Love the… what?
Last week, we were treated to (tortured by?) a new tourism slogan, plus a companion video that used stock footage from other countries.
“Love the Philippines.”
Few defended the new slogan; most groaned at the millions of taxpayer pesos that had already been spent to create it.
Perhaps it would be useful to first explore what a tourism campaign is meant to do. In general, such campaigns show off an image of the country, which should cover the country’s culture, heritage, future, and a snapshot of its present.
That’s why “Malaysia, Truly Asia” works: Malaysia is home to multiple groups from Asia, which manifest themselves in the country’s language and architecture. Or “Incredible India”: Tourists do get overwhelmed by the country’s multiple colors, smells, and flavors.Even countries that order people to do something invite tourists to be active participants in travel: “Imagine Your Korea,” “Choose Your Memories” (Turkiye), “Live Your Dream” (Czech Republic).
There are some outliers: “Fill Your Heart with Ireland,” “Treasure Italy,” and Brazil’s “Visit and Love Us.” They still imply active traveling because there is already existing infrastructure to support the statement (Italy really is filled with treasures) or because the traveler has to first visit before any action can be expected (go to Brazil first and love the country, go to Ireland first and then fill your heart).“Love the Philippines”? There is neither infrastructure that encourages tourist safety, nor an action that the tourist can take before they are expected to feel anything. They are simply told to love a country that they might know nothing about.
“Love the Philippines” is a sentence that demands a kind of love that is reckless and blind, fervent and silly. It seems to force a tourist (and locals) to overlook the poorly designed public transportation, cities that lack zoning, malls that replace what should be artifacts of a rich culture.
It is as bad as a campaign for the Light Rail Transit, where, instead of the management acknowledging that it must be fixed, orders people to start their sentences with “Thank you, LRT … ” (The rational end to that, given how things are, is “thank you, LRT, for making my life a living Hell, so maybe my Afterlife won’t be as bad if I have to put up with you every day”).
The concept of disregarding truths came up last week at Ateneo’s graduation, when class valedictorian, political science major TJ Alcantara, spoke candidly of how tired he was—how tired we all were, and yet how we should not forget that even in tiredness, we are called to great love. But, even then, he said, we could not truly love unless we, too, accepted our weaknesses and worked toward strengthening ourselves.
It is this deep tiredness that is manifest in all Filipinos now: It is a fatigue of having to deal with a pandemic whose tentacles have penetrated the economy, job market, and future.
It is a fatigue of uncertainty. Many of us are tired of being made to hope for great things, only to be disappointed.
We once hoped for a future of good jobs, a stronger economy, a safer country; in the academe, we were excited to teach new cohorts of students supposedly schooled in a more practical curriculum.
Then the pandemic came, and we were treated to a government that could barely function outside of merely handing down orders and demanding obedience despite having no support mechanisms for doctors, nurses, and wageworkers.
As the pandemic closed, we hoped that we could have a government built on a brand of radical love, where citizens were active participants in their own progress. And then the votes turned in favor of outlandish promises, history unacknowledged, propaganda.
People are tired.
The last thing we need is to be ordered to do something while being asked to overlook the ills of a broken country.
Veteran journalist Howie Severino suggested adding a comma, as though it were a closing salutation to a letter. “Love, The Philippines.”
This actually works. It encapsulates this fatigue of a country giving up on itself, describes so well a country pleading to be understood.
Hello, world. We messed up again. Visit us, maybe?
“Love, the Philippines.”
Well, it’s not really a campaign. It’s more like a letter to ourselves, to remind ourselves to change before we open our gates to the rest of humanity.
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