Where liberty is freedom from each other; where opportunity
is grabbing something before someone else does; where control is the measure of
an individual’s success over the environment. (Bauer, 2010)
Where for the rest of us, liberty is “personal freedom from
servitude or confinement or oppression” (when you had once long ago promoted
slavery); opportunity is “a possibility due to a favorable combination of
circumstances” (when you had been against preference option for any single
individual); and, control is the “power to direct or determine” another (when
you fight wars to promote self-direction and self-determination).
Perhaps our idolatry towards the United States come
from our shared history and shared bonds. You are our big brother who saved us
from Japanese occupation and gave us our freedom. You are our friend who made
us discover “liberty, opportunity, and control” (Bauer, 2010).
Our values just as our vision are intertwined. But just as
we stand shoulder to shoulder, we are dwarfs to you who are giants. Poverty,
crime, and corruption have stalled the arrival of our vision. It has also
corrupted our values. The Philippines has survived “luckily” thanks to the
consistent money remittances to families of overseas Filipinos largely coming
from the United States. Millions have come to this country to find their dream
come true. Filipinos are the second largest immigrants here. We are your
teachers and nurses who have left family and the familiar to try our luck in
your land. Success seems to come in each personal journey, from the Pacific
islands.
For me, the United States had always been in my psyche
especially for your protection of minority rights even when the majority rules
(Bauer, 2010). An article personally resonates with me because despite
the criticisms of the American Way, and how America struggles with controlling
its future, your protection of the minority and the different, the weak and the
oppressed makes you keeper of the history of the world.
Although I love my country, I have come here to the United
States to taste the feeling of how it is to be a contributor in my difference.
I realize that many have suffered to promote and protect this value – women,
African-American, Native Indians, veterans, persons with disabilities, etc.
Your framework is not perfect and your superiority is arrogant, but though you
conveniently forget the losses of the past, you have learned that there is no
“I” in team. “We” are the world’s citizens. Another’s victory like China’s is
not America’s defeat but America’s renewed potential for growth, “Bigness and
Expansionism,” (Bauer, 2010) and allowing them the opportunity for economic
well being as well.
China’s values of saving, obedience, and study – values
exactly non-American (Bauer, 2010) make them successful too on the world’s
stage as prima ballerina for 21st century. In contrast, to your key traits and
values historically built on top of each other and cumulative given by the
Spanish/Portuguese, French, and British, have made you for many ages the
danseur noble.
But history is a pas de deux or a dance for two.
Though America might not appreciate its history, thus
disabling it to move towards the future – you are who we aspire to become. The
realization that each family can have a good job, a decent college education, a
car, and the latest techno gadgets is what moves us Filipinos to mold ourselves
to become like you. We live on less than a dollar a day when you spend five
dollars for your morning coffee and bagel. Our children spend Christmas in the
streets selling cigarettes and gum when your children dress up as Disney
princesses and superheroes. Our families spend their entire life living in
slums beside polluted rivers when your families own a family van and live in
suburbia while going to soccer practices and other diversions.
As we get to know you more through your movies, through your
songs, through your bestseller diet books, I just hope we are in no danger of
losing the lessons that made us who we are. You have made us free, but we have
spent that freedom being a prisoner to your identity.
Allow us to shine too.
Reference:
Bauer, N. (2010). THE AMERICAN WAY: How It Came To Be and
Why Current Challenges Are Such a Surprise.
