PRESIDENT Duterte, father of four, encourages soldiers to stop at three. He ought to say the same to policemen. One doesn’t need a Malthusian theorist to argue that not every cop will find it easy, like a certain SPO3 Sta. Isabel, to support more than three kids and grow a fortune on a salary of P8,000.
At the beginning of his presidency I recall Digong saying he was in favor of a two-kids-only policy. Where did the additional third come from? He should make the acquaintance of the little boy whose innocent answer to why he eats vegetables has made him the latest “viral” star on social media. The boy’s reply, well beyond the reach of censors, revealed hilariously how Filipino parents bring up their sons to learn about sex, beginning with the adage that size and length matter – indirectly, the importance of virility.
Filipino culture being what it is, the family is sacred, the primary social unit, the center of every individual’s life and work. Is that why philanderers are happy to oblige, “That’s why I’ve more than one family! We have more blessings! ”
What moved Papa Duterte to urge his soldiers to freeze at three? A 102 million population? A P3.8 trillion budget next year? Transportation troubles choking Metro Manila and Davao? A vice presidential candidate blamed the Filipino’s attachment to and love for his family as a factor of corruption. A senator opined that Filipinos “are highly sexed, nothing to be ashamed of.” A colleague, Rene Saguisag, painted a picture of how a blanket covering two children is not big enough when another, and another, and another baby come along.
In the age of selfie-ish, spoiled, soft-living millennials, in the age of empowered women and better-dead-than-wed singletons and late marriages, isn’t it so last-century to talk about family planning? Better to call it life planning, the language used by insurance agents. The more children you have the smaller the inheritance for each, like Saguisag’s blanket. (Jullie Y. Daza)
