Filipinos' lack of individualism

Monday, 05 July 2010 11:36 PM Iya Justimbaste

One of the most hilarious yet troubling statements I heard during the campaign was a statement from a friend on why he was rooting for Noynoy Aquino in the May elections. He told me that his reason had something to do with his whole family supporting the said candidate. He even tried to defend his views by inventing a correlation between the number of cars in his village that have those yellow ribbon stickers on them and the validity of his reason. And so, I asked him about his personal views, beliefs and principles and with great boldness, he attributed these to the kind of thinking his family has.

Many Filipinos—I’m not saying all, have this inclination to follow the norms of the society regardless of how flawed and shallow these norms are. If one would dare say anything that is conflicting to the views of the majority, he or she would be condemned or worse, regarded as someone who is a deviant. This Nazi-like attitude of the Filipinos has often pulled the whole nation down because honestly, what the majority in the Philippines believes in is most likely irrelevant, trivial, and downright stupid.

For me it was the Spanish colonizers who inculcated the belief that leaders should be always obeyed and followed. Hence, the thinking that whatever the leaders do are right and just. The Spanish are long gone from the country but our eagerness to follow the rule is still there making it look like as if we’ve never matured in spite of the centuries that have passed.

It is not rocket science that not everything a leader says and does is right. As children, we are told to obey everything, as in everything, our parents tell us to do. The proliferation of nursing students is one example that many Filipinos notwithstanding the youth just follow what people tell them to do. Can you believe that these millions of nursing students really dreamt of becoming nurses or was it because their parents told them so? They don’t trust their own instincts and they can’t lead or instruct themselves ergo, our difficulty in finding leaders of our nation. Unfortunately, not everyone or very few people in the Philippines have the ability to lead and make a difference.

If there’s one thing aside from the society that is responsible for the lack of individualism in Filipinos, it is the very Filipino family. Many Filipino parents, again, I’m not saying all, expect their children to follow everything they instruct them to do and they leave little room for their children to decide on their own or pursue their own dreams. They influence their children on how to think, act, and behave like the rest of the populace thinking that that is how normal should be and not deciding for themselves. I believe it’s a sad situation for the children for they are deprived of their right to be able to quest and grow.

The thing about “going with the flow” is that it doesn’t foster growth for individuals for they are pressured to act like everybody. There is a pressure for people to think that not going along with the beliefs of the majority is tantamount to being a bad person when in fact, it is normal and right.

An effect of this going with the flow psyche can be proportional to how people pick their candidates. When they discover that there is a preponderance of people who supports a particular candidate, they would think that doing the same will do them good just so they can avoid conflict or being harassed by the majority. This is probably the reason why I have not reinforced the very idea of surveys being shown to the public. The voting population, contrary to what the “triumphalists” think, do not have the aptness to think for themselves. They would choose to be one of the majorities than go against them even if they have better ideas.

Another effect of the Filipinos’ lack of individualism is that it creates an atmosphere of dependence. People depend not on what they should reckon as accurate and appropriate. In fact, it is the other way around. What is appropriate is based on what others’ believe in not on what should be practised. The dependence on others for validation of ideas is dreadfully dangerous for the number of people supporting a particular idea is not identical to the idea being good and logical. Sometimes we have to take in to account that the more people believe in a belief, the more likely the belief is flawed and inconsequent.

The very question that should be raised here is why do people think that the majority is always right? I think the way people conduct themselves when dealing with others of opposing views is the answer to this. Many Filipinos feel bitter when other people do not back up their candidates of views. They don’t encourage individualism because they feel everybody should have the same principles when in fact, being different is just normal. Worse, they act violently and threaten other citizens when they hear of something that a person does not believe in what they think the person should believe. They do not cultivate healthy debates since in most cases, what the many believe in is inferior to that of the few.

Indeed, Alexis De Toqueville captured the reason for the very existence of individualism in this quote:

One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles and to purchase peace at the expense of logic.

Filipinos do not value the importance of logic or being logical since they prefer to keep quiet and go with the ideas of others thus, ignoring the importance of proper beliefs and individualism. Conflicting views shouldn’t be abhorred for it is in this way that we can learn from other people which develops the minds of the Filipinos.

In a country where people are not in to the idea of valuing individualism, it is hard to maintain personal views that oppose the idea of the many. The Philippines, despite being a democratic country fail to value the genuine essence of democracy. People should be free to pursue ideas other than those of the majority. Truth is, Philippine democracy is but a far cry from the democracy that was bestowed on the Americans. They value individualism when we don’t.

The absence or lack of individualism in Filipinos have caused so many problems that include voting for a candidate just because they think the majority supports him even if the candidate is incompetent in many aspects giving birth to a culture of “going with the flow”. Respect does not come in the form of confirming to the beliefs of many people. It is recognizing the differing views of other people.

In times like this, the last thing the country needs is people who are afraid to beg to differ to the "majority".

Ria "Iya" Justimbaste is the co-host of DWBL's Sentro ng Katotohanan which airs every Tuesday and Thursday at8:30-9:30 pm at 1242 KHz. She is a 21 year-old girl who believes that the Filipino Culture is what keeps on impeding the country's progress and that Filipino cultural values are resistant to development. She blogs at http://iya-j.co.nr and writes for http://antipinoy.com.

Photos by author. Some rights reserved.

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GabbyD 06 July 10, 05:49 AM

Marocharim 06 July 10, 04:20 PM

Tocqueville is not an individualist, nor did he "capture the very existence of individualism." Rather, Tocqueville is a *critic* of individualism. Taking the quote within the context of Tocqueville's writing it is precisely against individualism (to be more exact, the crass practice of it that leads to distorted practices of capitalism and aristocracy found in Europe and eventually, in America).

People associate in democracy because there is a need to fulfill mutual ends that the individual alone cannot address, hence the value of social conditions that make cooperation and common industriousness important, when America opened up opportunities beyond the serfdom and fiefdom of the homeland. Yet while that was great - people were "more equal" - mediocrity was more pronounced and gave America a tendency to have values like making more money, amassing more property, getting more power, and so on. Go beyond the quote.

On another note, I think it could be helpful for you to write with deference, respect, and tact when writing (something about the) Truth. Listen to what others have to say because they bear the same weight as your opinions, regardless of how you word them or trumpet them about like gospel. Cultivate healthy debate with a healthy premise: "Nazi-like attitude of the Filipinos?" Seriously, Iya: where are the gas chambers, the concentration camps, the ghettoes, the yellow star on your chest that marks you out to be a waste of Aryan lebensraum? Truth or perspective?

Recognition is *not* respect, Iya. They are different. I recognize the point that you are making; I agree that part of our colonization have brought many negative aspects to our culture. I agree that there is a tendency of people to always defer to the majority opinion, but isn't it also because of the structures in society that keep them from exercising and maximizing that freedom?

For that, Iya, I recognize. Yet I leave respect out the door for the time being; please temper your pen.

John Reyes 06 July 10, 05:22 PM

Hello.

I don't think the author said anything like De Toqueville is for individualism. She just quoted him.

Marcelle Fabie 06 July 10, 06:02 PM

Yes, nation! Because someone who "captures the spirit" of something is absolutely NOT implied to be endorsing that something he "captures the spirit" of!

Chino F 06 July 10, 06:04 PM

When people cooperate in a democracy, pure need does not dictate it. It is the decision of each individual to cooperate. If an individual refuses to cooperate, they are free to do so; they just have to That is why I myself disdain collectivist philosophies.

Nazi-like attitude = do not question the leader, he is god. I agree that there are some attributes the Nazis, or at least the German people of the time, have with Filipinos today.

Just look at the general attitude that Iya's getting to in her article. There's a bad aspect of culture that leads to wrong decisions in Filipino society, and it deserves to be questioned.

Iya Villania 06 July 10, 04:50 PM

^ yeah, what he said

Mara Imperial 06 July 10, 05:40 PM

all the defensive-like comments and attacks only prove how dense you people are.

Bentot 06 July 10, 05:47 PM

How come the vast majority of Filipinos can't stand for their own beliefs? Tipong palagi na lang bandwagon effect ang ginagawa ng karamihan.

For example, one would support Abnoynoy simply because the vast majority of people support Abnoynoy. Ang problema, kapag tinatanong na siya kung bakit niya sinusuportahan si Abnoynoy, it's either sasabihin niya na si Abnoynoy ang sinusuportahan ng karamihan or hahanap siya ng palusot just to divert the topic and escape the idea of answering questions on why he supports Abnoynoy.

Ganyan na ba ka-estupido ang karamihan ng mga Pilipino ngayon? Aba! This bandwagon effect and the lack of a definite INDIVIDUAL stand on things are more than enough proof of how downright STUPID most Filipinos are.

Carlos 06 July 10, 05:53 PM

The very essence of using a quote was to reinforce her idea thus essentially saying that the quote supported the very premise of her article. Just because you dont blatantly say "This quote refers to..." does not mean she is not using it to support her claim. The mere presence of that authors words in an article means she was borrowing his credibility to lend to her claim and premise.

In my opinion, we dont lack individualism, but rather we have an over abundance of it. Using her own example, the reason that kid is voting the way he did was because of his family. His family thinks that this candidate will be GOOD FOR THEM and not the country. the very essence of individualism. Maybe the term individualism should be better scrutinized and better defined. When you subject an entire race/nation under a category make sure you have the correct definition. Individualism may occur not only for the individual but also within the the structure of a society. The socius does not contain only oneself but also extends beyond the self.

ChinoF 06 July 10, 06:15 PM

Or one other idea is that Filipinos carry out ideas the wrong way. They want to be individualistc, they do it the wrong way. They want to be democratic, they do it the wrong way. They want to be "moral," but they do it the wrong way. That's why it's so easy to say that Filipino culture is dysfunctional.

Bentot 06 July 10, 06:46 PM

Unfortunately for this country, everything is being done wrongly by the vast majority of its people. What is even more unfortunate is the fact that these same people have the balls to be even proud of the wrong things that they did.

"Yabang Pinoy" na wala sa lugar, sa madaling sabi.

GabbyD 07 July 10, 01:44 AM

"And so, I asked him about his personal views, beliefs and principles and with great boldness, he attributed these to the kind of thinking his family have."

what kind of thinking does his family have?

its not clear what you want to say. what IS his family's "thinking"?

thonq 07 July 10, 04:03 AM

One recent study [Daniel Etounga-Manguelle in Does Africa Need a Cultural Adjustment Program?] attributed African poverty to a dislike of work, irrationality, excessive conviviality or the propensity to feast that suggests African societies are structured around pleasure, and suppression of individualism.

According to Manguelle, a Camerounian who holds a doctorate in economics and planning from Sarbonne, the African is vertically rooted in his family or in the vital ancestor; horizontally, he's linked to his group, to society, to the cosmos. The fruit of the family-individual, society-individual dynamic, all linked to the universe, the African can only develop and bloom through social and family life.

The suppression of the individual, the cardinal way of ensuring equality in traditional societies, is demonstrated in all areas--not only in economic matters but in cultural matters. The concept of individual responsibility does not exist in their hyper-centralized traditional structures.

Here in the United States, the richest country in the world, individualism and work ethic are central to their culture, as is opposition to hierarchy. In his latest book, the late Samuel Huntington devotes a chapter to this kind of culture that is deeply rooted in religion, of which he writes, "For almost four centuries this culture of the founding settlers has been the central and lasting component of American identity. ." Huntington points to the American Creed, a term popularized by Gunnar Myrdal in his 1994 book, "The American Dilemma." Myrdal spoke of the dignity of "the essential dignity of individual human being (individualism), of the fundamental equality of men, and of certain alienable rights to freedom, justice and opportunity."

The work ethic is a central feature of American culture and from the beginning America's religion has been the religion of work.

This culture has made Americans the most individualistic people in the world. In Geert Hofstede's comparative analysis of 116,00 employees of IBM in thirty-nine countries, for instance, the mean individualism index was 51. Americans, however, were far above the mean, ranking first with an index of 91, followed by Australia, Britain, Canada, the Netherlands, and New Zealand.

Americans believe you should 'make up your mind' and 'do your own thing' rather than allow yourself to be influenced too much by other people and the external flow of events.

This belief in individualism or individual responsibility gave rise to the gospel of success and the concept of the self-made man. The concept of the self-made man came to the fore in the Jacksonian years, Henry Clay first using the phrase in a Senate debate in 1832. Americans, countless opinion surveys have shown, believe that whether or not one succeeds in life depends overwhelmingly on one's own talent and character.

We almost share the same culture and dysfunctionalities with the Africans and Latin Americans.. And, according to the Trasparency International's Corruption Perception Index, many countries in Africa and Latin America are the most corrupt and the poorest countries in the world. That also explains why the Philippines is one of the most corrupt and poorest countries in Asia. We still have the old iberian culture deeply ingrained in every fabric of our society. Our Asian neighbors looked deeper a long time ago into their old cultural beliefs and attitudes that hindered their success and changed them for the betterment of their country.

By the way, I happened to read Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America and Two Essays on America.

One of the earliest usages of the word individualism in English was in the 1840 translation of Tocqueville's second volume of Democracy in America. He used the word in two different but related ways, as a political and social concept. It signifies a political shift from public and communal concerns to private and personal interests. Foremost among these sacred rights, according to Tocqueville, is the universally held American belief in the right of the individual judgment. Americans, he added, regard individual reason as the source of truth and thus each American is considered the best judge of what concerns themselves, society having no claims on the individuals unless their private actions harm the common good.

Isaac Kramnic, Richard Schwartz Professor of Government at Cornell University, said, "If the number of times an individual is cited by politicians, journalists, and scholars is a measure of their influence, Alexis de Tocqueville--not Jefferson, Madison, or Lincoln--is America's public philosopher.
Since 1950s, Tocqueville has been a towering presence in American life. Every president since Eisenhower has quoted Democracy in America. During the Cold War, while the Soviet Union had the German Karl Marx as its official philosopher, America had Tocqueville, the Frenchman who in the nineteenth century saw the democratic future in America."

Regarding Tocqueville's criticism of individualism, let me share you his own account on this one.

Tocqueville was born in 1805 into an aristocratic French family with connections to both the Church and Bourbon monarchy. and spent much of his youth in his family's ancestral chateau at Verneuil in Normandy, not far from the Channel coast.

Anyway, while studying law in Paris and especially during his three years as a junior official at Versailles, Tocqueville embarked on a rigorous regime of study and reading, immersing himself in the works of Machiavelli, Montesquieu, Pascal, Rousseau, and Burke. He learned about the historical development of French and English political institutions, and the emergence of a more liberal polity in England. Some of their ideas would be absorbed by Tocqueville and become forever his own.

Tocqueville's historical and political studies prompted the ambitious and thoughtful young man to try his own at writing, according to his historian.

To make the story short, during that time, he already wrestled with the ideas about democracy, despotism, centralization, localism, freedom, and individualism in the European experience before he went to America.

He, together with his friend Beaumont, arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, on May 9, 1831, and two days after that in New York City. They remained in North America for the next nine and a half months, a total of 271 days in the United States and fifteen in Canada.

Tocqueville singles out two other features of American life--its "spirit of association" and its "spirit of locality"--as fundamental to its success. He's struck by how Americans love to form associations, to join voluntarily in varied private groups to promote public safety, religion, and morality, or encourage commerce, industry, science, and culture. This predisposition, according to him, is necessary against the tyranny of the majority. America's voluntary associations are people-made, democratic substitutes for the older organic bodies like the nobility and the clergy that mediated between individuals and the state.

The enthusiastic involvement of Americans in private associations and local self-government, according to him, not only checks abuse of power but also helps overcome the excessive individualism of Americans. The transcendence of self is profoundly important for Tocqueville, who is fascinated by and worried about the individualism he sees rampant in America, an individualism at the core of all its attitudes, values, customs, manners, and fundamental feelings, all of which Tocqueville finds even more important than institutional arrangements in explaining America to his fellow Frenchmen.

.

thonq 07 July 10, 06:50 AM

By the way, Tocqueville is an individualist. Although he criticized America's excessive individualism, he was an individualist already even before he reached adulthood.

As a boy, Tocqueville was tutored at home by an elderly priest who had also been his father's tutor. At fifteen he was enrolled at lycee in Mertz, and he did well at school, winning the first prize in rhetoric. Years later he would link his three years at school in Mertz with the beginnings of his religious doubt. Reading the French philosophers of the enlightenment in his father's library ended once and for all any religious certainty he had, though he never went as far as disbelief.

During his time in Paris, Tocqueville had numerous romantic liaisons, falling in love with a sprightly bourgeois girl with whom he carried on a five- year affair his parents put an end to it. Soon afterwards, in 1826, he began a relationship with Mary Motley, a middle-class Englishwoman, nine years older than Tocqueville and employed as a governess in Paris. Against the wishes of his parents, the couple became engaged in 1828 and were married in 1835. That's how individualistic Tocqueville was.

This passage is again culled directly from his book that showed his strong individualism.

In 1826, at the age of twenty-one, Tocqueville wrote more than 350 pages of observation on a trip to Sicily, all but seventeen pages of which have been lost. Two years later he wrote an essay on English history, to which he would return in later years. But, more importantly, these years of study and historical reflection helped shape Tocqueville's political attitudes, freeing him from the unquestioning royalism of his father.
.
On July 29, 1830, barricades were erected in Paris behind which mobs defied the army and the police, all in response to Charles' edicts of the previous day dissolving the Chamber of Deputies, implementing censorship of the press and changing the suffrage to reduce the voting power of bankers, merchants and industrialists while limiting the vote to the aristocracy. Fearing the fate of his brother, Louis XVI, Charles abdicated and fled to Britain. While Parisian students and workers wanted to declare a democratic republic, the bourgeoisie insisted on retaining a constitutional monarchy, albeit one that was somewhat liberalized. The impasse was ended by the aging Marquis de Lafeyette, who proposed as the new king the Duke of Orleans, Louis Philippe, arelative of the Bourbons who as a young man had fought in the Republican Army.

Tocqueville never admired Louis-Philippe. But what really turned him against the "citizen king" was his retinue of bourgeois sponsors, upstart new men of commerce and money with their middle-class predilection for comfort and mediocrity.

Louis-Philippe's "July" monarchy set off a train of events that led ultimately a monumental trip to America. It began with the crisis over whether Tocqueville would take oath allegiance to the "citizen king," required of all judicial officers in the state's service. He knew that his parents, deeply allied to the Bourbon case, had refused to take the oath, and would consider him a traitor to their class if he were to do so. And, in August 1830, he swore allegiance to Louis-Philippe's bourgeois monarchy, consoling himself that it was at least a constitutional regime pledged both to preserve order and to protect individual rights. Tocqueville is an epitome of an individualistic person which is why he embarked on a nine-month journey to America. He was driven by ambition and and the desire for literary and political fame. Determined to make his mark in the world, Tocqueville himself recognized "everyday that I have a need to be foremost which will be the cruel torment of my life." He deserved to succeed because he was convinced of his own intellectual superiority. "All about one" he once wrote, "I see people who reason badly and who speak well; that continually throws me into despair. It seems to be that I am above them."

There are still innumerable circumstances that showed Tocqueville's strong individualism but I disgress.

Our suppression of individualism and our amoral familism (with apologies to Edward Banfield) are just two of the most common traditional cultural values and attitudes that make us what we are: a perennial loser. We will always be "The Sick Man of Asia" if we don't change our culture. Having been here in the United States for many years now made me realize how backward our country is and I don't even entertain now of living there anymore.

sparks 07 July 10, 11:16 AM

And yet it is the same Eurocentric social science that tries to explain the success of Asian countries founded on hierarchy, filial piety and the family-like way they organize their corporations (keiretsu, chaebol) and the family-like way the state engages non-state actors.

For the Japanese, the South Koreans, the Chinese and some other Asian countries 'familism' works.

Ano ba talaga kuya?

Marco M. 07 July 10, 03:16 PM

sparks, it's because the chinese, the japanese etc. etc have better values than filipinos. don't you just get it?

thonq 07 July 10, 06:41 PM

Just a piece of advice, Sparks. Please fill up your rusty and dormant gray matter with some relevant information before I engage you in a lengthy debate because I don't want to waste my time with your utterly stupid question. And don't be a pseudo-intellectual obscurantist if you really want to be enlightened.

Oh, by the way, I just want you to know that the adult human brain weighs about three pounds and contains about a hundred billion brain cells (neurons) with a million billion connections (synapses) linking those neurons to each other. And, according to world renowned neuroscientist, Dr. Richars Restak, experimental evidence showed that as we study and learn new things, better connections are formed, and more of the chemicals bridging the gaps between neurons are released. Continued use strengthens the connections, and thus learning is reinforced. The Scientific American magazine reported that "pathways that are often activated together are strengthened in some ways." So it's important for you to read more and learn new things everyday so you will not ask stupid question again.

For the start, please read the books of Samuel Huntington, Lawrence Harrison, Robert Putnam, Lucian Pye, David Landes, Francis Fukuyama, Jeffrey Sachs, Martin Seymour Lipset, Gunner Myrdal, Thomas Sowell, among others. They''re "the best and brightest" social scientists and political scientists of Harvard.

Lemme lecture you, boy!

The main reason of the success of the Japanese, South Koreans, Chinese and other Asian countries is because of the ethical code of Confucianism (it is ethical code, not religion) which is similar to the Anglo-Protestantism culture of the United States. Philippines, on the other hand, is of Ibero-Catholic culture that emphasizes on cycle of sins, confessions, absolutions, renewed sins, forgiveness and afterlife which contrasts to the unrelenting Protestant insistence on daily good deeds, work, diligence, persistence and achievement.

Confucianism, Judaism and Protestantism (once again, Confucianism is not a religion but an ethical code) are three "religions" whose value systems are classified by Harrison and Grondona as progress-prone or progressive culture in contrast to the static or progress-resistant culture of the Philippines and Latin America. All three promote the ideas/values of achievement, destiny, education, diligence/work ethic, merit, saving, and social responsibility, although in different degrees. And those values tend to persist even in the face of secularization, as the Nordic countries demonstrate. That explains why Asian countries with Confucian culture succeeded inspite of their "familism." However, according to the Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index, some Asian countries (e.g., China and South Korea) are also the most corrupt countries because of their "amoral familism" or strong family ties and limited radius of identifications.

But that's not the only reason why they succeeded.

Are you familiar with the history of China and the biography of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, boy?

China, the largest Confucian country, remains a one-party dictatorship, lacking in political legitimacy and sustained its power largely through the success of its economic policies: liberalizing markets, encouraging foreign investments, and maintaining stability, policies normally associated with the capitalism that was once its despised enemy.(Our country's seriously flawed constitution, on the other hand, still consists of protectionist clauses that the Oligarchs favor instead of economic liberalization that will entice foreign investors to invest in our country and generate jobs to our countrymen). It's the culture and economy, stupid!

Lemme lecture you more, boy!

Let's go back again to China. (Remember, boy, don't just focus on the culture. Pay attention also to their leadership, economic behavior, role of the elites, religion, and many others).

This time, let's hear it from Harvard sinologist, Tu Weiming, on why China succeeded. He describes the crucial 1976 turning point--"the revival of Confucian humanism."

According to Weiming, Deng's realistic pragmatism, sharply contrasting with Mao's revolutionary romanticism, recognized the necessity of the market economy for China's modernization. The marketplace of ideas, indirectly brought about by economic liberalization, was an unintended consequence of the "reform and opening" policy, but it was welcomed by the intellectuals (remember what I told you, boy? the role of elites matter too).

In short, it was a thorough dismissal of Maoist radicalism in favor of a moderate, gradual, stable, and sustained program of development. Historically, what Deng Xiaoping advocated was a definitive departure from the dominant ideology of the PRC and a significant return to traditional culture, specifically, Confucian, norms.

What Tu describes is the revival of the Confucian traditions, emphasis on education, achievement, and merit prominently among them, that contributed so much to China's earlier progress--at least comparable to that of Europe until the nineteenth century. Mao attempted, unsuccessfully, to suppress the traditions. The Chinese renaissance is a blend of Confucian and Western values that may lead to what was once considered an oxymoron: Confucian democracy.

Want some lecture, boy?

Let's go now to Singapore. You know the reasons of their success? It's the culture, leadership and economy, stupid!

Three factors were attributed to Singapore's success:

1. Singapore got a head start in attracting foreign investments, the key to its economic success, at a time when some of its regional competitors--China, the Indochinese countries, and India--were hostile to foreign investment, and Indonesia, awash in oil revenues, did not seek it.

2.the integrity and sense of public responsibility of [Lee Kwan Yew's] leadership.

3. the Confucian values placed on education, merit, work, frugality, and the family. (the intensity and pressure parents place on children for educational achievements is comparable to that of Japan and Taiwan).

Lee Kuan Yew is the architect of the economic and social miracle that has propelled Singapore's transformation starting in 1965, when Singapore separated from Malaysia to become an independent country.

I wish I could lecture you more on the Latin America culture that resembles our own damaged culture but I don't want to waste my time with you anymore.

Don't ever ask me any stupid question again, Sparks, if you don't want me to humiliate and clobber you. Please read up first on the things that you don't know and please fill up your brains with loads of information and use your analysis and critical thinking.

n_dado 07 July 10, 11:25 PM

Hi Thong

We do agree to disagree but please refrain from name calling and go straight to the argument. That's the reason we have a comment box to clarify matters.

Thank you.

Noemi

GabbyD 08 July 10, 12:09 AM

"The main reason of the success of the Japanese, South Koreans, Chinese and other Asian countries is because of the ethical code of Confucianism"

maybe. question is, how do you prove it?

Birdbrain-Dodo 17 July 10, 08:44 AM

GabbyDodo can't see it because he is so dim-witted.

Hey idiot Dodo...

READ THIS:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,923424,00.html

I Don't Get It 08 July 10, 11:02 PM

"Please fill up your rusty and dormant gray matter with some relevant information before I engage you in a lengthy debate because I don't want to waste my time with your utterly stupid question."

-Wait. This isn't lengthy and unnecessarily convoluted and didactic enough? Oh dear.

Jojo 07 July 10, 07:11 PM

People should watch Happy Feet, again.

Mumble 07 July 10, 09:07 PM

*pauses Happy Feet*

I agree!

Instead of name-dropping great thinkers (discredited though some of them may be), and going from individualism to Confucianism to explain the success of China, Korea and Japan (which I doubt even knew of Confucianism), we should just watch Happy Feet.

Though of course, if one could not be bothered to watch Happy Feet, one can always be prudent in block quoting, not only the theories and specific statements of these thinkers, but also snippets from these thinkers' lives. Some people may not think it relevant that Tocqueville lost 17 pages from his manuscript on his trip to Sicily. Because losing pages from one's manuscript, really (if you think about it), is not a sign of individualism.

(Could have saved us a lot of trouble if someone just quoted Ayn Rand. She somehow gets her name dragged into these things anyway.)

Yawn.

Mumbleisstupid 17 July 10, 08:48 AM

WHAT THE FAKK are you talking about?!?!?!?!?!?!

You doubt that Japan even knew about Confucianism?!?!?

What a fakking idiot you are!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

READ THIS, you stooopic fakk!!!

http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/japanese-confucianism.html