uphill battle. The New York Times notes that in China, Ming's calls to end the consumption of sharks' fins, has gone almost unnoticed.

Tradition

Another celebrity, Hong Kong's Jackie Chan, has spoken out against the use of tiger bones, bear bile and rhino horns for Chinese traditional medicine because it has led to the slaughter of these animals.

Shark's fin soup, tiger bones, bear bile -- all of these are Chinese traditions, and, unfortunately, when you talk about changing Chinese culture, you're taking on values and practices that sometimes go back at least a thousand years.

All too often, we presume that the longer a tradition has been around, the better it must be. Culture is powerful precisely because people begin to believe that the traditions are meant to stay with us, from the beginning of time, through eternity.

It's this assumption that allowed some of the most barbaric practices to be perpetuated. For example, for a thousand years Chinese mothers would tightly bind the feet of their daughters, sometimes as young as 4 or 5 years of age, to keep them tiny. The practice actually fractured the foot bones, and crippled the child; yet the "lotus feet" were praised as the epitome of female beauty and eroticism, and poems were written to extol their allure.

Another example is female genital mutilation. A ritual practice in parts of Africa, it involves the removal of the clitoris and, in a more extreme form, the sewing up of the labia. It is a horrendous practice, yet even women physicians from those countries have sometimes defended the practice, offering to perform the procedure in a clinic, at least with anesthesia, to reduce the chances of infection.

Context

Pierre Bourdieu, a French sociologist and philosopher made waves in the academic world many years ago when he described "culture" using the Latin word "habitus." He pointed out how social structures are so powerful we end up "doing" culture pretty much like a habit. When I first read about habitus I told myself, goodness, we Filipinos have been describing culture as "kaugalian" [habits] for the longest time ever.

But yes, it does take Bourdieu to remind us that habits are powerful because we're not conscious about their power. Like habits, culture insinuates itself into all we do, into our minds and our bodies. I have endless debates with relatives whenever I question certain traditions and always, they try to end the argument by saying: "It's our culture, and
there's nothing we can do about it."

Many practices are attached to beliefs that are accepted without question, like the tiger bones and bear bile as effective medicines. What's sad is that they are totally ineffective.

Culture becomes even more powerful when it is made sacred, sometimes with claims that it is God-given. Advocates of female genital mutilation sometimes claim it's a Muslim practice, yet nowhere is it mentioned in the Koran or in the "hadith" (sayings attributed to Islam's founder, the prophet Mohammed). Similarly, Catholic conservatives like to claim that family planning goes against "natural law," which is supposedly given to us by God.

Fortunately, even theologians now accept that sacred traditions and holy books need to be understood in a historical context. Many cultural practices -- religious or secular -- emerged in response to some social need. Female genital mutilation, for example, is believed to even predate Islam, and may have been practiced because of the inter-tribal warfare at that time, which often led to women being raped. Perverse as it may sound,
the mutilation was intended as a kind of chastity belt, to protect women.

It was also this inter-tribal warfare that led to Islam's endorsement of polygamy, which was intended to find ways to provide for the widows and their children. Mohammed himself took a widow as one of his wives.

Similarly, the admonition against birth control, often citing the biblical call to "go forth and multiply," was understandable in a time the world's population was tiny, and when agricultural societies needed as many hands as possible to work the fields. Times do change, and it's not surprising all the world's major religions, except for Catholicism, now look at the non-practice of family planning as irresponsible, even immoral.

Parties

Besides learning to probe into the historical contexts of culture, we should also learn to dig up -- and question -- many of its practices' latent or hidden functions. Foot-binding in China began in the Sung dynasty, a time when Chinese women were becoming quite independent and assertive. So, for all the talk about lotus feet making the women more
"feminine" with their tiny steps, foot-binding's hidden function was really to immobilize women, keeping them at home and dependent on the men.

Culture is there as well to show off one's status, and this takes us back to the shark's fin soup. Previously a privilege only for emperors and the Chinese aristocracy, shark's fin soup has become a way of boasting of one's wealth, especially for the new rich. A local lauriat without shark's fin soup could get tongues wagging, the host seen as being miserly.

We all need to start thinking hard about the habits of culture, through an ethical lens. It's not just questioning the menu, but also of tackling the very idea of an expensive party and of conspicuous consumption.

Birthdays are big in the Philippines; the government even allows employees to take a birthday leave with pay. Even the poorest of families will splurge meager savings for a child's birthday party. The rationale here is that one should share his blessings -- thank God for another year. I wonder. Is it right to spend money that could have been used for the child's many other needs? And if a family can really afford a party, shouldn't the blessings be shared by donating to the poor?

It seems the banks are now ready to capitalize on culture. Banco de Oro Universal Bank has been running an ad: "For only P63 a day ang saya-saya ng birthday party ng anak ko. Kayang-kaya!" ["For only P63 a day, my child's birthday party was so much fun. I could afford it!"] I read the fine print and realized that was based on a P20,000 loan, payable over 12 months. Now, wasn't there a time banks were there to instill a culture of saving?

Dog days, 'ber' months

PINOY KASI

Dog days, ‘ber’ months
By Michael Tan
Inquirer
Last updated 00:15am (Mla time) 09/06/2006

Published on Page A15 of the September 1, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


THE “ber” months have finally started, and for many Filipinos, that means, jingle bells, jingle bells, Christmas is around the corner!

I’d like to do a different take though to the “ber” months. We greet them with cheer maybe because we sense the rainy season slowly coming to an end. Sure, we anticipate more typhoons, including super-duper ones, but we sense relief is coming. September, too, comes on the heels of the very difficult, if not strange, month of August.

From March to May, we go through oppressive heat, so we welcome June, made cooler by the monsoon rains. Then August comes along, the rains pounding away even as the heat seems to return, this time with a vengeance.

We associate August with dangerous vapors that emanate when the rains hit the warm earth, causing all kinds of ailments from skin diseases to diarrhea. It’s a month that seems almost unnatural, full of omens and dangers. Our collective memories grope to the distant past of earthquakes and volcano eruptions in August. Suddenly, August takes on sinister qualities, what with memories of the Plaza Miranda bombing in 1972 and the Ninoy Aquino assassination in 1983, which both occurred on Aug. 21.

As a Filipino-Chinese, I’ve always had a kind of doubly hexed way of looking at the month. August often coincides with the seventh lunar month, owned, older people say, by the hungry ghosts. The underworld supposedly opens its gates and lets the ghosts roam the world. These are the ones neglected by the living, and, let loose, they seem to be able to wreak great havoc, causing disasters and wars and, well, just getting people darn crazy.

I was out of the country part of August and came home to what I felt was particularly muggy hot weather: Homes with a stuffy smell, moldy belts and bags, pets burdened with more fleas and ticks than usual.

It didn’t help when my parents told me this is one of those years where the Chinese add another month to the calendar. The Chinese take all this quite seriously, reluctant to start any new venture, whether a business or a marriage, until the hungry ghosts return to the underworld. Why, I asked, do they have to add another seventh month? Does that mean another month of hungry ghosts?

Dog day afternoon

There’s really a reason for the kind of weather we see. For countries north of the equator, these are summer months, even if we think of August as a rainy one. The particularly hot days are those when the planet’s tilted toward the sun to take in more heat.

The Romans called these “caniculares dies” [days of the dog], attributing the heat to Sirius, the Dog Star, shining a bit too brightly. The term still survives in the Spanish “la canicula” and in English as dog days.

At best, the dog days are seen as languid, lazy days. I remember living in Texas and seeing poorer families sitting out in the porch, looking quite glum and unwilling to do anything. Sometimes, though, especially during very warm dog nights, I wondered too if people weren’t being consumed less by melancholy than by torrid desires brought by the sultry summer.

Balmy sweltering summers do seem to incite people to do crazy things. Remember the movie “Dog Day Afternoon”? That was based on a true story about John Wojtowicz who held up a Brooklyn bank on Aug. 22, 1972 (look at that date!) to raise money so his transsexual lover, Ernest Aron, could get a sex-change operation. The botched robbery turned into a hostage drama, partly comic with all the different characters, including the transsexual lover, popping up at the bank.

Reframing

Dog days do carry over into September, and with it, our fears and anxieties. Men do crazy things even in September -- look at when martial law was declared. It doesn’t help that we live today with another President who believes in destiny and divine mandates to greatness.

But hey, let’s snap out of this national depression. Let’s use the month to do a bit of what psychologists call “cognitive restructuring.” In lay terms, that means learning to look at the same reality with a different frame, with a different lens.

August need not be a month of dire omens and ghosts and malevolent vapors. If the weather’s inhospitable, look at it as a challenge for you to renew friendships. Find a copy of “Dog Day Afternoon” and invite friends over to watch, and impress them with your knowledge of the true story’s ending: Wojtowicz was eventually sentenced to 20 years, but served only 7. He did make money from the film’s rights, giving $2,500 to Ernest Aron, who did get his operation and eventually became Elizabeth Debbie Eden.

Better than videos, take up nature’s challenge in your backyard. Instead of despairing with the overgrowth of plants, marvel at what nature can do. The monsoon rains and August’s heat seem to set off a botanical alchemy: Ferns and mushrooms appear from nowhere, wild rhizomes sprout tropical lilies, vines suddenly yield flowers and fruits you didn’t know you had.

The other day, I asked my mother’s gardener to identify a particularly tenacious vine, wondering what exotic flower was waiting to bloom. “Ube,” he replied curtly, quickly adding on to the day’s lesson in ecology, “Galing sa ibon” [Comes from birds]. The birds do a good job of spreading plants around.

And that’s what you could do as well to overcome August’s angsts: Look for birds, better still, entice them to come out -- even bread crumbs can be a feast.

It’s a good time to plant, although you should avoid those that are prone to being water-logged. Imported herbs like lavender and rosemary and mint die easily during the rainy season, while tropical ones like mayana and oregano (the native version) and “damong maria” quickly colonize your garden with the rains.

Choose some corner to create a garden with one family of plants. I’ve started a ginger garden, what with the many versions that yield cooking spices as well as ornamental flowers. Besides the common “luya” [ginger], look for “dilaw,” or Curcuma,varieties, galangal (for Thai tom yum), torch gingers (for Singaporean “laksa”). Where to get the rhizomes? The vegetable vendors at Farmers’ will tell you.

I started the ginger garden for Yna, hoping that when she’s older she’ll garden too and, seeing the gingers, will remember I planted them for her with magic incantations: “Like ginger, may Yna add flavor, add spice to people’s lives, but never with hurtful maanghang speech.”

And the ghosts? The other day she came running out of a room screaming, “Multo! Multo! Multo!” [“Ghost! Ghost! Ghost!”] Ah, but little Yna’s a wise old soul, laughing her way through as she rushed into my arms. To be sure though, I told her, “You know better right? There are no ‘multo,’ no hungry ghosts.”

When she’s older, I’ll tell her about the human ghouls we need to worry about, notwithstanding dog days and “ber” months.