The Problem With Self-blogs and Other Midnight Thoughts

There are four tabs on my browser at this time. The first one is on Facebook. One is always on Facebook. That’s like default. The second tab is on an article in the Inquirer about a comedian, a journalist and the appropriateness of gang rape as a joke. The third tab features an article in Positively Positive entitled “Stop Judging Everyone!” (So intense.) And the fourth is on a Traffic Law website, which is currently not loading. Thank God.

Facebook

First things first. Facebook has an assortment of interesting stuff daily: tidbits about people’s lives, moments in their days, different angles of their faces, food on their table, and slivers of their thoughts.  Facebook is the addiction of the Immature, the Self-involved, the Hypocritical, the Bored, the Lonely, the Angry, the Boastful, the Conceited, the Judgmental and so on.  This is an extremely long roster including approximately 80% of the adjectives descriptive of human beings. However, Facebook is NOT, I suspect, an addiction of the Content.

Disagree if you feel differently but do not be offended. I am not at all a big fan of Content. Content is a bitch who has had three packs of pancit canton (with egg), and is now about to sit back and doze off in place. She’s ridiculous and always sleepy. She doesn't yearn for connection, does not have anything to get off her chest, and feels no need to find out what everyone else is up to. That’s Content.

Prior to the attainment of world peace, the eradication of poverty, and the free flow of love and goodwill to all men, I humbly submit that no human being has the right to be Content.  And I've never met anyone who is, which makes us all very exciting. So in a way (by a long stretch of logic), the unprecedented success of Facebook is a strong point for humanity.

Inquirer

Then I have here the Inquirer Opinion Page, which as the name suggests is designed to be self-righteous and judgmental.  Once again, you may disagree but do not be offended. I love the Inquirer Opinion Page, primarily because it shares my predisposition to find fault and comment. What they do is they take an issue and examine it from every conceivable angle. It is, they say, one of the highest forms of human activity.

This particular Inquirer Page is about the recent joke on a respected journalist and news executive, whose side I am on. The joke was not only inappropriate, it shouldn't be funny.  You would be weird if you found it funny. So my position is that the comedian who thinks he can make fun of people that way is a social-climbing popularity-seeking bully.  Others say taking offense is taking oneself a bit too seriously, but actually only bullies say that.  You make fun of people to feel good about yourself. What does that make you if not insecure?

Positively Positive

The third tab on my browser is on Positively Positive, a self-help blog, the goal of which is to show the lonely, the bitter, the angry and the frustrated the road to true peace and happiness. It features a collection of inspirational stories which I occasionally read and debate with myself about for fun and well, personal growth.

To be perfectly honest, being positively positive sounds unbearable to me but it’s the in thing of late so I try. Be light and be carefree. These days, if you’re not entirely happy, content and at peace with yourself, you are a catastrophe and –get this— a safety hazard (according to international guidelines).  It wasn't always like this. Jaded used to be fashionable. Dark was sexy. Those days are so gone.

Who started this insistence on a white-picket-fence life, in which every single minute of every single day, you are expected to be the best version of yourself? What does that even mean? When are you the best version of yourself? That’s just a minor upgrade from advice of self-help paperback books of the past decades which enumerate 100 tips on how to live life well (be friendly, play sports, sleep early etc) and then end with, “Be yourself!”

Are you not writing from a place of confusion? Can you really divorce from the entirety of your character your worst traits? Passionate people feel so strongly about everything it’s annoying. But they do live with a certain purpose, a pursuit of an ideal.  Carefree people are fun to be with but they don’t care about world peace, malnutrition, global warming or any of that. Hence the term, “carefree” and that’s why they remain happy.

I suggest we all say fuck it and just live.

The Page Not Loading

Now, let’s just move on to the fourth tab, which is just a traffic law website.  I use it as “inspiration” for content.  Nothing dramatic here. Just a money-making gig for a little extra cash every month. Do I like it? Well most days, I pray that I can buy myself out of all these things but all the same, I’m grateful for the opportunities. I will never again scramble desperately for cash if I can help it. And I do intend to work on that material very soon. The page is not loading though so I can’t get to it at this time. It’s not my fault. *innocent smile*

For freedom!

That’s my life at 11:49 pm on a Thursday night. It is no Cinderella story but it’s no Schindler’s List either so there is no point in complaining…too much. This is where life has taken me: awake at midnight, staring at four tabs, procrastinating and wondering if tomorrow will be the same. It is not enough, never is, but it is a solid choice. This is the only version of myself that I know.

hot topic: Suicide and UP

I ought to apologize for my recent status message which was very insensitive to the recent tragedy of a UP student killing herself over unpaid tuition fees.  Each life is unique. It’s always downright unreasonable to comment on the plight of others when it is not your own. 

I have to maintain though UP cannot be blamed for this tragedy and it does not deserve the bashing it is receiving now. We don’t have to hold anybody responsible for this. The situation can be better. There could be room for improvement for UP but that’s not equal to discrimination, oppression or repression. We have to admit at this point that it cannot help all the students who need its assistance. This is not the best situation but let’s not kid ourselves.  It’s true. If this were a math problem to be solved, we can safely consider this as one of the givens.

There is nothing romantic about poverty. When it comes to money, there are three questions to be asked: How do you get it? How much do you have? And how do you spend it? Don’t even bother asking yourself how much you really need. The answer will only upset you and the number tends to grow.

One way for UP to get money is to raise its tuition fees. It should. Because unlike UP high school which screens applicants on the basis family income, UP (the university) only requires that you pass the entrance exam. So regardless of financial status, students are welcome to study in (forgive my bias) the best place to learn everything you need to know about how to make a difference in the world. It is worth what it charges.

But it has taken upon itself a greater task which is to socialize education and make it more accessible to those who otherwise cannot afford college education. This is a task as large as the problem of poverty itself not just for this one student but for the rest of the Philippines. UP is not the only university calling out for greater support. In fact, if it were up to me, I will not make UP the priority in budgeting. I might decide to allocate more funds to impoverished public elementary and high schools, state universities in far flung areas and other state universities which for the longest time have been sitting quietly in the shadow of UP. Realistically, budgeting involves trade-offs.  It’s a tough balancing act. When deciding to give to one or to the other, there is always a point when it becomes mutually exclusive.

(There is by the way no need to react strongly if you disagree with me on this. I’ll never be president.)

What I’m trying to say is to achieve its goals and to satisfy our great expectations, UP also has to work with several givens including lack of funds for different priorities: facilities, teacher training, teacher compensation, infrastructure and tuition fee subsidies.  We have to go easy on the institution a little bit.

The tragedy has brought to the floor the issue of tuition fee subsidy, which is a good thing. Is UP doing it right? I do agree that in light of this recent event, the university ought to revisit its methods in assessing how much subsidy one student deserves and how much flexibility it can afford (yes, the word is afford) in terms of payment schedules.

I think when it comes to the issues of making education more accessible, people aren’t exactly disagreeing that this merits utmost attention. But we have to be realistic in identifying what is within our means and how much we actually can do. There really is nothing romantic about poverty.