Wrong Filipinism, wrongly placed

I was in high school when I first heard the word Filipinism. I had no idea what it was. This was often mentioned in a series of discussions about love of country among old people, mostly septuagenarians. The quintessential group, composed of academicians in the field of history and government, prelates, free masons, business and civic leaders had my highest respect. There was no doubt in my young mind that their hearts and minds were imbued with the highest sense of nationalism. Each time they spoke of Filipinism, their patriotic fervor was so inspiring that I thought the word meant “love for our country, the Philippines.” By the way, when I use “old people” in this column, this should not be treated as disrespect to them. It just happened that the more palatablevterm “senior citizens” is a much later terminology.

Thru the years, I learned the correct meaning of Filipinism. It is not anywhere near love for the Philippines. This word actually refers to linguistic usages specific to or typical of the Philippines, often involving borrowed English words or phrases used differently than in standard English. According to the internet, these words are not necessarily grammatically incorrect, but because they are almost always results of transliteration, they sometimes lead to misunderstandings. In other words, my youthful perception was wrong as I realized that Filipinism had no relation at all with patriotism.

I will still use my incorrect understanding of Filipinism in this column today to dramatize pronouncements made by senate re-electionists Francis Ng Tolentino and Maria Imelda Josefa Remedios "Imee" Romualdez Marcos-Manotoc. Senator Tolentino delivered, last week a stirring privilege speech in defense of Philippine sovereignty against the incursions of Communist China. His patriotic act fell under my wrong concept of Filipinism. The senator said: “The illegal seizure of Sandy Cay by the China Coast Guard is an outrageous assault on Philippine sovereignty. Sandy Cay lies within our territorial waters- indisputably ours under international law. This brazen intrusion must be met by the strongest diplomatic and defensive measures. We must not allow foreign forces to trample upon our rights and dignity. The West Phil Sea belongs to the Filipino people and no intimidation and act of aggression can ever change that. We call on all Filipinos to stand firm and defend what is ours- resolutely, lawfully and without fear.”

Thank you, Senator Francis Tolentino. It warmed my heart to hear a Philippine senator asking his countrymen to stand firm against this modern bully of a state named China. This, to me, is the very first time an expression of outrage being delivered in the halls of Senate. Before Tolentino’s Filipinism, no senator spoke openly against the violation by China of our territorial sovereignty. For many years, no one in the upper chamber of legislature dared to denounce the seizure by Communist China of some islands in the West Philippine despite the ruling of the permanent international arbitral tribunal these are within our Exclusive Economic Zone.

Unlike my erroneous understanding of Filipinism, the patriotic oratory of the senator was not really aimed at arousing our love of our country. So, no thanks to the senator. I honestly believe that his privilege speech was an act of desperation. His was not Filipinism. He made it to get the attention of Filipino electorates to his fading candidacy. Actually, he had no more electoral card to play. As late survey results have shown, he is placed quite far from the winning column. Unfortunately, if my concept of Filipinism is entirely wrong, the senator’s speech is worse than wrongly motivated. It was sadly out of time