Sports Synergy

Talks about synergy almost always start with a slide that which says "1 + 1 > 2". This is usually done for the workplace where each individual contribution of a team member taken together is a whole which is greater than the sum of its parts.

Now, however, I'll be talking about something I've bugged my friends over constantly during our badminton games. When playing mixed doubles, both partners have to be in sync with each other. If not, they're a very easy team to beat. Now, shear strength can overcome much weaker opponents but what I'm talking about here is when you take two players who (on paper) should lose to another team but because of their synergy, they are able to perform much better than expected.

I'm talking about one of the guys from my badminton group. Now, two years ago, I joined my current badminton group after a friend of mine, Nigel invited me and told me the guys there where really good. I didn't know anyone else there so everyone was a new person to me. One of the guys there, Grant, stood out to me because as we played, it was very clear we simply understood each other's movements. Grant would automatically cover areas I wasn't defending or set up a smash I could easily make.

The weird part of all of this is that me and Grant hadn't talked at all prior to that first game. In fact, to this date, we don't exchange much words between us other than the customary "Hi!" and "Hello!" But I've always found that playing with Grant, I feel I'm at my most natural state in playing badminton. I've played with other people, even ones who are objectively much better than Grant but we just don't click as well. Nigel, my badminton friend from back in high school, comes close but we had to build that up over years of playing with each other. My dynamic with Grant came naturally.

We still get to play on Tuesdays and while I don't get to play with Grant always, when I do, I always find it a pleasure. We don't always win but we are able to challenge pairs that are objectively much stronger than us with better than expected results.

My badminton friends will most likely tease me about this as I've been very open to them about how I love my dynamic with Grant even though we rarely speak to each other off the court. I'm pretty sure Nikki will tease me about this but I just wanted to let this out.

The Effect of Privatization

News lately has been that Manila Water will soon charge more for water after they were slapped with a fine by the Supreme Court. News outlets either report this as a 780% price hike or a Php 26 price hike if the SC does not reverse its decision.

Now, a side note, most news outlets want to paint this in as bad a light as possible and so stress the 780% figure as opposed to the Php 26 figure. Math geeks will love cracking these numbers and since I'm one of them, it basically refuses to state that water is currently priced (apparently) at Php 3.33 per cubic meter which I think is crazy cheap and a price hike is warranted.

Many of my UP friends then cite this instance as one of the dangers of privatization. Since private companies will want to make money, utilities might wind up more expensive than before. This is a no-brainer. When the power industry was privatized during then President Ramos, electricity rates did indeed go up! The promise was that prices would go down but let's not kid ourselves, prices went up. Judging by this Php 26 price hike, yes, the promise of lower prices is not fulfilled.

Why then do some people (me included) push for privatization at all? It's the quality that we're after. If you're a 90's kid like me, you will no doubt remember how brown outs and black outs were regular occurrences. Right when the power plants, the grid and the distributors were privatized, Filipinos experienced less brownouts. As a child, I didn't appreciate it or hardly noticed it but we had electricity more reliably. Now, it's not perfect. We still do experience brownouts every so often but it's due to these private companies wanting to make money that these brownouts are fewer and further in between.

The logic is simple. In the past year, we received several notices of possible brownouts. Only a few ever materialized as VECO knows that the longer the power lines are down, the longer the time is that their power lines aren't making money for them. These private companies are also more vigilant in catching cheaters who try to steal electricity or water. Do some escape? Of course but I dare say, much less than before.

Now we can talk about the fine that the SC imposed on Manila Water and how I think it's excessive and unreasonable but to stay on point, the short of it is that privatization assures that we have these services at all. Electricity may be more expensive, but the fact is it's more reliable than ever. Water may be more expensive, but the fact is it's there (even with the water crisis earlier this year, mind you).

These companies want you to use water and electricity so in other words, they have every incentive to continue providing the people with water and electricity. That's the effect that privatization has on industries. Having certain things government owned usually sees a decline in its quality slowly through time. Notice things like public schools, public hospitals, public roads and bridges. I've said it before and I'll say it again, it's time we stop demanding a lot of things and start demanding nice things.

Misunderstood Bible Quotes: Ask and you shall receive!

I'm starting a new series of posts which will feature misunderstood Bible quotes. Now, I'm no Biblical scholar so I hope this series will be a sort of guide to people who also aren't Bible scholars to understanding more the word of God. I won't be dealing with the more difficult passages in scripture. Instead, this will be focus on passages whose contexts are usually missed (usually in the same chapter). This series shall follow this format:

1. The Bible passage and how people usually read it
2. The worst possible reading of the passage and how it's used against Christianity in popular media
3. Why this reading is incorrect based on surrounding texts
4. A more profound and meaningful reading of the text

Today's text comes from both Luke and Matthew. The text I'll use now will come from Matthew as it was this reading that made me see it in a brand new light.

Luke 11:9-10

"And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened."

People have normally taken this passage to be a promise from the Lord that whatever we ask for, we will receive. Most Catholics will say that this usually means you'll get what you ask for when God determines the time is right. They usually say this to explain away the worst way to read this passage.

As this is a quote from Jesus, many skeptics will take this to mean if you ask for something now and you don't get it, then maybe no one's listening at all. Logically, it makes sense. If God Almighty has declared that whatever you ask will be given, then you ask and it's not given, you can start to question whether God is Almighty at all!

I'm probably in the minority of people who find this passage troubling. I, in fact, have asked for many things from God. Some have been given to me, some have not. So what's the deal here? I thought all I needed to do was ask or seek or knock. Then upon closer reading of a few verses before this text, it then starts to make sense.

I always found the last part of the trio (ask, seek and knock) to be an odd ball. I get why asking and seeking are together but why is knocking in there at all? The answer to my years old long question was simply a word away.

Look at Luke 11:5-8 and you'll see that Jesus paints a story of a man who wants to ask for bread from a friend of his. His friend responds by saying that his DOOR has been closed and that he won't open it anymore. This short story closes by saying that his friend will eventually open the door because of the first man's persistence.

In effect, the passage isn't telling us that God is like a cosmic ATM where you just push some buttons and you get exactly what you ask for. It's not telling us to ask once and expect an answer. The passage is telling us to be persistent.

If a grumpy man who doesn't to give bread to his neighbor can be tired down by persistence, God, in contrast, will happily give us what we ask for or what we seek for if we are persistent.

It's heartwarming, in fact to hear about stories about people who's petitions were repeated over and over only to be answered after many many years. I personally had prayed for something over a period of 6 years before God had given it to me. My family had prayed for a particular petition continuously for close to 18 years only for it to be given at the best possible time for our family.

So maybe next time you mention to someone that all they need to do is ask, add that little bit on persistence. It really does make all the difference.

Traffic in Metro Manila

Apparently, the traffic situation in Metro Manila has gotten worse. Having lived there in the past, I didn't know it was possible but apparently it is. Several of my friends post on it and I give the same advice. And every time I get the same reaction, a laughing smiley. Guys, I wasn't joking. Maybe it really is time you guys left Metro Manila.

No, not Cebu. Not us. Please. I'm not even talking about the other big cities like Bacolod or Iloilo or Davao or Gen San. I've thought about this for a while now. Why is everything in Metro Manila? The only railway system is in Manila. Most major companies have their headquarters in Manila. Manila has everything.

It may be a chicken and egg scenario but it's ultimately because Manila's infrastructure makes it a very attractive site for businesses to pour their money into it. In a unitary form of government like ours, government officials in Manila see the need to add more infrastructure to make it even more attractive and so on.

Even in Cebu, which people say is the "Philippines 2nd City", I don't see the same amount of infrastructure support from the national government. We still have nothing like an MRT or LRT. Only more recently starting with PGMA did Cebu see more of that money that Metro Manila has long enjoyed.

So forgive me if I find the complaints about Manilenio's 2-3 hour commute to and from work unamusing. I'd be way more sympathetic if people weren't clamoring for more government intervention on these matters as opposed to less. The MRT/LRT problem goes back to everything wrong with government spending.

The state's primary concern is public service, not profit. As such any proposed increase in price for the train system would be met with huge opposition. Monthly maintenance costs take a back seat which is why people saw numerous car breakdowns during the time of PNoy.

Yet the LRT abd MRT continues to operate at a loss and that ultimately comes from the taxes of Filipino people, many of whon have never seen or set foot on an MRT train.

My advice? Cease any and all subsidy to the MRT and LRT trains immediately! Let them operate by themselves. They would be forced to jack up prices for the train rides to compensate for operating costs and new trains but it would at the very least be constrained to a local issue in Metro Manila.

The same goes with the PUV modernization program. The state is right in introducing this but should allow individual drivers to opt in or out of these programs. They should also be more free to raise the price of fares. I mean riding a dusty old jeepney as opposed to a brand new airconditioned Beep is like day and night and people will spend for the difference. The old cheaper options will still be available along side the more expensive more comfortable and safe options so it does encourage competition in this regard.

And I truly think competition is the only thing that can truly drive down the price of our transportation.

On Carlos Celdran's Death

Last week, Carlos Celdran, a famous activist and tour guide died. All accounts simply say he died of natural causes which leads me to think maybe it was a stroke or some other disease that had been slowly killing him could be why he'd been staying in Spain since the beginning of this year.

I had been a fan of Carlos Celdran when my Aunt and Uncle took me to a walking tour where he was a guide. I learned a lot about the walled city of Intramuros, which I swear came alive during his tour. He was talented and knowledgeable. That's undeniable. He was also arrogant.

In 2010, he attended a mass which he disrupted in the middle to protest the Church's stance to the RH bill (now RH law). In that stint, he was calling the priests of the Catholic Church, Padre Damasos, a fictional character from Noli Me Tangere who is known for being hypocritical. He was later imprisoned for "hurting religious feelings". I guess that's the term the Philippine government decided to use to refer to disrupting religious services.

Whether you agree with Carlos Celdran on the issue or not, it was wrong of him to disrupt a religious service. He might've gotten more support if he had voiced his Padre Damaso outside of mass. I still wouldn't have agreed with him but I would have at least taken him more seriously. At that point, I knew he had his demons. I still believe he loves his country but I think he took it a step too far in that direction.

More striking is one of his last tweets where he retweeted a news bit which said President Duterte has an auto immune disease. To this he responded with, "Good. Now die. Please. Kthanxbye." This is shocking to me. I know he very much dislikes Duterte but to wish ill will upon someone else is something beyond what I thought he could do. The irony in this story is that the day after he tweeted this, he was the one who died. When I read the story, I couldn't believe it.

Now, his death with somehow always be connected to that last tweet of his. After his Padre Damaso stunt, I never liked Carlos Celdran even during the few times I agreed with him. But I can only hope only for the best for his soul. May he rest in peace.

Pleasing the Mob?

The type of activism that goes to the streets or is very vocal on social media should always be taken with a grain of salt. Where one group may say that we need government policy to do one thing, you might have another group whose interests are in the way and may end up suffering. Most politicians have the mentality of pleasing the mob. Meaning they jump on board any seemingly popular opinion with no regard to the soundness of the opinion.

Last week, a young girl named Greta Thunberg made headlines as she demanded that the world governments should take serious steps to address climate change. I personally have a problem with some politicians using her to paint others in a bad light as it does have an appeal to emotion. However, her points ring true and the internet activists flocked to support her.

Later in the week, public utility vehicles (PUVs) drivers and operators protested the PUV modernization program - a program that would slowly phase out the jeepneys (the old ones; more than 15 years old) and introduce more energy efficient and environmentally friendly PUVs! Isn't this what we wanted? Government (at least our own) making moves to address climate change? Well, not so much. Internet activists are then quick to point out how this policy is anti-poor and will negatively effect the drivers as the cars are too expensive. A direct consequence would be higher fares and no one wants that. Or so they say.

I'm in no way saying the same people protest both ways. I'm happy that I haven't noticed the same person complaining about the two inter-related issues both ways. What I am saying is that we cannot allow ourselves to be blinded simply by the loudest complainers (aka, the mob). Now, this second group of activists are now calling for the government to pay for the new jeeps. This then goes back to my post about free things.

Can our government afford to purchase all these new jeeps? For some reference, each unit would cost up to Php2M. Now, let's say we can afford them. Would you trust any government official to handle that kind of money? I think not.

I prefer the politicians who don't listen to mob. The ones that listen to the people without listening to the mob. Ones that try to solve the problem and not just give the mob what they want. Coz more often than not, the mob has no idea what actually works.

Divorce is being pushed in the Senate again

Senator Risa Hontiveros is pushing for a lot of laws including the SOGIE bill. She's also pushing for the legalization of divorce in our country. The Philippines is actually among the last few countries that don't allow divorce. One of the other countries is the Vatican.

What we currently have in it's place is legal annulment and legal separation. Before we discuss these things, it might be best to define these terms:

Legal Annulment = the marriage never happened (i.e., there was an impediment to marriage at the time of the wedding). Things such the couple are actually related, either spouse was forced into marriage, the marriage was never consummated and cannot be consummated, mental illness at the time of the wedding, and in cases where the couple got married while they were minors, the parents did not consent would be grounds for annulment. Annulment looks at the validity of the marriage itself. As such, physical abuse and infidelity are not grounds for annulment. 

Legal Separation = the couple is still married but for specific reasons, one of the spouses can request that both of them be legally separated. Reasons like a violent spouse or infidelity are among the reasons that legal separation is given. Legally separated couples are not allowed to marry other people. If they somehow do get married and the spouse is still alive, this can be ground for an annulment. 

Legal Divorce = both parties agree that the marriage happened (is valid) but one or both parties want to end the marriage. It's exactly like legal separation except that afterwards, the spouses are no longer considered married to each other.

Now, that that's out of the way, the only reason for legalizing divorce is to allow both parties to be free to marry other people as that's the only difference between the proposed legal divorce and legal separation.

As with almost anything that Risa Hontiveros files in the Senate, religious groups flock to oppose this move. Senator Hontiveros makes a good point when she says that divorce isn't something that is forced on people so if it opposes your faith, then don't do it. It should be so simple. But I'm still against this move by the good senator.

My reason for opposing the legalization of divorce is simple - it seeks to redefine marriage. Good marriages are the foundations of good families. Good families are the foundations of good societies. And good societies are the foundations for a great nation. In other words, we have to get marriage right if we're ever to grow as a nation.

So what is marriage? I want to take my time with this and go the opposite route. I'd start with what marriage is NOT.

Let's start from the one thing (probably the only thing) that everyone agrees on. Can family members (like siblings, parent/child, cousins) get married? To this people will rightly say "No." That's because marriage, while it rightly involves love, it refers to a romantic type of love - the type where both parties engage in sexual intercourse. The reason we exclude family members from marrying each other is that the offspring will have a tendency to have abnormalities and be generally weaker.

In other words, we cannot separate the idea of children from marriage. Even proponents for same sex marriage will agree that incest is a line they aren't willing to cross - even if it involves two sisters, for example. We, as humans, know that romantic love is NOT the sole basis of marriage as our minds directly go to the children of that marriage.

From this line of reasoning, we should then exclude everyone whose relationship is incapable of bearing children - same sex couples, incestuous relationships, etc. This means anyone can marry any one else of the opposite sex as long as they're not related.

Where does divorce enter the picture? We then have to define how long a marriage is to last. Practically everyone will agree that marriage isn't something people can go into willy nilly. There exists a heaviness with getting married to someone that doesn't exist with going into a relationship or a friendship with someone. If I were to pose that marriage can exist between a couple but only for a year then it's renewable after a year if both parties still consent, we'd find that rather odd.

As I've explained in my previous point where children are a part of the marriage equation, they should be considered again in this scenario. The reason we do not allow marriages to be valid for a fixed amount of time is the protection of the children. The model of a father and a mother in the household is still the best model for a family  - almost as if we were made for it but I digress.

In the same vein, we find it equally odd that a marriage would be valid only for an arbitrary period of time or "when one party doesn't want to stay married." Put simply, divorce actually goes against what marriage is and is in effect, trying to redefine it.

Right now, we already have legal annulment and legal separation. The push for divorce is a move to redefine marriage for the sole purpose of appeasing the tiny few who wish to remarry after being separated. Think about it clearly and that's exactly what this is.

And as I've said before, if we allow marriage to be redefined this one time, it will allow for so many other strange combinations in the future like a trio being married, or a child marrying their parent or an old person. People will say this is a slippery slope and I get that. But what isn't a slippery slope is to expect another redefinition of marriage if we allow it one time. I assure that.

The Reds aren't Even Hiding it Anymore

I find this troubling. Online activists, or the reds as I like to call them, are more open about being socialists and communists. I find this sad as more and more of them are popping up and they're coming from people I didn't expect it to come from. This post was shared by a friend of mine and I still can't wrap my head around the idea that he's become a red.

Socialists and communists. I admire their honesty in clumping these two ideologies together. I've heard it said that socialism is just the stepping stone to communism. Communism is a bad idea. It's a bad idea in all the countries that have tried it. Socialism is also a bad idea and it's also a bad idea in all the countries that have tried it.

Both systems are based on Karl Marx's idea that everyone simply contributes to the community (which is where communism gets its name) and takes from the community according to their needs. No one entity owns anything. Everything simply belongs to the commune. In other words, the government owns everything and the government can distribute the goods however they see fit.

Simply put, in both systems, the government (or the community) controls the means and distribution of production. This is seen by the reds as a moral way of distributing the finite resources we have. But is it really? To do this would be to reduce the human person to a mere machine who's sole purpose is to provide goods or services for others.

Does the commune require all hands on deck to produce food? If it does, then that's what's needed. Never mind if you don't want to produce food and instead wish to provide entertainment for society. These systems do not take into account the personal choices of people and as such, would not lead to human flourishing. It could lead to human survival, but human flourishing? No.

How about things like universal health care? This is one of those "sounds good" ideas. I mean if everyone pitched in for healthcare, it should only be a good thing right? Well, not exactly. I've explored this in a previous post but the government is not the best at handling money. If we give the government money to handle our healthcare, we would expect to see a lot of wastage.

What would inevitably occur in the long run is hospitals would tend to increase their prices instead of lowering them since there's a guarantee of payment from the government. With increased prices, we would expect to see higher tax rates and we'd tend to have less money for other expenses we may have.

The reds brand socialism and communism as this moral way of handling state affairs. These systems actually undermine our own choice and as such are not moral. I can see how some people could see the appeal but I for one am not having any part of it. And I do think, neither should you.

Did Pope Francis change Church Teaching again?

Spoiler alert! No. No, he didn't. This Mirror article, however, will have you believe otherwise. See the link below.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/pope-francis-anyone-who-discards-14430539

I've mentioned this in a previous post of mine where I talked more in depth about the Church's teaching on homosexuality. Every time this article mentions church teaching, they actually get church teaching wrong.

It's very much apparent that the writer of this article cares so little about the accuracy of their article when it comes to the church's teaching on homosexuality. It seems that they've painted a caricature of all Christians as people who believe that the gays are less of people than the rest of us. It's quite disheartening as the Catholic position on this is very easy to find and upon comparison with Pope Francis' statement, there's not much argument there.

This is another one of those journalists who are trying to inject a certain narrative into their story oh so very subtly. The Church has always held the dignity of every human person, no matter what they may feel or believe. The Church also defends truth and rejects lies. So when the pope says we need to have compassion for the people in the LGBT community, of course we should! This has been known since day 1! What the Church doesn't do is say that homosexual acts are okay.

The article closes by saying that gone are the days when the church says "You are intrinsically disordered." but I'd challenge the author to point to a time when the church taught this at all! What the church teaches is that "Homosexual ACTS are intrinsically disordered." The humans still have their dignity and that's something no one can take away.

I find it curious the author mentions a quote from the Pope and does't understand what he's trying to say. The pope says that we are all too fixated on the adjective (gay) and we forget the noun (man). That means we derive our dignity from our being human, not from being gay, straight, black, white or Asian. And this has always been church teaching. There's nothing new here. Just some journalist who thought they stumbled upon something new.

The Joys of Writing

I started this blog many years ago and I've been writing on and off. It was once the case that I wrote for other people and that just depressed me. I didn't have readers. The ones that did read would just comment on my typos. I wasn't so encouraging.

Lately, however, I've had a change of heart. These days I still don't have that many readers but it doesn't matter to me any more. I write because it's therapeutic. I write about issues when they interest me. An unexpected use that I derived from this blog is that when a friend of mine expresses an opinion that opposes my own, I simply send them the link to my blog and viola! I've started a discussion with a friend.

I have actually mad a friend through this blog. We had disagreed on abortion and started a comment war on Facebook - you know, the ones that don't go anywhere? I decided to stop there and sent him a link where I more freely expressed my opinion on the matter and we had a few more back and forths. I think the best thing I got from that interaction was a new friend.

Right now, most of my posts go several days with just two or three views. But that doesn't matter. I write because it allows to me to arrange my thoughts. I write because it allows to me to leave behind something that might help someone think through issues in the future. I write because it makes me happy.

I won't lie though, I get a thrill when I see that a certain post gets more page views than usual. Considering I gave up on using photos on my posts, it gives me some pride knowing that some people do read my stuff. One of friends who I mean on average five times a year has told me that he regularly reads my blog. I'm not gonna lie - those times make me feel like a rock star. And then it just sparks a conversation and discussion - this is what excites me.

I think I should put myself out there more. I've got a lot of material which I believe can start discussions and conversations for issues and news bits. It might be nice to have more readers.

But whether I have 100 or 1 (my biggest fan, my fiancee) views on a post, it won't matter. I'll continue to write.

Hmmmm. I guess I chose the write title for this blog after all. It truly is just my own personal online journal.