Giving
Giving
Updated 00:52am (Mla time) Dec 08, 2004
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the December 8, 2004 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
THE VARIOUS TV networks repeatedly mentioned it: how heartwarming it was to see people giving cash, goods and services without a thought. One station showed a relief center full of youth who had volunteered to help, packing things and generally putting order to the bedlam that is relief centers.
I agreed entirely. I had been going to Mt. Carmel church since last week and seen it too with my own eyes. Almost overnight a mountain of goods had arisen there from out of nowhere. By dint of word of mouth and text messages (finally the latter proved immensely useful, thank God for small miracles), people contributed from everywhere: sacks of rice, noodles, medicine, batteries, cooking pans. The back of the church turned into a veritable bazaar. There was a horde of volunteers, too, particularly youth who had decided to devote their sudden vacation to the pursuit of loftier things. There's a time for everything, as Ecclesiastes says. There's a time to Ragnarok and a time to sew the sacks (of rice).
It truly is heartwarming, and shows that we are not beyond hope or redemption as a people. It's always like this every time a disaster happens. And as disaster goes, what happened to Quezon Province last week is comparable only to the July-August floods of 1972 and the Mt. Pinatubo eruption of 1991 in scale of destruction. For some reason, disasters seem to bring out the best in us, the direr the catastrophe the more heroic our response. We rise as one to help others.
I've only three suggestions to add to the spirit of giving that fills us during these times.
The first is that we may do with rediscovering the spirit of humility along with it. I address that particularly to the networks, politicians and business associations that like to draw attention to their magnanimity. I find it irritating when TV hosts in particular take on the attitude that you find in the regular TV shows that offer to ease the pain of the needy and afflicted, one that half-expects the beneficiaries to fall on their knees and kiss the hand of their benefactors in eternal gratitude. That expectation being often realized in scenes that show precisely that, or at least that show the beneficiaries breaking into tears and with voices cracking profusely thanking their benefactors.
I'm not knocking gratitude. People ought to be grateful for being helped. But the givers can do as well with being more self-effacing. True giving is one where the giver disappears. The kind of giving where the giver looms larger than life is called PR. True giving is one that allows the recipient to cling to his dignity. And in any case, the victims in this case aren't all calling for charity, some are calling for help to bring them back on their feet. One farmer in Dingalan said it best: What they needed was seedlings to grow things with after they've cleared their fields of mud. A woman in Real also said she just needed a small amount for a new livelihood; she lost her tricycle to the floods.
But whether the need is for food or seedlings, medicine or capital, the enormousness of those needs must cow us to silence, or invisibility. Deacon Mario Van Loon, who's supervising the work in Mt. Carmel, suggests that enormousness when he says it will take at least half a year for the affected areas to raise themselves by their bootstraps. If there's any attitude to take here, it is that however you give, you can never give quite enough.
My second suggestion is for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and other officials to stop saying let us unite and rise over this. At the very least, it is superfluous. All you have to do is go to the relief centers to see the spontaneous outpouring of sympathy from everyone and their sincere desire to help the victims. This country has never had problems uniting when beset by a common threat or affliction. Like I said, disasters bring out the best in us. You do not have to cajole Filipinos to rise above themselves during these times.
But more than this, the call is insidious. It is premised, like the same call that attended the kidnapping of Angelo de la Cruz et al., on forgetting who caused the disaster and filling our minds only with feel-good thoughts. Why on earth would I want to unite with the loggers -- and the real criminals, to repeat, are the legal loggers and not the illegal ones -- and rise over this with them? It was their logs that tumbled down the mountain and mangled the children who slept the sleep of the innocent, dreaming of Christmas, and buried them in the mud. I do not want to unite with them, I want to haul their asses to court and seek justice for the dead.
My last suggestion is for all of us. There's nothing more breathtaking than seeing people tying themselves to a tree and jumping into the floodwaters to rescue the drowning. There's nothing more inspiring than seeing the youth toiling day and night in relief centers and people everywhere chipping in to help the hapless. There's nothing more satisfying than public officials, businessmen and the rich of Metro Manila rushing to send trucks and choppers and equipment to the afflicted areas to rescue the hungry and dying.
But why in God's name do we have to wait for disasters to do this? Why can't public officials and businessmen and the rich simply do this by not pillaging the treasury, by paying decent wages and distributing goods through land and asset reform? Why can't we rise to heights of selflessness, or show an ardent desire to help others, or serve the people, as the activists put it, other than through relief operations? Why can't we tie ourselves to a tree or post and throw the other end to a country that is being swept away by the rampaging waters?
There's one other property of giving. Like God, it has no beginning and it has no end.
Updated 00:52am (Mla time) Dec 08, 2004
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the December 8, 2004 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
THE VARIOUS TV networks repeatedly mentioned it: how heartwarming it was to see people giving cash, goods and services without a thought. One station showed a relief center full of youth who had volunteered to help, packing things and generally putting order to the bedlam that is relief centers.
I agreed entirely. I had been going to Mt. Carmel church since last week and seen it too with my own eyes. Almost overnight a mountain of goods had arisen there from out of nowhere. By dint of word of mouth and text messages (finally the latter proved immensely useful, thank God for small miracles), people contributed from everywhere: sacks of rice, noodles, medicine, batteries, cooking pans. The back of the church turned into a veritable bazaar. There was a horde of volunteers, too, particularly youth who had decided to devote their sudden vacation to the pursuit of loftier things. There's a time for everything, as Ecclesiastes says. There's a time to Ragnarok and a time to sew the sacks (of rice).
It truly is heartwarming, and shows that we are not beyond hope or redemption as a people. It's always like this every time a disaster happens. And as disaster goes, what happened to Quezon Province last week is comparable only to the July-August floods of 1972 and the Mt. Pinatubo eruption of 1991 in scale of destruction. For some reason, disasters seem to bring out the best in us, the direr the catastrophe the more heroic our response. We rise as one to help others.
I've only three suggestions to add to the spirit of giving that fills us during these times.
The first is that we may do with rediscovering the spirit of humility along with it. I address that particularly to the networks, politicians and business associations that like to draw attention to their magnanimity. I find it irritating when TV hosts in particular take on the attitude that you find in the regular TV shows that offer to ease the pain of the needy and afflicted, one that half-expects the beneficiaries to fall on their knees and kiss the hand of their benefactors in eternal gratitude. That expectation being often realized in scenes that show precisely that, or at least that show the beneficiaries breaking into tears and with voices cracking profusely thanking their benefactors.
I'm not knocking gratitude. People ought to be grateful for being helped. But the givers can do as well with being more self-effacing. True giving is one where the giver disappears. The kind of giving where the giver looms larger than life is called PR. True giving is one that allows the recipient to cling to his dignity. And in any case, the victims in this case aren't all calling for charity, some are calling for help to bring them back on their feet. One farmer in Dingalan said it best: What they needed was seedlings to grow things with after they've cleared their fields of mud. A woman in Real also said she just needed a small amount for a new livelihood; she lost her tricycle to the floods.
But whether the need is for food or seedlings, medicine or capital, the enormousness of those needs must cow us to silence, or invisibility. Deacon Mario Van Loon, who's supervising the work in Mt. Carmel, suggests that enormousness when he says it will take at least half a year for the affected areas to raise themselves by their bootstraps. If there's any attitude to take here, it is that however you give, you can never give quite enough.
My second suggestion is for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and other officials to stop saying let us unite and rise over this. At the very least, it is superfluous. All you have to do is go to the relief centers to see the spontaneous outpouring of sympathy from everyone and their sincere desire to help the victims. This country has never had problems uniting when beset by a common threat or affliction. Like I said, disasters bring out the best in us. You do not have to cajole Filipinos to rise above themselves during these times.
But more than this, the call is insidious. It is premised, like the same call that attended the kidnapping of Angelo de la Cruz et al., on forgetting who caused the disaster and filling our minds only with feel-good thoughts. Why on earth would I want to unite with the loggers -- and the real criminals, to repeat, are the legal loggers and not the illegal ones -- and rise over this with them? It was their logs that tumbled down the mountain and mangled the children who slept the sleep of the innocent, dreaming of Christmas, and buried them in the mud. I do not want to unite with them, I want to haul their asses to court and seek justice for the dead.
My last suggestion is for all of us. There's nothing more breathtaking than seeing people tying themselves to a tree and jumping into the floodwaters to rescue the drowning. There's nothing more inspiring than seeing the youth toiling day and night in relief centers and people everywhere chipping in to help the hapless. There's nothing more satisfying than public officials, businessmen and the rich of Metro Manila rushing to send trucks and choppers and equipment to the afflicted areas to rescue the hungry and dying.
But why in God's name do we have to wait for disasters to do this? Why can't public officials and businessmen and the rich simply do this by not pillaging the treasury, by paying decent wages and distributing goods through land and asset reform? Why can't we rise to heights of selflessness, or show an ardent desire to help others, or serve the people, as the activists put it, other than through relief operations? Why can't we tie ourselves to a tree or post and throw the other end to a country that is being swept away by the rampaging waters?
There's one other property of giving. Like God, it has no beginning and it has no end.
posted by Dante at 5:40 PM
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