Manny Pacqiao: The Modern Philippine’s National Hero

Everyone has heard of our favorite and most famous boxer, Mr. Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao, what a stupid a.k.a. name though. Isn't being named after an ancient Namco game humiliating? Or does he not realize it? It would be much cooler if he were named something that belongs, or at least fits in with the 21st century.

But I’m not here to criticize his stupid nickname, but here to provide yet another essay, questioning his status here in the Philippines. He is so revered here in the Philippines that when he had a fight against a guy (whose name I can no longer remember) earlier this year, I think, people were flocking to televisions and eagerly (insanely) cheering on their idol in Las Vegas.

Sure, it’s really great that he’d bringing glory and honor to the Philippines, he is, as my title claims, like the new National Hero. It seems that he is greater than those heroes of more than a century ago, who have done much, much, much greater things to the Philippines, like setting it free from the Spaniards, Americans, and Japanese. Although, freeing ourselves from then Spaniards and the Japanese, we got help from the Americans, but that’s not the important part. Our heroes, like Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, or other guys from our monetary system, they are the significant heroes in the Philippines, even if they are long dead.

They initiated, or continued, our fight against our colonists. It is because of them that we are the first country liberated from colonization, in Asia, I mean.

If we talk about the heroes of today, at least we should honor the OFWs a bit more. They’re the ones who are pumping a significant percentage of our dollars into the Philippines. But, no, all the wrong people are the ones receiving honor and grace from our very dear president. Although I doubt that the government has enough money to honor the OFWs the same was she does to Mr. Pacman (and the dude from the Black Eyed Peas, who is totally undeserving as well).

We get honor and glory, in the form of boxing victories of all things. I’m so totally against boxing, so that pretty much adds to my negativity about Mr. Muncher. I remember reading about a proposal of the DepEd to include boxing into school’s curriculum. WTF! That would be a summarized version of what went in my head though. The totally elongated version of it would follow.

Boxing in our school curriculum. I would love to ask the guy who proposed this if he actually thought about what he was proposing. Is he insane? Or is he such a Pacquiao fan that he was totally deluded by Pacman’s shiny little stars floating around him when he fights a match? Probably both. This is certainly not a good was to honor the boxer. He’s a boxer for crying out loud, the image he is feeding to the people of other countries is that, “Sure, we’re a third world country, but at least we can fight well.”

It’s crazy. We have misdirected all this time and energy for no significant, or even valuable purpose. Heck, it’s a totally brutal sport.

Pacquiao is wealthy. He is famous. He gets accusations that he impregnated a woman, or something like that. <>