Clare Henney: The Pinoy Concepts Taken Too Far

12:00 PM | | Posted by Clare Henney

There are a lot of things about being Filipino that I like/love.  The sense of family, the bayanihan thing, our faith…during moments of struggle and weakness, these are things that make us shine and help us to rise above our troubles. In spite of the good traits, there are some that I think are often taken a little too far.  Here are a couple of those traits:

Pakikisama – I think that the trait of pakikisama can be a good thing.  It’s when people work together and do their best to get along to be able to work/live together or just to do things together in general.  While it’s good to have that kind of compromise, some take it too far.  Either you just become such a doormat so that you won’t rock the boat and make sure the relationship goes well or you become the person who abuses that. Sometimes we tend to expect too much from others because of this and it becomes a form of peer pressure that is taken way out of context of what pakikisama should be about.

I think that as much as we can be united, we are also individuals.  We need to respect that we cannot agree all the time and there are some moments when we need to “agree to disagree.”  I’ve seen people who ended up feeling pressured because the majority claims that one person lacks “pakikisama” just because they believe in something else.

I think a compromise is just that, a compromise.  It should not be forced on people.

Utang na Loob – Translated in English as debt of gratitude. Yet another trait that can be good but can get bad at the same time.

I like it that Filipinos repay the kindness done to them.  They may not do the exact same thing but an act of kindness to them is given a similar act of kindness in return when the opportunity is given to them.  What I hate about this is when this is taken too far.  When one act of kindness becomes a lifetime of paying it back.  When people always mention that act of kindness to get something in return and a single act of kindness in return is ever enough. It is a pet peeve for me when people are like that.  I believe that if you do something good for a person, you do it out of the goodness of your heart.  You do not do this to expect anything in return.  If you do, that isn’t really an act of kindness.  It’s the same with claiming payback in perpetuity.  It really defeats the purpose of it being about gratitude when it becomes abusive.  I’d rather people just believe in paying it forward instead of just being about a debt of gratitude.  I think it’s better that way.

Again, I am not against all the good traits that we Filipinos have.  I just don’t agree with them when they are taken too far.  Feel free to mention other traits that are often abused if I forgot any.