YO213

Grp1-Jejemons
Mary Rose Claire M. Galbo
2007-35538
More than the Hero-Driven Society and the Society-Driven Hero

Just like any other society, ours is driven by the exploits, ideals and symbolisms of its

heroes and great individuals of history. Most of them ceased to exist but a part of them seem to

have found immortality or just say immunity to forgetfulness for some time if it cannot make it

to forever. Did the great men know that their lives or their works or ideas would mean as much

to our present generation? Are they aware that they owe these immortality from the society

which they were born from, the timeliness of their birth and sprout of their ideas, the

environment that nurtured them and the people that supported them? If they did or did not, we

shall also acknowledge the fact that we owe them something yet something more to.

Once upon a time. The great individuals were born in a real, existent and problematic

society like we have today. In their own time, they must have faced similar problems with other

nameless ordinary people but they have something that differentiated them from those other

ordinary people. This may be skills and abilities or great passion of divine origin that the

principle of charisma talks about.

Mikaela Irene Fudolig was the 16 year old BS Physics class 2007 valedictorian of UP

Diliman. In her valedictory speech, she talks of how UP students is fond of making new paths in

UP ground despite the presence of pavements that are supposed to be walked on. As she says,

these paths are the easiest to take 1. Instead of staying like any other ordinary individual or boxed

by the existing structures, the great individuals built their own roads, roads to their dreams, to

their aspirations or to their goals. They may or may not reach what they wanted but they made a

move closer, a significant difference. Pondering on this analogy makes me realize more of the

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importance of the need and followers. If I am going to make a new path to a building that¶s going

to lead me farther from that building, would you expect others to follow me? Some crazy people

probably would but in the practical sense, it would not make sense because there is no need for

it. The road must be something others needed. This others would soon follow the road that I walk

on and quoting Fudolig again someday the grass would give in and stop growing altogether,

making the path more and more visible, more and more walkable (tenses changed). Else, nobody

would follow after me and create the new road.

^t¶s all in the timing. Being a great individual or hero entails perfect timing. You cannot

change the world that is not ready to accept the change that you want to implement. As

Sztompka says, the society must be ripe and ready for the great individual¶s ideologies. The

application of an ideology, theory or work or its usability in specific situations will determine its

value. The value will put on permanence or possibly immortality no matter how short-lived the

life of the person could be. People are the ones to attach meanings in the first place. And for

something to mean much or be appreciated must, it must serve to solve a timely need. A timely

need can never be solved by an untimely solution.

Every lifetime creates its own hero. For this lifetime, let us strive becoming one. Whether

we get there or not the present time calls for people who would do their part in molding the

society and molding the great individuals that would shape the society and the future generations

back. The society calls for heroes of each lifetime, a lifetime no one ever else will live in. Jose

Rizal might not have been as popular as he is right now if other heroes succeeded ousting our

colonizers before his time. I, with all those other people taking P.I. 100 or the Rizal course might

not need to take this subject without Rizal making it to who he had become.

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 uhe role of the environment. Nurture versus nature is one lesson I learned from

psychology1. Nature talks about the role of genetic factors, inheritances, things similar to

charisma where everything goes back to what you were innately wired for. Nurture, however,

talks about the way you were brought up or trained. Focusing on nurture, the training that we

receive would affect how much more we could achieve. If you were a man endowed with the

greatest potentials but those went unharnessed in your lifetime, it becomes useless. If you do not

have an exceptional innate skill but your little ability went through on intensive training, it is a

lot better than the previous one and has a better chance of contributing to social change. Getting

as much training as possible today and maximizing the kind of nurture and feeding we are

receiving may pay us back tomorrow.

More than a folk tale. As much as our epics are concerned, I see them as part of the

Filipino culture. Period. My elementary years thought me how to read stories and listen to tales

that formed part of my culture being raised by my grandparents from whom I heard the first folk

songs and town tales. Now, I have learned that these epics speak more of the ideals of the early

Filipino society. I would have to admit that the epics that tale of the monsters and the different

supernatural powers sounded corny to me compared to those foreign movies that I watched as a

product of colonial mentality. But now, they made greater sense to me because they are ideals

and imaginations of my ancestors passed on to my generation.

I¶m pretty sure Rizal have heard or read of them. As one great individual in the Filipino

society , this formed part of who he had become and who he had become formed part of who we

are, as a society and individuals, today.

uhe cliché that life is but a dream is false. Not because we wanted to become heroes,

we will be. This life is not a dream world where everything could happen by itself effortlessly,

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with our eyes close and our whole being in a state of deep sleep. In this world, we need to open

our eyes more and work for our goals. Our labor does not guarantee success, nevertheless doing

our best is the only way to find out how far we can go, how our environment was successful in

nurturing and how untimely or untimely everything else have been.

Ñaying debts. Dr. B. O. Juliano, the commemorative lecturer of the centennial

celebration of UPLB Institute of Chemistry said that we are more indebted to our future

generations than we are from the ones that shaped us. Our great men surely shaped our society

and the society must have shaped them to become who they had been. This time is our time to

pay back and make a difference. They made their part, let us do ours. By making a difference, a

positive one to be specific, is the way of paying back both generations. This is more than the

story of the hero-driven society and the society-driven hero. This is our story, our nation, our

time, our responsibility.

Note:

1.c Taken from Mikaela Irene Fudolig¶s Speech ³ Take Not the Road Less Traveled´

from my Speech Com 1 Class.

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