Filipino Joke Culture
The last time you probably heard a good Filipino joke or a funny story was when you were trying to be serious with someone in the Philippine. Filipinos have an uncanny ability to joke about the most serious matters.
I'm talking about the sort of joke that leaves your sides in stitches, your belly aching and your lungs out of breath from laughing.
The sort of Filipino joke that you can't get out of your head for ages, no matter how hard you try, and later on, at the most inappropriate times, when you're in the library working, in the chapel praying, or at the family table eating dinner, you will suddenly recall the fiendish absurdity and stupidity of that joke, and you'll start guffawing your head off to the consternation of your friends and loved ones.
So, if you've ever experienced such a situation, you'll know what I mean when it comes to Filipino jokes.
An inherently cheerful and comedic race, the Filipinos are famous, even notorious, as some circles would say, all throughout the globe for their uncanny ability to turn even the most disheartening situation into an amusing one.
This virtue of perpetual optimism, unique to Filipinos, can be seen as the side effect of several centuries of colonization, of suffering from the torment and degradation of being under foreign rule.
Western oppressors had ventured to kill all semblance of hope for liberation from the Filipino masses, so of course, when the country gained its independence legally in the 1900s, the Filipinos had the last laugh. The joke was on them! The country's declaration of independence was a memorable occasion, one worthy of celebration, thanksgiving, and of course, laughter.
And we have been laughing ever since.
Throughout the ages, the Filipino spirit, although severely hampered and disillusioned by outside forces, proves its resilience time and again through humor, which serves as an outlet, a defense mechanism, a way of coping.
When the economy becomes too distressful, when national politics is teeming with incompetence and underhanded corruption, and when all hope seems lost for the Filipino masses, what do we do? Why, compose Filipino jokes, or Pinoy jokes, of course! (Pinoy is a common word for Filipino.)
Filipinos are experts on self-deprecation, on exposing all the flaws of the system and mocking them for what they really are.
Whole Filipino joke books and annals have been recorded about the ineptitude of our democracy, the inefficiency of our educational system, the social stratification, and the many idiosyncrasies of popular political and entertainment figures.
Filipino joke writers poke fun at how figures of authority express themselves in English, at how shortsighted our economy has become, and at the traffic situation in the metropolis.
Comic writers, such as the nationally notorious Bob Ong, author of "Bakit Baliktad Magbasa ng Libro ang mga Pinoy?" ("Why Do Filipinos Read Books Upside-Down?"), pen entire series that tackle issues of national interest in an intellectual and analytical manner, but slightly tongue in cheek.
Included in this genre is Carlo Vergara's "Zsa Zsa Zaturnnah", a controversial graphic novel that pokes fun at the country's obsession with superheroes such as Wonder Woman and Darna by having the series' protagonist be a flaming homosexual. All in the name of humor, of course.
What's even more perplexing is the fact that the Filipino public has received these humorous volumes, no matter how frank or blatantly subversive, with astounding acclaim!
Friends and acquaintances send each other political Filipino jokes through text messages, while eagerly anticipating the next installment to Bob Ong's books or Pol Medina's comic strips (conceptualist and artist of the darkly humorous but nationally relevant "Pugad Baboy" series).
Even Carlo Vergara's graphic novels are on the bestseller lists in national bookstores! What does this have to say about the way Filipinos respond to and glorify current affairs?
Misgivings and prejudices aside, this patronage and encouragement of subversive materials that is uniquely Filipino shows a profound level of maturity on the masses' part.
We are willing to accept and identify with our flaws and face our insecurities head-on, even belittling them to the point of making them humorous.
Self-deprecation through humor is the healthiest and most honest form of coping with crises, because it shows we are aware that a problem exists and we need to deal with it immediately.
This is in contrast with the traditional act of denying the problems' existence and hiding them deep in the closet to be forgotten, only to be confronted with them at inopportune moments later on.
They say adversity brings out the best in individuals, and this is also true for races as a whole. For Filipinos, adversity brings out Filipino joke books and Pinoy-style comic strips by the dozen, and laughter truly becomes the best medicine.
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