| 3 Arthropodic Wisdom I wrote BUGS & BYTES partly to
dramatize problems about the kind of education available to the Filipino children in Saudi
Arabia, and some of these early writings quoted heavily from Letters to the Editor pages
of the English newspapers in the Kingdom. But lest you think that BUGS & BYTES
took inspiration from these Letters to the Editor sections, I will only half-admit to
this.
I have to. One cannot stay unaffected by
the bits and pieces of arthropodic wisdom that jump out of these pages to knead the acids
of my Jeddah lunch hours.
As a case in point, consider this recent
wisdom about the controversy surrounding the February 1999 execution of a convicted
rapist:
"… I feel that
Congress should pass a new law requiring every Filipino to register his or her preference
so far as the death penalty is concerned. It will be a simple process, just like filling
up "single" or "married" columns in civil status. This will help
judges render final judgments in cases of heinous crimes."
"If the victim is
pro-death, punishment of the criminal should be lethal injection. If the victim is
pro-life, punishment should be life sentence. This will give criminals also a choice: they
will know whom it is safer to rape or murder."
"If such a law is
there, no one will argue about judgments and there will be no street rallies...."
Romy Parian
Jeddah
Feb. 19, 1999, Arab News
Or consider this other one about the
identity crisis of some confused people:
"Erap should count
his children properly. It was his choice to be their father, not theirs to be his
children...."
Jojo M. De
Guzman
Jeddah
Feb. 27, 1999, Arab News |
