Starting them young

It is never too early to start familiarizing children with books,” said Vivian French, British writer of children’s picture books, in one of her articles in the British daily The Guardian, on Oct. 4, 2003. She wrote her article, “Start them young,” to promote children’s love for reading books. She exhorted parents to orient their children, even as early as over two months old, to benefit from reading or develop a love for reading books.

Like all other values, the love for reading can be inculcated among very young children, even as early as infancy.

Unfortunately, undesirable values are also learned early in life, when young children are exposed to violence in their own households when they live with abusive older members of the family who hurt them for slight transgressions of household rules. Exposure to environments where dishonesty, violence, and misogyny are normalized at the household level and in the wider community, in schools, and at the national leadership can also imbue children with ideas that all these undesirable behaviors are “normal” and are needed to become successful or powerful in the future.

Yesterday was election day for new sets of Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) and barangay officials. We would have thought that these “simple” barangay and SK elections would just go on, quite peacefully, and uneventfully.

But this is the Philippines, where electoral exercises are known to generate a lot of tensions, even bloodshed. It does not matter that the electoral posts are quite “insignificant,” as barangay offices are perceived to be—at least during my youth when officials at this level were appointed and did not receive a regular salary. I remember my father being the barangay “captain” for three terms, and his endless complaints of this “thankless and pay-less job.” He finally told the mayor of the town he would no longer serve as captain for the fourth time, invoking his failing health and other reasons. Nobody envied him and no one coveted his post either.

When barangays were considered quite important as the smallest units of government, and got regular shares of the Internal Revenue Allotment of the municipality or city, barangay elections became as hotly contested as the municipal, regional, and national political exercises.

In the Bangsamoro region, as early as two weeks before barangay elections were held, several casualties were already recorded in Lanao del Sur and in Cotabato City. In the latter case, a candidate for the SK elections was reportedly killed after his supporters took down his tarpaulin displayed in areas not legally designated for campaign posters.

Yesterday morning, as polls opened for voters in a barangay in Datu Odin Sinsuat municipality, in the province of Maguindanao del Norte, two people were killed and four others injured after being fired at just in front of an elementary school a few hours before the polls opened.

But these are just a few electoral-related killings the region has seen over the years, even with a peace accord in place, and a new Bangsamoro government taking over the reins of the regional political leadership.

Many young people in the autonomous region, and elsewhere in the country, have also accepted violence and irregularities in every electoral exercise as “normal,” proof that these have been inculcated in them early in their lives. Seeing these as “normal” also pushes them to resort to another undesirable value—using the very same instruments of violence that older people use, like guns. Together with the ownership of guns is the propensity for coercive behavior or bullying.

Dishonesty and bullying behavior have also become distorted norms within government offices. Children hear news about government officials’ corrupt practices and bullying behavior from both mainstream and social media. No less than the Department of Education secretary and her father, who used to be our president, have shown these recently, in the hearings on confidential funds. In the case of the former president, his threat to kill a member of the House of Representatives is a blatant expression of his violent and bullying behavior.

Some young politicians at the SK level are already being groomed for this kind of “normalized” values in their political futures. Indeed, it is never too early to instill the “lucrative” values of corruption and violence in later life. Start them young!

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