floccinaucinihilipilification and other blogging no-nos

1. Intelligence is never measured based on the high-faluting words you use. Your friends won't hate you for not knowing the meaning of zetetic, glabella, or floccinaucinihilipilification. Just don't use it to impress people.

2. Don't harass your blog by posting 50 pictures of yourself with the same shirt and same background, taken on the same day but on different angles and facial expressions. I know you love yourself, but please, love your blog.

3. iF yOu eNjoY aLteRnaTinG cAps, typing layk dees annoyeeng wey, and putting too 'much' un-neces/*sary punctu^%ation... marks, I think you should see your doctor.


4. Give credits to your sources. Link them back-- pictures, quotes, or videos. Copying of words without permission and proper attribution is not only plagiarism but also cyber stealing; you as the cyber thief.

5. Colors can be very useful, and powerful, when utilized properly. Blend it, BUT NEVER PLAY COLORS LIKE THIS UNLESS YOUR THEME IS A RAINBOW BLOG. If your background color is black and your text is also black, I swear there is something really, really wrong with you.

6. Doing paid posting sometimes is a great help, especially now that the Philippines is nearing recession. But placing too much HIRE ME badges and Google Ads in your sidebar is a different story. Not only that it slows down the blog, but your readers will be forced to think that you are mukhang pera.

7. Leaving a one-word comment like 'nice', 'kewl', 'astig', or 'idol' is not a polite thing to do. If the entry was very great that it left you speechless, don't say anything. Why? You are speechless, remember.

8. Chatboxes give you the space to say anything random without ruining the blog post. But CBOX has become a place for shameless plugging. Some would leave a message like 'nice blog' or 'x-link?' Don't fall for the trap. I think the right term is papansin.

9. The fact that you share your Cerebrum with no one else but yourself is an enough reason to respect what other bloggers have to say. Do not monopolize ideas. Never start a Cyber War; you will only end up with your fingertips swollen and sore. It's a no-win situation.

10. Read and re-read. Look for words that you might have misspelled. 'I need you, boo / I gotta see you, boo' is three miles different from 'I need your boobs / I gotta see your boobs.' The first message is so sweet. The last will make you look like a sex maniac, honestly.

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18 Years of Singlehood Summarized!*

There are times when I wondered how was it like to have someone to call 'mahal', 'baby', 'sweetheart', or just simply 'sugar-coated low-calorie high-protein high-fiber cream-filled thick-crust decaffeinated Buko Pie'. WTF.

For almost 18 years, I am still spending each passing day of my cursed life with no one to call my 'special someone'. But my being single for nearly two decades now has never disheartened me; at least I am saved from the perpetual cheesiness and mushiness of this world.

I am a congenital loner, because I love to be alone. Which is not to say that I hate people within a 5-meter radius. In fact, I love humans-- those creatures who breathe air and eat foods. They are amazing, especially those who talk of things with sense. Yet their excessive presence sometimes makes me cringe. I don't have a peoplephobia and I am not an antisocial. I just love to be alone. Period.


My friends think that watching a movie alone is sad. NO, I said. I always go to the movie house with my jacket alone. Roam your eyes, you're not the only one inside a sinehan. There are other movie goers like you, and sex maniacs like your friends, in the dark. So, obviously, you are not alone; and it's not sad to enjoy your 130 pesos.

If being happy is all about watching Serbis with someone who shrieks every two minutes and thirty seconds because of Coco Martin's body, then I am sorry, I don't want to be happy.

(I remember a popular saying that people are lonely because they build walls instead of bridges. If you think about it, most of us would choose to construct walls rather than bridges. Building a bridge alone is not only a daunting task but it's also not practical, especially now that the Philippines is on the brink of recession. Building your own bridge will not only make you poorer, but lonelier.)

I have to admit that I watched both Before Sunrise and Before Sunset alone, not if you consider a bottle of Pepsi and a pack of Lights as companions. I watched Max Payne, Kung Fu Panda and Cloverfield with my imaginary soulmate I invented three years ago. We are happy, honestLy. We both enjoy each other's company. I am always proud of him and his looks. Oh, we never fight (it is hard to put up a fight with someone non-existent, really.)

Pain, then, is an emotion almost alien to me; because as part of our innate defense mechanism, I never expose myself to things or situations that would hurt me. We naturally stay away from people who might be a threat on our emotional stability.

Now, it makes sense. I don't stay away from people. THEY stay away from me. Why? Do I look like a potential threat? Do I look like an Abu Sayyaf? Do I look like your ex? Or do I look like a heartbreaker? If you say yes to any of these questions, you better start running and save your life.

It all boils down to diskarte. While some people choose the desperate-aggressive-brutal way to manhunt (or womanhunt?) that special someone who will make them complete, some choose not to exude effort at all and just let destiny do the hunting for them. While some jump from relationship after relationship, some patiently waiting while cross-stitching. Some people want it all / But I don't want nothing at all / If it ain't you baby / If I ain't got you baby / Some people want diamond rings / Some just want everything / But everything means nothing / If I ain't got you, Yeah No matter what path you take, I will always take the road less traveled: to search and wait.

Being taken is not a matter of choice; it's being single that is. Not unless someone named Gerald Cel Arce proposes his undying love for me before my 18th birthday, I will be single til ad infinitum.

One thing about our special someones: they are not really special (unless they have gills or they can spell 'pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis' correctly). Maybe we have put too much decorations, make-ups, and illusions on them believing that, in this way, there would be 'special effects'.


*Apologies to Ms. Zafra. As of now, I am single for 17 years 10 months 22 days 12 hours 4 minutes and 5 seconds.

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Down(elink) with the Sickness

I appeal to the legislators in the Senate, especially to the new Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, and the people in Malacañang to act now and hire a group of high-caliber Pinoy hackers to infiltrate the systems of the social networking sites Downelink and G4M because of the illusions that pervade the site.

I am serious!


The onset of these types of social networking sites has truly made a new platform for people to get noticed, a new place to stage publicly their inner angsts and personal desires.

Downelink and G4M only justify the tumultuous nature of socializing. More than the reasons to connect with old friends and make new ones, to find a hook-up is inevitable.

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By signing up in these sites, you unknowingly turn yourself into a commodity. As a human product, you advertise yourself; you plot marketing strategies for the success of your uh product. Your primary picture is your immediate and most effective tool (don't ask me why). Pictures of you with your screaming favorite Starbucks Coffee, or you in Embassy is, of course, a plus. The content of your About Me section shows (or feigns) your substance-- your educational attainment, occupation, affiliations, etc.

Add all points then you get your market value: the higher, the better. End of the story.

1. Everybody has a 6-pack abs

Downelink is a site not recommended for the prim and the proper. People here like to play it dirty, they are either under-dressed or totally, excuse me, naked. Browse the photos, Nine times ten that you'll see a topless photo with that bulges there, I mean, the abs. The Bench Body.

2. Everybody is Single

A recent CBCP-sponsored survey revealed that 95% of DL users say that they are single; the other 5% is between a liar and a two-timing jerk.

No one visits DL and G4M for the mere purpose of just to make friends. That's bullsht. Talk about hidden agenda (ex. getting laid, finding a sugar daddy, etc.)

3. Everybody wants ♥

Since every user is single, everybody needs love. The pressure is building even more now that December chill is here and that no one wants to have a cold and -- excuse me-- fnckless noche buena.

Only if I didn't fall for a DL guy I wouldn't make such discriminating and pseudo-pro-heterosexuality post like this one. I see a lonely, cold and -- excuse me -- sexless Christmas ahead of me. But I still want to spend the chill with the one who promised to buy me a pack of Lights.

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Being an Out-of-school Youth and Its Advantages

People would ask me why I am still out of school. These people are stupid. Why the hell would I stop schooling when I am swimming on a pool of 1,000 peso bills? I might even enroll myself to Yale or Stanford, or pursue a Graduate studies in Harvard. But personally, I won't. Not because I am a pseudo-xenophobic and I loathe hot, sexy and blue-eyed foreigners; it's just that I still don't have a Visa. Plus, I hate commuting on a weekly basis, honestly.

Wait, I must be hallucinating.


1. You have your own Schedule

To cut it short, YOU ARE FREE. And when you are free, you can:

• watch Eat Bulaga daily
• watch My Husband's Woman daily
• sleep all day
• sleep all night
• trim your nails every two hours
• maintain 28 blogs
• make your own sex scandals every week
• prepare for the next Palanca
• can do FLAMES (Friends, Love, Anger (?), Marriage, Engaged, Sweetheart) anytime

During your 'free' time, you can also flip through the pages of Twilight and go gaga over Cedric Diggory. Or re-read the Harry Potter series, start with the 7th. Or re-read Jessica Zafra's Twisted series, read the words backwards.

If you're not the Reader-type, you can start an inuman session with your friends. Or grab two of your friends and start an orgy.

2. You are spared from doom

Students are, excuse me, whiners. It is obvious, right? They would text you "Ayoq n mg-aral!ü" punctuated by an irritating smiley. They would blog about it and tell you how their impossible assignments and terror professors are killing them.

Luckily, I don't have any assignments and professors to kill me. I am spared from insanity.

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Wait. I am taking my words back. I still wanted to study. I missed my classmates, my professors (especially the one who used to corrupt our minds). I still want to commute. I still want to introduce myself to new classmates. I still want to uh study.

Wait. Someone must be hallucinating. Who is going to Yale, anyway?

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teaching old dogs new tricks

Amidst issues on overpopulation, high numbers of teenage pregnancy, and poverty, the immediate passage of a bill that would mandate the inclusion of a reproductive health education in the curricula of grade 5 to 4th year high school has never been this tempting.

It is for this reason that Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman brings to fore the controversial Sexuality Education, causing the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) to stand firmer on its stance against the things they deem immoral.


TRACING THE ROOT
The conservative orientation of most Filipinos can be traced to the 300 years of Spanish colonial rule. During those times, they had spread their influence by introducing Christianity to the Filipinos.

The Spaniards may have succeeded but beliefs, like any other things, are subject to change. Though it takes time, traditional beliefs are challenged and later discarded.

A recent Social Weather Station (SWS) survey concluded that 4 out of 5 adult Filipinos favor Sex Education in public schools- a lucid vindication that, as 2008 nears its closure, Pinoys are fast-becoming decisive, and are now smarter.

DARE (NOT) TO ASK
In a predominantly Catholic country like ours, sex still tops the list of the things that teenagers dare not talk with their parents. So these curious teens are left with no choice but to ask questions to their equally curious friends. Chances of misinformation are high, leading teenagers to a dangerous path.

Majority of the teenagers find it awkward to raise sex-oriented questions within the walls of their homes for fear that it might only add up to the growing gap with their parents. For instance, how would a mother, raised in a conservative family, answer a why-do-I-need-to-masturbate question from his son? Shocked, the mother would most probably leave the question unanswered. Little did she know that silence would be translated into desperation for answers.

Truly, Sex Ed will bridge the gap that parents find difficult to fill. So why does majority of the bishops oppose such things that would benefit the youth and their family?

DARKER SIDE OF THE NET
We are currently in the so-called YouTube generation, and anything that stimulates the eye is a spectacle.

The Internet has given the youth the freedom to view and explore the things which make up the World Wide Web--blogs, social networking sites, references and, not to mention, pornography.

Along with the fact that there are more porn-related sites than all the websites in the world combined, the internet never fails to lure the youth into its darker side.

Sex Education, indeed, is completely different from pornography, or anything similar to it. These sites are made only for the temporary pleasure of the eyes and of the flesh.

Not only that those porn sites do not teach abstinence, they also do not promote correct sexual values. To venerate blindly such archaic beliefs that sex is an evil topic to discuss with teenagers is an obvious display of our culture of apathy.

The existence of porn sites and their number ascending each day, only heightened the mounting need for the implementation of an age-appropriate sex education.

CHURCH-SPONSORED OPPRESSION
The Constitution, the 'law of all laws', has clearly stated the separation of the Church and State. Yet, CBCP still remains as the 'moral radar' of the nation.

In 2003, the Church did not fail to block the legislation of a bill that would release funds for condoms and other contraceptive supplies.

Moreover, in 2006, the government derailed its trial run of a sex education program in two areas in Manila due to an alleged Church-sponsored oppression.

It is misleading, then, that the very Church who swore the welfare of the Filipinos are the same people who deprive them of their Rights to Education and Health.

SCARE TACTICS
As part of Church's scare tactics, it has been asserted that Sex Ed will 'breed a culture of promiscuity' and 'spawn a generation of sex maniacs'. None of these two is true.

The implementation of Sex Ed will produce a generation capable of making smart decisions, a generation capable of drawing its own conclusions, and more importantly, a generation that does not allow anyone to dictate them what's moral or not, even the CBCP.

The SWS survey reveals that 4 out of 5 adult Filipinos want Sex Ed is enough to spur the passage of the bill. After all, the voice of the people is the voice of God, and it's time for the CBCP to heed the call of the people they seek to serve.

As long as the country's fate depends greatly on the dictates of the antiquated dogmas and flawed beliefs of the Church, progress and liberation will remain as plain illusions and historical mythologies.

This is my entry to the Blog Challenge 08: Teach me eroticism in school, Please

Reference: Rebel without a clue : Sex, lies and the Catholic Church by Patricia Evangelista

*Special thanks to Glenn Diaz and Mark Amoguis.

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