Yes, I am Pro RH because I am Pro-poor

We just moved to our new apartment after almost a couple months being holed up at Best Western Hotel and I just got my internet back.  I would have written more entries in the last couple months if only I got time and space to write everything down.  Today, I got both so here I go.

I am writing about the RH bill and the reasons why I am supporting it.  If you are able to read this blog entry at all, I assume you already have made a choice--you either support it or you don't.  Let me be the first to tell you that you don't have to read this to be informed.  The fact that you are reading this right now online I reckon means that you have access to the information you need on reproductive health, family planning and sex education.  If you say you don't, then your ignorance is your own fault altogether.

Let me start by saying that the RH Bill is not for you and I.  You are reading this entry, you are reading this online.  I assume you are educated.  Therefore this is not for you.  The RH Bill is for the millions of Filipinos who are poor, those without access to the right information on reproductive health and family planning, those who cannot read this entry just because they don't have access or they don't know how to turn on the computer and much less use it to be informed.  The RH Bill is for the poor and the poorly educated, not you and I.

Families and couples have the right to choose how large they would want their families to be. It is mostly subject to the availability of funds.  Yes, a big family is fun.  You have a lot of hands to help around the house, farm or business. You have a lot of support in times of crisis.  You will not run out of playmates and nannies to watch over the kids.  You have more people to help you with work, with projects, with assignments.  But common sense also dictates that having more people to support entails that you have to have enough resources to support them: basic necessities, education, healthcare, etc.  All of those things will put a strain on your resources unless you are enviably wealthy. A couple with a college degree for example with a combined income of thirty thousand a month would probably be able to support one child quite comfortably.  But even they would fall below poverty line if they have five or six children.  How much more a lavandera and a tricycle driver with the same number of kids? Or a saleslady and a security guard? Which is why I am saying that the RH Bill is not for you and I, the somehow okay people.  People who can get by.  This is for the poor.  When a lavandera comes to the government for help because she can no longer support the number of children she has, it is only rightful for the state to help her.  How? One way is to educate her on alternative methods of contraception.  Education is still the best way to set our people free from the chains of poverty.

The Philippines is the 12th most populous nation in the world. Now there would be studies claiming either population is or isn't what makes a country rich or poor.  I just find it so contradictory to common sense whichever says that a huge population doesn't equate to poverty.  We have a hundred million people cramped like sardines in a tiny piece of land in the Pacific ocean.  We have one-third the entire US population and one-tenth the entire Chinese population in a land of dwindling resources.  Note though, that China and the US are the third and fourth largest countries in the world respectively.  The Philippines has a hundred million mouths to feed three times a day. A hundred million mouths requiring sustenance and support pushing our land and resources to the brink of total devastation.  Add to that the fact that we are at the center of climate change with massive storms claiming lives, livestock and grain every so often.  How much more can our fragile land of diminishing resources take before we have a land left barren and unable to provide food, water and basic necessities?

Overpopulation, they say, is not the problem.  It is the corruption in the government, inequality in the distribution of  wealth and greed of the rich. They say that if they get these resolved first, then poverty will be eradicated. Yes, I admit they are problems. They are very serious problems indeed. I hope I don't sound so cocky and condescending but not even Jesus Himself, when He still walked the earth, was able to eradicate them.  Yes, they have to be addressed but as they are so deeply rooted on our beings, on our culture, on our society, they won't be resolved in a year or even ten.  That is a fact. We can stem them little by little but we can never eradicate them completely.  That, too, is a fact.

The barrage of anti-RH bill supporters finding all that is wrong and evil about contraception is now overwhelming.  They have researched thoroughly all the studies pointing to the relationship of contraception and cancer and diabetes and whatever there is they can find.  I would like to thank them for that.  Because if the RH Bill is passed into law, their information would be vital for couples to choose which one they would use, if they indeed decide to, based on their pros and cons.  I just hope that they stop implying that with the government supplying people with their chosen contraceptive, they are in effect giving them cancer. That is just so f****d up, pardon my French.

I am thinking of probably writing a second part for this entry as this is getting too long and long blog entries bore people.  Let me just explain one more thing before I finish this.  The issue of the being pro-RH or anti-RH is not just as simple as being left or right, black or white, up or down.  It is not even just about the degradation or preservation of our nation's morality.  Nor is it just about correct or incorrect management of the country.  It is more about choice.  It is all about choice.  If you think that using contraceptives is immoral and sinful, then don't use it.  If you think that it's a blessing to have many children in your family, then go ahead.  It's your choice, it's your right and it shall be rightfully respected.

However, if a couple decides they cannot support any more and they choose to use contraceptives. Respect their choice, too.  If they cannot afford to do so and asks the government for help, it should be the government's responsibility to look after them.  If you say, "but they are using my taxes to pay for their contraceptives", shall I assume that not only are you anti-freedom but also anti-poor?  Just a question to ponder.