it has been over a year since the unnecessary and absurd outrage over teri hatcher’s line on desperate housewives and here we are again, fuming mad over alleged racism remarks and actions done over BBC’s comedy sketch program, harry and paul.  extremely conservative filipinos are up in arms crying for blood after what they claimed “the show did to humiliate, disgrace, demean, and reduce to sex objects those hardworking filipina women in the UK.”  signature campaigns were launched left and right and even called for the network to publicly apologize for their potrayal of our countrymen on that particular program.

being one person who gets it, i say to the executives of BBC, the producers, writers, and actors of the show harry and paul, and to everyone else who also understands and gets it, i humbly apologize for the actions of my fellow filipinos–every single one of them–who are giving you unnecessary and negative publicity over such a mundane issue.  apparently, they don’t understand the concept of a comedy sketch show (or, in the case of desperate housewives, a joke made in jest).  those people who are clamoring for an apology from BBC are the same ones who riled up NBC over the desperate housewives issue (which in the end, NBC did apologize which i think was not necessary and is uncalled for).  i apologize for their primitive reasoning, onion-skinned sensitivity, and stone-age naivity.  i know for a fact that you have potrayed different nationalities and races on the harry and paul show in quite the same manner, but the network did not receive the same reaction from their citizens compared to what my fellow countrymen have shown.  apparently, they would laugh at the segment if the person in the scene involved wasn’t a filipino, but they’ll cry foul if it was.  that’s how one-sided minds those people have.  those are the same filipinos who demand for their relatives on death row being found guilty of crimes committed in a foreign country to be sent home and be spared, but when a foreigner was found guilty in the philippines of the same crime and sentenced to the same fate, the families of the victims are moving heaven and earth to prevent the accused from being sent home to their motherland even if their governments are asking us to send them back home.  with this, i implore you, executives of BBC to please not take what NBC did and issue a public apology.  doing so is a step backwards in logical thinking.  i say again, there is nothing wrong with what was potrayed in the show.  it was funny and hysterical.  i’m just saddened by old-school thinking people saying otherwise.

i’m very proud to call myself a filipino and be one.  it is just in very petty situations such as this (other than local showbiz, stupid tv network wars, and filipino politics) that i bow my head in shame.  my only wish is that one day, all of us would understand that not everything art imitates is based on real-life situations, and vice-versa so that we may all appreciate a good comedy, a good soap opera, or even a good movie regardless of who or what race is potrayed.