40 Michelle S.

Tolentino SOCIOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY 3F-PHARMACY

A Moral Recovery Program: Building People-Building Nation
(SYNOPSIS and CRITIQUE)
One of the major events that happened in the Philippine History was held last February 25,1986
it was called the EDSA Revolution. Millions of Filipinos participated in the said revolution. All of them
aimed to remove Ferdinand Marcos as a president so that Martial Law will be abolished in our country.
With bravery, unity and faith they have ousted the dictatorial president and democracy reigned again.
But our country has never been freed of political, economic and social issues. We repeatedly face
challenges in our country like poverty, graft and corruption, environmental depletion and many more.
Each member of our society has his or her own responsibility in building the nation but first we must
understand ourselves, the way we think and our behavior may be the key to our victory.
Filipinos are known for traits such as pakikipagkapwa-tao, family-oriented, cheerful and with
good sense of humor, flexible, can easily adapt to change, creative, religious and for being resourceful.
These traits enable us to grow as a person, to survive the hardest and toughest times of our lives and
to perform our commitment and responsibility to our family and to our nation.
Aside from good traits we also develop some undesirable traits which hinder us to achieve our
goals for our nation. We Filipinos have extreme personalism, we often take things seriously. Our
extreme family centeredness often results in greed and selfishness like government officials who
practice corruption just to secure the custodies of their families. Lack of Discipline often results in
violation of rules that can lead to more serious problems. Colonial Mentality, corrupts our minds to
patronize more foreign products because its the modern trend which may result in less love and less
appreciation of our very own.Kanya-kanya syndrome that results to envy, competitiveness and crab
mentality which destroys harmonious relationship to fellowmen. Passitivity and lack of initiative can be
a result of laziness, we allow others to decide and act for us. Filipinos religiosity keeps them passive
and dependent to God. Filipinos are patient and long suffering they will choose to keep quiet and have
an ordinary life rather than defending for their rights to achieve justice.
There were many factors that have shaped and molded our Filipino Character. Family and home
environment is the basic component in developing our standards of behavior. The social environment
on the other hand affects our behavior through interpersonal relationships with other member of the
society. We often adapt the established culture and language of our society. Education teaches us
about moral values. Religion teaches us morality and Gods commandments. Economics tells us that
conditions of living can dictate our character. Politics centers power to the elite and government
officials which make poor people inferior.
Knowing the strengths and weaknesses of the Filipinos there are proposed goals in order to
change our situation for good namely: a sense of patriotism and national pride, a sense of common
good, a sense of integrity and accountability, discipline and hardwork, self-reflection and analysis.
Understanding mechanisms of society can initiate change.

I strongly agree on the article A Moral Recovery Program: Building a People-Building a Nation
of Patricia Licuanan. All the points that were emphasized like knowing oneself through our weaknesses
and strengths and identifying the roots of our character are important part in understanding the
current situation of our country and in finding ways on how to solve the problems that it is facing.
In my nineteen years of spending my life here in the Philippines I have already experienced
things that makes me proud to be a Filipino but on the other hand there are also which makes me feel
ashamed. I am truly overwhelmed that we are still preserving some of the culture and traditions of the
past generations like saying po and opo as a sign of respect for elders, bayanihan, and many others.
Filipinos have an evident cultural change since the colonization of the Spaniards and Americans which
influenced us starting from the food that we eat, manners and way of living. These transitions
somehow challenged our social norms and beliefs. We became more liberated and preoccupied of
other countries culture.
I wanted to point out my opinion if why we experience extreme poverty here in the Philippines.
Like what was said to the article, government officials graft and corruption is the main reason why we
were declared as third poorest country in the world. But based on my point of view our country is rich
because as we can see we have different sources of living that other countries doesnt have like
agriculture, fisheries and forestry in provinces which are not propagated because our government is so
busy solving unnecessary problems here in Metro Manila.
Many Filipinos have the tendency to commit crime because of poverty, we often call it
askapitsapatalim, in order to provide the needs of their family. But as we can see others can still
survive without doing such and by just being resourceful, flexible and creative like doing crafts out of
garbage and waste materials from plants and sell it for income.
According to A.R. Radcliffe Browns structural functionalism that organization and stability in
society is determined by harmonious social functions in the social structure, we can say that the reason
why this country is dysfunctional because we dont have harmonious social functions because of
difference in state of living conditions.
We cant put all the blame to our government because these graft and corruption is just one
side of the story and there are still many factors that worsen it like our lack of discipline, selfishness,
laziness, and so on. Each and everyone of us has his own role in changing this society. We must be
open to the truth that everyone of us must be blame of the things that are happening. It is never too
late to be an agent of change, we have the power to be individual actors to change our situations. It is
not impossible that our country can rise up again and level itself with other prospering countries such
as Singapore. Come to think of it that if everyone will wholeheartedly participate in this program then
we can attain peace and unity. If we have done it before during the EDSA Revolution its not impossible
that we can do this again for the sake of our nation.