There were many perceptive comments on my previous post on this subject, so I decided to take up a suggestion in one of them that I extend the debate a little. There has also been some interesting e-mail dialogue– I will ask permission to use it and may add a third post.
On the influence of Catholicism, one reason I didn’t get into this is that, as an atheist, I find it a bit hard to assess. Clearly Catholicism per se does not preclude a “modern” outlook – JFK is only the most famous of example of a Catholic who excelled in a contemporary capitalist context.
However, it does seem to me that, as Brommel implied, in a semi-feudal context such as one finds in many parts of Philippine society, Catholicism reinforces a more general social consciousness (which itself derives from the means of production, as Marx pointed out). In short, poor Filipinos are convinced they will always be poor. This view of a fixed and unchangeable universe is similar to that found in Shakespeare, many of whose plays (especially Macbeth and Julius Caesar) deal with acts which disturb the “natural order” – leading to chaos and turmoil. It seems to me that Weber was right to see Protestantism’s focus on the individual as fundamentally threatening to such a world view, so in that sense I am with the Weberians in the comments on my previous post.
Of course one could ask what all this has to do with the “childlike” quality that kicked off this discussion, yet is a fixed and unchanging construction of the world not precisely the view of a child? That is why their parents’ divorce is so traumatic for children, as shocking in fact as regicide was to the Elizabethans.
I certainly agree with Carla that the Western parent—child relationship is no model. Her observation that “I am disturbed by how many Europeans I've met here actually hate their folks” is a chilling one. When I explained to Frayed a while back that it seemed that the most a British parent could expect of their adult children was a sort of patronizing tolerance, she said that here in Manila all of her friends loved their parents. That was a (pleasant) shock to me and makes me wonder whether there is at the heart of all love a sense of dependence, which, as I noted in my last post, is apparently fundamental to Philippine familial relations.
Another excellent point was made by Staufer, who pointed out that the other side of Filipinos’ lack of seriousness is that they are not prone to fanaticism. Exactly right; in fact I believe that Jemaah Islamiyah has found it almost impossible to recruit suicide bombers here, even in the disaffected Muslim south. Thankfully, there has been nothing here to compare with with, for example, the communal violence that has studded Indonesian history in the post-colonial era. The contrast between the massacres that accompanied regime change in Indonesia in 1965-67, which caused almost half a million deaths, and the bloodless EDSA events in 1986 and 2001 is particularly stark.
Neux Roux made a very valid point about the economic disincentives for leaving home, something that has been observed in the UK too as rocketing house prices have forced many children to stay at home later than in earlier generations. Carla’s point that the “Artful Dodger” type who has to survive on his or her wits almost from the moment he or she can stand is very different from the pampered middle-class or elite child is also a fair one. In fact one might almost say that Filipinos are made up of two types: those living in a sort of perpetual childhood and those who have no childhood at all.
Thinking about the influence of patterns of rearing (which, I argued in my previous post, are fundamental to understanding adult social relations), I got to thinking about Jewish families. Here too one finds extreme patterns of dependence (the source of all those Jewish mother jokes), yet the adult consequences are quite different. Jews are famous for their drive (making the desert bloom), entrepreneurial flair, and independence—one finds those qualities among Filipinos too, but I would not say they are defining characteristics. So in other words, the key seems to the more general social and ideological milieu in which these patterns of rearing take place. To give just one example, when I discussed this issue with a Jewish friend she pointed out the extremely high value that is placed on education in Jewish families; in her view it was this that propelled Jewish kids into adulthood.
It will be very interesting to see the impact the Balikbayan experience has on the Filipino family, I am sure it will be profound. Here for example is an extract from a recent Rina Jimenez David column:
For every child or spouse feeling resentment at being sacrificed on the altar of prosperity, there is an OFW suffering from intense loneliness and perhaps resentment, too, at being seen as merely a meal ticket and supplier of imported goods. To this, says Corazon Atuel whose husband Eugenio works as a ship captain, the antidote is frequent communication and treating each other and their seven children as “friends.” The Atuels join two other families recognized as “Model OFW Family of the Year,” a belated nod to the role that the family plays in the success of an overseas worker.
There’s a lot you can read into that, not least the seven children in this “model OFW family”.
I have come to the end of my second post on this subject and yet I feel I have barely scratched the surface. I’m looking forward to reading what you have to say.
She’s just the latest in a line of bimbos* to have appeared in the scandal sheets because of their involvement with a politician, but I can't help finding the life of high-class New York call girl Ashley Alexandra Dupré sort of absorbing. 
Twilight of the books
