The Real Sickness of the Filipinos

I remember one time in our Filipino philosophy class that according to Fr. Mercado, Filipinos
has a penchant for “small time thinking”. This means that Filipinos in general, whenever they try
to achieve something prefers to go for the minimum. In other words, we don’t think big. This is
very evident in our society; in opening a business, we prefer opening a sari-sari store rather than
a grocery store, in buying goods such as shampoos, we prefer those in sachets rather than those
in bottle containers. No wonder the Philippines is one of the top contributors of plastic waste
worldwide. However, thinking small is not our gravest sickness. There is something more severe
that is openly yet secretly holding us back from attaining progress. This sickness is the thinking
that we Filipinos, as a people is inferior than others or the so- called inferiority complex.

If we take a look at our history, we will see that we were not always like this. In the past,
Filipinos were filled with pride with whatever kingdom or tribe they belong or with themselves.
This is evident by the culture of our forefathers such as the painting of tattoos all over one’s body
which screams one’s greatnes as a warrior. Noteworthy to include as well the great tales of
Filipino heroes such as Biag ni Lam-ang.

Now the question is, how and when did we get this dreadful illness? It was during the time of the
Spaniards that we fell ill. During their time, three things must be remembered: first, because we
were invaded, we became dependent upon the Spaniards since we were under their rule. Second,
because of abuses and because we were treated as second class citizens, it has been generally
imprinted in our minds that we can never be great and that we can never do something right. And
finally, when we were granted independence our leaders either became hungry for wealth and
power which paved the way for corruption or were clueless about how to govern a nation. Our
leaders may be likened to a dog tied to a post all his life. Upon release, he may either be hungry
for the outside world, clueless about it or both.

Upon the coming of the Americans, we became worse. Our leaders felt that we cannot govern
our own country as such it was better to live under the rule of the Americans