New morality is unacceptable
I am told that the corps of promoters/protectors of the image of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte is given the label "troll."Is this information correct considering that the "troll" I knew was a kind of doll my children played years ago and that doll had a menacing appearance? In any case, President Duterte's "trolls" emerged during the campaign in the 2016 elections initially as benign endorsers of the then Davao City mayor and evolved into relentless and vituperative bashers against those who dared to say anything against their idol. These people seem to have pursued their role beyond the elections as they are observed to be still very active in the social media. Each time someone criticizes the president, the "trolls" literally pounce on him with what many other persons consider to be indignities.
With that context in mind, and because what we had was a discussion done face to face and not conducted through the internet, I did not consider as a "troll" someone who talked to me on my article on the supposed admission by House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez that he keeps a girlfriend. This gentleman actually worked briefly in Malacañang in the early days of the administration of President Duterte.He did not tell me why he left the Palace.
New morality.This was the term I heard from this former Malacañang guy. According to him, we just have come to accept that our high government officials keep mistresses. His explanation was that if the great leaders of the past were irresistibly attractive to the opposite sex, the modern women are no different for they too always fall for the charm of strong pillars of society. There is, to him, mighty leaders possess a kind of lure to women.
In our conversation, he used "new morality" because, in fairness to him, he acknowledged morality, in its true sense, being the one referred to by the constitutional mandate that marriage is an inviolable social institution. Theoretically, the ideal is a married leader being faithful to the spouse. Infidelity is basically wrong and it is something we should not and cannot be proud of. Otherwise put, committing an unfaithful act is shameful such that it should not be flaunted.
But, society, according to him, accepts the philandering by our officials as a new norm. This man I talked with posits that we, in modern times, tend to look the other way each time a leader tags to a public function, somebody believed to be an extra-marital partner. We no longer feel scandalized. Why, we even burst into an approving laughter when the president seemed to suggest that it is okay for such a male leader as the speaker to be a womanizer because women are a source of "kaligayahan."
To react to this ex-Malacañang-placed official, I could not help but draw from my personal conviction. I do not believe his "new morality" concept. Conceding that all of us are frail and at times fall to the tug of fleeting emotions, I still contend that a vast majority of our people would rather have a leader that can demonstrate strength of character. That is unchanging morality. There is no "new" version of it. Because remaining faithful to the spouse is, without doubt, the highest exemplar of virtuous character, many of us believe that we need to fill positions in the government with men and women imbued with fidelity. If, at all, officials cannot resist the call of the flesh, then, at least, they should keep their humiliating acts hidden from the public view.
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