Let’s be honest about it

Media

Part of The Carolinian

Title: Let’s be honest about it
Creator: Bugarin, Dito
Language: English
Year: 1953
Rights
Abstract: First prize winning oration in the Annual Lex Circle Oratorical Contest held last March, 1953.
Fulltext: tyirst Trize ^Winning Oration in the c/lnnual Lex Qircle Oratorical (Contest held last eTrtarch, 1953 /NEED not tell you how bad things have been going on in this country. I am a Filipino; you are Filipinos. And this fact makes my task of conveying a message to you very much easier. We are peace-loving people. We hate wars and all the destruction and carnage that follow in its wake. We love our country tiny as it is and all its scattered islands lying in the vast Pacific like pieces of broken glass on the map of the world. We love it not only because its fertile valleys give us corn and rice; its seas give us fish; its sylvan forests homes to protect us against the tropic sun and the cold heavy rains, but also because we believe it gives us all the opportunities of life, liberty, and the pursuit of hap piness. All of us are cognizant of the ever-widening chasm that divides the rich from the poor, the powerful from the weak, the fortunate from the miserable. The enemies of our country are only biding time for the opportune moment to strike. To widen more and more that chasm, our country's enemies go to the rich and tell them not to better the conditions of the poor because the poor are many and to improve their lot would be giving them much power. They would become a LET'S BE HONEST by S)ito agar in * ABOUT IT grave threat to the rich. Instead of reminding them to love the poor they incite them to hatred. Then these same saboteurs of our Re public go to the common man and exaggerate to him how the rich are exploiting him, depriving him indirectly of his God-given rights which the rich too are fighting tooth and nail to enjoy. And deep down in the hearts of these two extreme classes are altars burning with the incense of hate against each other, fanned by communist propaganda, abetted by agents of a foreign power they will come into the arena when both classes lie prostrate, bleeding, helpless, dying. .. Ladies and Gentlemen: There you have the picture of the problems besetting our country today. What shall we do about it? It is not enough that we have made a diagnosis of the malady. We must propose a remedy if we hope to become strong and happy once more. But our Democracies have bun gled time and again. Communism on the other hand has been spread ing out fast and has been putting ★ DITO BUGARIN Is of the Freshman class of the College of Law, and will be a the democracies in the defensive. Does our weakness lie in our in stitutions and systems? Some say, let the Minimum Wage Law ope rate and workers will no longer be discontented; others say, reform the Presidential Government into a parliamentary type and public of ficials will no longer be powerful without any direct and defined re sponsibility; still others say, con serve our dollars by cutting down our imports and then our country will no longer be threatened by economic collapse. In each and every instance the remedy is on something outside the Filipino... his wealth, his government, his economy. Never once is the Fi lipino blamed for his country's dis order and never once does the re medy apply to him. This outlook depicts today's tendency of making man fit institutions and systems in stead of institutions and system fit man. Instead of making the pants fit the body, modern critics make the body fit the pants, which is only another way of saying that insti tutions, governments, and systems must survive even at the cost of man's life, liberty and happiness. We believe that the right place to start a general reform is here. . . the Filipino heart, the Filipino per sonality. We believe that the blame (Continued on par/c dJ) The Author president without half-trying and won the Lex Circle 1953 Oratorical contest with Candidate Magsaysay as Guest of Honor. —EDITOR SUMMER, 1953 Page 7 Cet’s %e Honest About Jt------------------ - —-(Continued from page 7) should not be on politics but on politicians; not on economics but on economists; not on our Congress but on our congressmen; not on things but on persons, not on prop erty but on man; not on our gov ernment but on our conscience. We are always inclined to blame some one else; from earliest childhood we threw and kicked the ball be cause it hurt our nose and in games we cursed the devils because we lost the prize. The ball was not to blame nor the devils of hell; we ourselves were to blame. And transferring the blame is no solu tion; the fault is always in man. What is the use of transferring the administration of a public trust from a group of commoners to a group of aristocrats if we still leave both greedy and dishonest? Why blame the house when its occupants do not endeavor to make it a home? Why blame the piano for the single false note struck by the musician? Why blame Congress and the Ad ministration when the actions of these two bodies are really the actions of the human beings who compose them? In other words, we must first remake the Filipino if we hope to remake this country and its institutions. I am not saying that political, economic and social reforms are useless, insignificant. I am only saying that they come next to the remaking of the Filipino. No won der, cognizant of the predicament the Filipino is in today, a big shot of the Liberal Party bluntly dis closed to his boss that the people are looking up to the "Glamour Boy" for a rallying point for a re turn to our old moorings and moral values as we knew them before the war. In his impassioned speech last night at Fuente Osmena, the "Glamour Boy" himself told the immense crowd around him that the Filipino people of today from every walk of life and from every corner of the country are clamor ing for the return of ethics and honesty in the government, the es tablishment of an efficient govern ment dedicated to justice and service and the renewal of our moral va lues. Do you think the two socalled prominent gentlemen of our government would bngage in throw ing invectives against each other, one dubbing the other as hiding in his so-called "Vested Interests", while the other hits back with more bitter accusations that the other fellow has enriched himself while in Office, if deep down inside there was love instead of hate, forgive ness instead of revenge? "Out of the treasure of the heart, the mouth speaketh." Ladies and Gentlemen: When we see that aged and sickly woman dressed in rags slowly and weakly picking up the grains of corn covered with dust and dung down there in the har bor, placing them one by one into her can, perhaps her only faithful companion on earth and returning to her hovel in silence and lone liness, our hearts ache for her. What, we ask, are the afflictions of the rich? They have their loved ones to cheer, comforts to rejoice in, wealth to divert and dissipate their griefs. What are the worries of the fortunates? They have their mansions to protect them against the weather, doctors to watch their health, treasures to buy power, prestige and honor; but the tribu lations of the poor, who have no outward devices to mitigate the heartaches, of the cargador to whom life seems best when there are sacks to load and unload and who can look for no soft couch after the day's fatiguing work — the miseries of economic slaves, sick, underpaid, unhappy, clinging to the single thread of uncertain life. These are indeed the sorrows which make us realize the ever-widening chasm separating the rich and the poor — afflictions that communist agitators can easily turn to violent anger, a destructive whirlwind that will carry all of us into slave camps or into our untimely graves. Unless we face honestly this grim reality and do something with it, unless the rich stop exploiting the poor and the poor cease en vying the rich, unless the Filipino reform within himself, unless we shall be honest to our selves by boosting to the presidency a man whose tested honesty and justice have won many a disillusioned Huk back to the faith and gov ernment of our ancestors and have evoked a world-wide acclaim and admiration among the democracy loving peoples of the world, we can never hope to save our Ship of State from going to the rocks. There are more dark clouds than sunshine. Ladies and Gentle men, in today's picture of our country; yet in it, there, too, is the silver-lining. Our country believes much still can be done to brighten her picture. This is why she is appealing to you to rally behind her cause. She needs your help: moral, mental, physical and ma terial. If you are a genius, she needs your brains; if you are strong, she needs your strength; if you are poor, she needs your spirit; if you are rich, she needs your genero sity; if you are a saint, she needs your prayers and your virtues, and if you are truly a great country man like "Glamour Boy" there who was only to bold to court the anger of a mighty President as well as the displeasure of his fellow, parly(Continued on page 34) ON DA LEVEL. . . (Continued from page 6) overlooked, deliberately we sup pose, is the carriage of the spirit of fair play, of good clean fun and fellowship. Activities sponsored jointly by schools are intended to enhance better understanding and to promote harmony and at the same time to determine the stand ards of each. This is some kind of comparison which allows for im provement. It is unethical to em ploy foul and underhanded methods to get on top of the heap. college editors in this city have started with the right foot in or ganizing the CEGS. At the rate things are going, we expect better things to happen. the tempest over the religious con troversy has simmered down con siderably although people here abouts — some of them at least — have snapped quite frequently with quaint I-don't-want-the-Church-tobe-over-bearing injunctions. They point out that the more than thousands of school kids should go find an accomodating padre and swamp his convent. The school house is government property. Of all the... well, now. . . the Cebu Press Club should chide the editorial contest winners for being so damned serious. The college editors couldn't take a rib, we suppose. Nothing like raising a laugh once in a while, eh? SUMMER, 1953 Page 31 --------------------------------She Comes Mack a Savant (Continued from page 3) bent for everything that is beautiful in thought and feeling. Faculty member Miss Leonor Borromeo of the USC Col lege of Liberal Arts, Dr. Rodil's former teacher, when asked to comment on the subject of this interview, enthused: Look ing at her and thinking of the many things she has accom plished, I feel like one standing before a shop-window on a raw Christmas night and feeling empty-handed and poor!" And she had to admit Dr. Rodil’s efficiency as a student under her when she further said, "I wish I can have even just one-fourth of her diligence!" And that from her former mentor and dear friend. Dr. Rodil is likeable and friendly. Anybody in her presence feels at home with her contagious sense of humor and charming repartees. In the course of this interview, she had more than amply given evidences of her agile thinking powers. We could not pin her down into committing as to which institution she loves most out of the three which has nurtured her. But she was profuse in her averment when she enthused that she loves all of the three equally. And yet, a particular meaning can be deduced with her coming back to USC. . . that she loves this alma mater more. This summer has seen her doling out what she knows about Principles of Education and Ethics to undergraduates and Socio-Educational Situation of the Philippines to the students of the Graduate School. We did not need to fathom out the Doctor's impressions about USC. She was open about them. She believes that, generally speaking, USC compares very well with any insti tution in Manila. She likes the kind of environment we have at the USC campus which is conducive to study, and the high standards which the- University has safe-guarded and maintained. But finally, perhaps without intending it, she crowned San Carlos with her last words: "Of course I like San Carlos or I would not have come back." And her words are in themselves a pledge of love and respect for San Car los. . . an eloquent proof as to the reason why Carolinians are so acute in coming back to this home where precious me mories live, and whose hallowed walls evoke in every trueblue Carolinian heart sublime feelings of loyalty and devotion. WHAT DO YOU THINK . . . (Continued from page 27) "The Recto-Castelo light should be continued, even, I would say, to the bitter end.” Felix Eamiguel • FELIX EAMIGUEL, College of Law, says: "It is useless of Recto and Castelo to be hurling brick bats at each other when the country needs more constructive ellorts. People become so engrossed in in trigues and imbroglio that they forget about the more essential and delicate tasks they should render to their country. We are forced by internal and external dangers which need close and careful attention if we must protect our ideology. There is no time for puttering around pick ing quarrels. Right now, a big bully is trying to stub our corns. We ought to fight him and teach him a lesson in meekness. Besides, much as we would like to know the truth about the RectoA CAROLINIAN . . . (Continued from page 16) many degrees and doctorates, still, not satisfied of all these beads of achievements, he plowed further to delve on the mysteries of tomorrow and the unseen gyrations of yes terday. His unwavering thirst for more knowledge knew no bounds. To cultivate his mind fully, to en rich his spiritual capacities, to fur bish his moral endeavors... these are the true marks of a well cul tured man. .. Reverend Father MA NUEL SALVADOR. To all these we can meekly say that there is a seemingly perpetual attraction in this man to that pot of knowledge at the foot of the rainbow. To the layman, with all these bundle of learning tucked safely in him, it is time for him to settle down in a comfortable corner and rest. He has come to the point of earthly satisfaction, armed well enough to clash with the forces of hardships and virtuous sacrifices. For us, the preparation is met: now, for the real battle. For him, it isn't even the beginning of the prepa ration ... he is yet to step on the first rung of the ladder. We do not know how many honors are there yet for us to await by way of his restless strive for perfection. We do not know how Castelo battle, it usually never comes out. The combatants are not on even terms and it is very un likely that they will ever be. One is so low he can crawl under a lizard's belly." LETS BE HONEST , . ._________ (Continued on page 31) men and who could still with child like sincerity, even risking assasination, disclosed to the citizenry the hurting truth which caused so much misery and confusion of this once peaceful country, if you can be that other man, then let you also be our guiding light until all the forces within and without us shall have subsided. And then when you and I and every true and faithful son and daughter of our country shall be standing beside her and shall lift her chin in pride and confidence; when you and I can proudly present her to the noble and dignified society of free nations, then can we withdraw from this earthly stage bowing with joy and peace in our hearts, carrying the happy thought that we have left an everlasting souvenir to the world, that we have given our share in making a solid bastion in these beautiful islands of ours, a realiza tion of the only outpost of Christian Democracy in the PACIFIC. many laurels he will yet garner: and by these, San Carlos will re joice at the sight of a man once her child, and has came back once again to her laps with a ransom of knowledge. And we should await not only with fervor and admiration of the man but also with prayer and thanksgiving to the Almighty that as he had left us with honors, he came back to us with more honors. Page 34 THE CAROLINIAN