How The Culture Of Littering Also Helped In The Philippines' Degradation

It's been a week or so since Boracay was reopened last October 26, 2018. I was reminded of my trip there last 2012 and I didn't enjoy it aside from a lot of stuff being too pricey there -- it was also how Boracay was now a cesspool. The sand wasn't as white as I expected and not to mention -- a lot of the LOCAL tourists were throwing their garbage left and right instead of throwing them at the proper place. The culture of littering has been prevalent not just during the Aquino Years but even before it. I remembered living and growing up in the Philippines as a natural-born Filipino citizen during the Cory Years, the Ramos Years, the Estrada years and the Gloria years and the problem is the culture of littering -- I don't even need to wait until the next Earth Hour which unfortunately isn't really Earth hour if they can't even clean up their mess to start with!

I could take myself back to the past when I was still below the teenage years. It's really stupid how people just love to throw their garbage just anywhere. Worse, I was told that if I liked to throw my garbage to the proper place then I should just "return home to China" -- which is impossible because I have no Chinese citizenship either! Is picking up one's garbage and throwing it in the trash can making one less Filipino or an act of being anti-Filipino? Instead, the habit of throwing up one's garbage where it should belong is not anti-Filipino -- in fact it's very pro-Filipino. Besides, making people pay a certain fine for littering isn't even harsh at all. It's all about discouraging littering because of the consequences it brings.

The start of the degradation starts with how improperly disposed garbage is a huge invitation to disease carriers such as rats, mosquitoes and flies to party in that place. Rats are known to bring in rabies and leptospirosis. Flies bring in various diseases as they lay their eggs on rotting stuff where they can breed maggots. Can you imagine of these rats and flies went anywhere and contaminated food and water with them roaming around? I can't imagine how many more diseases are brought in such as malaria and dengue fever would be next. Still think that throwing your garbage anywhere doesn't harm anyone?

Did you know throwing of garbage also leads to floods? How does that happen? It doesn't require an expert engineer to figure it out. You can have all the garbage getting stuck in the sewage system. Little by little the garbage accumulates until it becomes one huge blockage that would prevent the waste water from passing where it's supposed to pass. If the waste water doesn't pass through where they are supposed to pass (ex. the pipelines that lead to waste water treatment plants) then you can expect it to pile up causing floods. It's just like a toilet bowl. Why is it that public places like restaurants always tell people not to flush anything into the toilet bowl? It's because the toilet bowl would get stuck and it won't flush. The same is true about the sewage system when garbage enters into their system.

Not to mention, you can talk about how once pristine nature spots got destroyed. Boracay's degradation is just one example. Now I think about the number of years that the Pasig River was neglected. Who can remember the song "Anak Ng Pasig"? I also think about how repealing the anti-squatting law in the name of "human rights" also led to the degradation. It's because squatters have their culture of littering. I'm just disgusted to think how they use the rivers or oceans near them as their toilets and source of drinking waters hence spreading and recycling said germs. These conditions where people kept littering have caused the nature spots to degrade. Worse, many of these idiots shift the blame to all foreign tourists -- never mind that I've seen some foreign tourists who actually throw their garbage in the proper place. If anyone is to blame then it's people who litter their garbage anywhere whether they are Filipino or foreigner.

It's more than time to be serious about putting strict measures against this culture of littering. My proposal is to actually make people pay from PHP 500.00 (or maybe PHP 1,000.00) for littering. Those guilty of habitual littering should be forced to do some forced community service so they will know how difficult it is to keep picking up garbage that they keep throwing at the wrong places. Just because there are metro aides or street sweepers is no excuse to throw garbage just anywhere. Street sweepers are supposed to help take care of mess beyond people's control but not to make people too lazy and reliant on them. That's why there's the need to teach people to clean up the place on their own because not picking up your own garbage is a sure sign of laziness.