CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY (MindaNews / 15 Feb) – While driving down the steep highway in Civuleg, at the foothills of Mt. Balatucan, the radio DJ blurted out: Love and Hate Collide by De Fleppard. My late kumpare Longskie would have grimaced in disdain.
“You could have a change of heart if you would only change your mind…
… When divided we stand baby united we fall.”
Valentines is just over, but listening to this Def Fleppard Obra, made me ask whether this trite love-themed mellow rock speaks of the cognitive dissonance this country is now facing.
In one of his campaign spiels promoting the presidential candidacy of Vice President Leni Gerona Robredo, Mayor Oca Moreno said he is aware of a very popular candidate, but he doubts whether this candidate can lead the country to a better and peaceful tomorrow. This candidate is a scion of a dictator and yes, an inglorious past. Mayor Oca is worried that should this candidate win, the country may be divided between those who love them and those who hate them.
Clearly, the veteran politician does not believe in the calls of this candidate for unity, for moving on without accountability and justice.
If surveys are to be believed, this country is in a serious state of cognitive dissonance. While people hate corruption in government, they continue to support a person who has lied his way to power and fame with fake college diploma; gets away with tax evasion and peddles untruth not in small way but in a systematic and massive campaign to revise history and overpopulate social media with fake news, hate and other inanities.
Cognitive dissonance occurs when a person’s beliefs and behavior does not align. Example is the mindless belief to a son of a dictator, a tax-evader, an inveterate liar – who despite statements from his supposed alumni that he did not finish his studies – he still lies through his teeth of having a diploma from the prestigious Oxford University.
On the other hand, studies also indicate that on top of the dislikes of people from their politicians is corruption: kawat, pamakak, pangilad.
The principle that homo sapiens are on top of the food chain, the alpha species because of their ability to be rationale may need some very serious review.
Problem with behavior and belief is that these cannot be challenged purely based on facts and logic.
Some 10 years ago, I was on an adventure – many thought a death wish – in one of most authoritarian regimes and a near failed state, Myanmar or Burma. I lived for one year with a Muslim from Iryan Jaya (Indonesian side of Papua New Guinea) and a Kachin Christian (Kachin is the northernmost state of the Federation of Myanmar). We lived in a state where Buddhism is the state religion.
As peace advocates, we were trained on intercultural relations and tolerance. Hardin, a Papuan activist, taught me that we cannot debate with beliefs – like religion. And that perhaps made us survive our stay inside the Tatmadaw regimes. He was right.
Behavior? There are theories of behavior change communication and social marketing, and this is still mainly based on positive reinforcement – rewarding socially beneficial behavior to redesigning how people do their routines with engineering and other solutions. The habit of hand washing, for example, can be reinforced by placing hand washing basins in front of building entrances. In one experiment, the problem of airport workers demanding unreasonable tips from passengers was solved by removing pockets in their uniforms. Transparent tables have also been thought to discourage under the table deals, so on and so forth.
The widespread cognitive dissonance of Filipinos in the run up of the election is indubitably hard to hurdle.
A decade of trying to revise history, demonization of the professional media and exploitation of the absence of verification and vetting in social media by this disgraced family who stole billions may have been mission accomplished.
That explains the popularity of the butcher’s scion. A man who built his credentials on falsities may yet become the next president.
The country is in a precarious situation. But we cannot just throw the towel yet. We cannot allow this state of cognitive dissonance, a psychological disorder to result in a country literally gone crazy.
The woke middle class, the so-called silent majority, needs to do major remolding from just using the tsinelas, for example, as symbol of being one with the poor, to walking in that tsinelas to feel how hard it is to be poor, how cruel life is in the laylayan of our society.
Radical love, I believe is the magic pill to turn the tide of this mass insanity. The tide can still be turned around if volunteer-driven campaigns would at least equal the mainstream, traditional election campaign and when the woke portion of our society engage the masses in tolerant, persuasive conversations, in military-like cadence.
So, in 3-2-1 commence LIGAWAN!
(MindaViews is the opinion section of MindaNews. BenCyrus G. Ellorin is a former journalist and former consultant of the City Government of Cagayan de Oro. He is now chair of the advocacy group and think tank Pinoy Aksyon for Governance and the Environment / Pinoy Aksyon. FB: @NoypiAksyon; Twitter: @Paksyon.)
