Loophole

Ever been in a long line let's say, when you're lining up for a ticket in a movie? Then, some random person is standing say.. 1 meter next to the 5th person from the ticket counter? In the midst of confusion, the next thing you see, is that the random person is now the 6th person in the line? (much to the chagrin of the other people waiting in the line). What sucks even more, is that the other people in the line aren't doing anything real to alleviate the situation (such as move the person who snucked in the line out). Anyway, I meant that as an example.

Welcome to Philippine culture. One that is very polite (and hypocritically polite at times).

Too polite that there are good and bad aspects of being polite. I'll talk about the good effect of it first.

The good part of being polite, is that when you do something wrong, people will... usually not correct you. What happens is that they will hope that your conscience will hit you on the head seconds after you do something inappropriate. In other words, you are given a chance to gracefully settle an issue.

The bad part of being polite, is that people who know this part of Philippine culture will still do something inappropriate, and they know they'll get away with it -- because people will wait for you to fix yourself.

[ I know there's a really big and good example we'd all like to site, but I think I'd rather site a much simpler example, which also caters to some people who read my blog regularly ]

I remember a couple of months ago, my friend (who was years younger) was complaining to me at how there was some guy placing his hand around her, or even on her waist when he said he wanted a picture. She was in a costume in an event, so there were a couple of people (she calls them cleptomaniacs) who were doing this. She felt that she was being handled, yet she could not do anything, because shrieking in the middle of a photo opportunity when a lot of other people around will almost certainly send the impression to other people, that the guy who just was beside her is a pervert.

That's an example of the bad effect of being polite. YOUNG girls (I specifically emphasize YOUNG because sensible, aged girls will slap guys who do this) always refer to elder guys as "Kuya", and in doing so, denotes respect. When this respect is taken advantage of by violating a person's personal space (by touching in any form), the younger girl usually can't do anything about it, because our polite culture dictates that we have to respect our seniors (let alone can't talk back at them). We wait for the lecherous "kuya" to fix himself, however, much to the disappointment of those who believe in values, this does not happen. And this happens again and again - thus, the loophole in our (hypocritically) polite culture.

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Taking a step farther back, I think about my niece, who is starting to express an interest in cosplaying (after she learned that I'm usually covering those types of events). I wonder if I did see a stranger's hand on my niece's waist or similar -- I really want her to learn that lesson the hard way. After all, I feel that minor-aged girls won't listen to advice (even if they ask for it). It always has to be a personal experience before they even do something (or hope they do something).