Some Food for Thought On Filipinos and Our Crab Mentality

Filipinos are generally both very judgmental and very sensitive people. We’re always quick to make comments about things, but then, when someone says something bad about us, we get offended fairly quickly, as well. I think Jad Contreras said it perfectly with this Facebook status of his that has been making the rounds again lately:

The status reads:

Dito lang ata sa Pinas takot ang mga tao i-express sarili nila sa fashion eh. Kase kung susunod ka sa mga uso, kukutyain ka ng This Crappy Generation, iistarter pack ka. Tas pag di ka naman sumunod, people will label you as a weirdo. San ka nalang lulugar? Hahaha. Sa ibang bansa, kahit gaano ka-weird pormahan mo, walang paki-alamanan, walang basagan ng trip unless of course kung pino-prohibit ng dominant religion ng bansang ‘yon. Eh dito, kailangan talaga hahatakin ka pababa.

Then it hit me. Yung crab mentality ng mga Pinoy, macro to micro. Large scale to small scale.

Ano na, peenoise?

Sadly, all of this is true. Do you think this kind of crab mentality is sort of ingrained into our culture? What do you think we can do to get rid of this type of mentality?