Posted: September 5th, 2023

The Indolence of the Filipinos

My topic to be discussed is regarding the fifth installment of Jose Rizal in his essay “Sobre La Indolencia De Los Filipinos” or “The Indolence of the Filipinos”. In my presentation, I will only show and explain to you the core concepts found in this installment which is what Jose Rizal wants to address to his readers.
Illustrated and highlighted in my topic are the causes of indolence, the effects of the influence of climate to the indolence of the Filipinos, the manifestations from the part of the government and church to their contribution to the causes and effects of indolence in the communities during Spanish period, the government’s action towards it and its effects, and the solutions Rizal had concluded to stop this symptom of a country’s indifference to its ills.
In the preceding chapter, it talked about the causes that proceed from the government in fostering and maintaining the evil that we are discussing. This part analyzes the causes which proceed and emanate from the people itself. According to Rizal, these causes can be reduced to two factors. The first factor is the limited training and education Filipino natives receive or the defects of training. Segregated from the Spaniards, Filipinos do not receive the same opportunities that are available to the foreigners. Filipinos are taught to be inferior.

The second factor is the lack of unity among all Filipino natives or the lack of national sentiment. Because Filipinos think that they are inferior, they submit to the foreign culture and do everything to imitate it. The lack of national sentiment also brought to life another evil and is divided into two classes. And what are these? These two classes are the absence of all opposition to measure prejudicial to the people and the absence of any initiative in whatever may redound to its good. A man in the Philippines is considered only an individual, and not a member of a nation.
He is forbidden and denied the right of association, and is, therefore, weak and sluggish. And as a result of those and when prejudicial measure is ordered, (1) no one protest, all goes well until later the evils are felt; (2) no one has neither the nerves nor voice; (3) all keeps silent and remains with the need; (4) All suffer and pine away from fear of receiving a scolding; (5) and the worst, administrative positions fall to the Filipinos who are the most stupid and incapable men, those who submit to everything.
Of the influence of the climate talked about in the beginning, Rizal mentioned in this last installment the effects that had arise from it. The first one resulted from the very limited training at home, the tyrannical and sterile education of the rare centers of learning, and the influence by people in the mind so that a man would not aspire to excel those who preceded him and is what we call stagnation or nonproductive or being inactive. Indolence is a corollary derived from the lack of stimulus and of vitality.
The second one resulted from the insinuated inferiority of the Filipinos which is convinced by the brutalization or harassment of one’s self by education, the exchange of usages and sentiments among different nations, and the Filipinos’ susceptibility which allows him to be guided by his fancy and his self-love. This is called the Spirit of Rivalry in which if by some rare incidents, when others excel, instead of his example stimulating, it only causes others to persist in their inaction or being unproductive.
The third one is nurtured by the anchorites of a contemplative and lazy life which made the natives resort to spend their life in giving their gold to the Church in the hope of miracles and other wonderful things. Their will is hypnotized by the friars that from childhood they learned to act mechanically through the exercise imposed upon them such as praying for whole hours in unknown tongue, of respecting things that they don’t understand, and accepting beliefs that are not explained to them while even protests of reasons from them are repressed.
The last one is the origin of Filipinos’ indolent disposition which had resulted from all his energies paralyzed and the severity of the climate, which is called eternal vacillation or being hesitant or indecision in his speech and action. From the causes and effects mentioned, the evil coming from the part of the government and the church in their contribution towards the Filipinos’ Indolence were manifested in this installment also which is why natives still hardly prosper in free and well-organized communities.
This manifestations were (1) inefficiency in the lower spheres of power and ignorance and indifference in the upper, since then the lower spheres were headed by incapable people which only submit about to anything what the upper officials will instruct to them, (2) frequent changes and eternal apprenticeships, (3) great fear and many administrative obstacles, (4) voiceless people, (5) employees who nearly all strive to amass a fortune, and (5) inhabitants who live in great hardship from the instant they begin to breathe, create prosperity, agriculture and industry, found enterprises and companies, since the Spaniards would not want that Filipino natives’ would be much richer than them because they are afraid that people will not follow them anymore.
Proposals were raised from the government to combat Filipinos’ Indolence such as increasing natives’ needs and raising the taxes but since the proposals didn’t came from a profound study of the evil that afflicts us, instead the effects were even worst since criminals have multiplied and the penury has been aggravated. Why?Because the Filipinos already had enough needs with his functions in the Church as imposed by the Spanish friars, with the fiestas, with the public offices forced on him, and the donations and bribes that he had to make so that he may drag out himself from the anger of the Spaniards. It was too much for them. Here, Jose Rizal stresses out the true solution Filipinos need to solve this problem of indolence. And it is a reform, a reform which requires education and liberty for the Filipino natives. Rizal had said that Filipinos should not be begrudged of educational opportunities and that all policies will be sincere and consistent or highly civilizing to all of them.