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Karma
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| Michael Tan |
Wed, Nov 21, 2007
Philippine Daily Inquirer
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>I have two articles today, both dealing with national karma. We've all heard about individual karma, but there's also something called collective karma, the idea that what we do as a nation, likewise yields results for the entire country.
I had heard of the concept from Buddhist monks in the past but was reminded about it last weekend when I overheard someone telling her friend: "With so many horrible things happening in the Philippines, we must have done really terrible things in the past. Bad karma."
You don't have to be Buddhist to believe in karma. Even the Bible has a passage about reaping what we sow. It?s not about God or gods rewarding or punishing us, but about recognising that all our actions have consequences, sometimes long-term, and often in the most unexpected ways.
Intrigued? Read on to find out what I mean.
Conde
Conde was the old, emaciated and overworked horse that collapsed in front of the Inquirer during the weekend. Inquirer staff called the vets in to rescue the horse, but it was too late, and it had to be put to sleep. The owner argued that he had cared for the horse as best as he could.
We treat animals badly in the Philippines, and often I hear people explain that this is inevitable in a poor country. When people need to feed their families, they can't be thinking about being nice to animals. I disagree. I've visited many countries far poorer than we are but where animals are treated well. And in my work with the poor in the Philippines, I've seen many households too where animals are cared for, even brought to the vet when ill. Conversely, some of the most maltreated animals I've seen come from wealthy households.
Some time back, I wrote about a resort town in Bohol province where "barangay tanod" (village watchman) went out one morning and beat stray dogs to death, all within eye sight and ear shot of tourists. They were doing this supposedly to protect the tourists.
I was reminded of the incident a few weeks ago when the Philippine Daily Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net) published a letter from a foreign tourist complaining about cruelty to dogs in Boracay. The tourist said she would never visit the Philippines again. That was what I warned about before when I wrote about Bohol. I was with Dutch visitors and I can imagine them returning home and telling friends about the barbarism here.
I'm sure our tourist officials haven't thought about this angle of animal cruelty keeping tourists away, but it is a factor. We already get so much bad press in Europe about our dog-eating so if they hear about the way we beat up dogs to protect tourists, "Wow Philippines" is going to mean something totally different from what the Department of Tourism intended.
Bohol doesn't need this kind of bad karma. A few months after that heartbreaking incident in Bohol, I returned, this time to another town in that province. There were several dogs roaming the beach. You could tell they were well-treated with the way they'd approach people. They weren't scrawny and hungry. They went up to people, inviting them to play. I'm careful too about unfamiliar dogs but was comfortable with these dogs because they had collars on, and rabies-vaccination tags. One of them joined me as I strolled down the beach, and eventually enticed me to go for a dip in the sea. Then it went off looking for new friends.
A Zen dog, I thought, without attachments. They could become part of the attraction of these resorts.
Next time you're in a resort, or maybe even a restaurant, surprise the resort owners by praising them if they treat dogs and cats well. And if they don't, let them know as well that you don't intend to return, unless they do something about it.
But let's not be kind to animals for show, or to attract tourists. There's another karma angle to this: being cruel to animals makes it that much easier to be cruel to humans. Cruel is actually an understatement for the way we treat animals in the Philippines. Even in the slaughter of food animals, I've seen butchers doing their job with sadistic glee -- I'll spare you the details -- sending shivers up my spine as I thought of how they might treat their children or spouses.
Again, karma isn't about gods rewarding and punishing you: it's about an ethic that grows on you, for better or for worse, and that becomes part of you, or a whole province, or nation.
Engaged literacy
The US National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) has released a new study called "To Read or Not To Read", summarising findings from some 40 studies about reading habits and skills.
The report is packed with statistics to support some basic messages. First, Americans generally are reading less than earlier generations, but the decline is greatest among the young. On a weekend, for example, 15- to 24-year-olds average more than two hours watching TV and only seven minutes reading. Of those who do read, 35 percent would do this simultaneously while tuned on to other media like TV, videogames or the computer.
Second, when people read less, they read less well. There?s a decline in reading comprehension, which affects job prospects. One survey asked employers about the quality of applicants and the complaints were uniform: younger Americans had weaker command of English (is this America or the Philippines?), which meant they were less likely to perform well in their jobs. The decline in reading affects prospects for employment and opportunities for advancement -- those with substandard reading skills were less likely to end up in management positions, or in business, financial and professional sectors.
The solutions aren't hard to come by. One study quoted in the NEA report found that the most significant predictor for high academic achievement was quite simple: having books in the home. I worry that in the Philippines, parents might think the computer can replace the books, but they forget that being computer-literate is still associated with reading skills. Abandon reading and you'll end up with kids who use the computers mainly for games and cyber-dating.
The NEA had an earlier study, published in 2004, where it emphasised that reading allows people to develop "focused attention and imaginative growth that enrich both private and public life". People who read are more likely to search for more knowledge, to go to museums, to do volunteer work, even attend sports activities.
Now for the karma part. The NEA notes that the decline in "engaged literacy" has resulted in America becoming "less informed, active and independent-minded". If we want to use the karma angle, we could say that by neglecting the needs of the young for reading, Americans generate "bad" karma for themselves and end up with a president like George W Bush, and the mess in Iraq.
What's so scary too is that America's karma is often our karma too, if not that of the world, and it just might take more than being nice to animals, or reading, to get us out of this quagmire.
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