Name: Tamba, Jan Arvie P.

Program & Section: BEED-101X

Reaction Paper on the Indolence of the Filipinos

The Indolence of the Filipinos was published in 1887 in Berlin by Jose Rizal during the
writing of La Solidaridad. It was a continuation of Rizal 's educational campaign in which he
tried to awaken his countrymen to their own flaws by harsh facts, while at the same time
arousing the Spaniards to their faults that produced and continued such weaknesses in the
colonial structure of Spain (Craig, 1913). Moreover, the essay is an analysis of the causes why
the Filipinos did not work hard during the Spanish regime to make progress in their
development. Rizal pointed out that the Filipinos were diligently doing business with China,
Japan, Arabia, Malaysia, and other countries in the Middle East even before the arrival of the
Spaniards. However, owing to different reasons brought by the Spanish regime, it caused decline
in commercial activities between the Filipinos and other nations.

When we say indolence, it is describing a person who is lazy and often avoids activities
or exertion. Rizal pointed out in the beginning of his essay that there are certain beings or feeling
that people at that time blames for everything. He first discusses that the word indolence was
been greatly misused in the sense of little love for work and lack of energy, while ridicule
concealed the misuse (Rizal, 1890). Although the misuse definition is true in some sense, it is
however, not entirely applicable to the early Filipinos and of those Filipinos during Spanish
colonization. This was supported in the part two as Jose Rizal quotes various information coming
from the primary sources of the accounts of different voyager such as Dr. Morga and Colin.
Rizal also noted that indolence does exist among Filipinos at that time, saying “We must confess
that indolence does actually and positively exist there; only that, instead of holding it to be the
cause of the backwardness and the trouble, we regard it as the effect of the trouble and the
backwardness, by fostering the development of a lamentable predisposition.” I agree, on the
other hand, in what Rizal is trying to convey in his words, that people do not look at the causes
of the circumstance but rather look at it as an effect. Rizal now then explain the reason behind
this prevailing indolence among Filipinos and considered the tropical climate to be a major
factor. He mentioned that, “A hot, climate requires of the individual quiet and rest, just as cold
incites to labor and action.” This is true in every sense as having a hot climate is now regarded as
a big factor why loss of productivity keeps people from working. To relate this to our generation,
sometimes, we students want to sleep or just avoid doing anything if the weather or the
temperature is somewhat humid as we are just going to sweat exaggeratedly. Therefore, it is in
my opinion that being indolent during hot conditions is reasonable for the Filipinos before and
now to slack off, as we even though accustomed to the hot weather, we still cannot take it. But,
in every situation, we must always adapt and learn how to cope up with different environment or
else progress and development will not be attained; and knowing us, humans, we know that we
can adapt in any environment just as long as we are willing. Rizal argued that it is the Spaniard
who is lazy since they hate hard labor and live surrounded by Filipino servants who “not only
exist to take off their shoes for them but even to fan them!” As a physician and scholar, his
analysis led to primary sources that showed Filipinos were not so indolence and they have not
always been like that in pre-Spanish times.

Rizal noted that Indolence is a chronic illness, “Indolence in the Philippines is a chronic
malady, but not a hereditary one. The Filipinos have not always been what they are, witnesses
whereto are all the historians of the first years after the discovery of the Islands.” Rizal provided
early accounts like Antonio Pigafettata’s chronicle of the Magellan expedition which describe
the industrious and morality before the coming of Spaniards. Now, Rizal had proven that the
Filipinos were not the indolent people of our day in spite of the climate and their few needs
before. Spaniards, now, cannot refute that the reason behind of the indolence of the Filipino is
not because they are what they are but, as Rizal provide a solid proof, that it is them who made
them like that; and it is them who fostered and magnified this inclination to laziness of the
Filipinos before.

Furthermore, Filipinos were indolent as they lack of unity and resources to fight against
the invaders. Through Spain, quality education was not developed, especially in agriculture,
trade and industry, and if there were, the lessons taught were irrelevant and lacking in resources
to teach them what they need to learn. They were also asked to pay immense taxes or rents if the
Filipinos cultivated their own land and business and were abused by foreign rulers. Furthermore,
the friars themselves are also one of the factors why Filipinos became indolent as they do not
motivate the Filipinos to work hard; instead, they instill in the minds of the Filipinos to remain
poor because they were told by the friars that when they die, it will be easier for them to be in
heaven.

Rizal cites a variety of factors that could have triggered cultural and economic corruption
among Filipinos. There are, of course, the Filipino-Spanish war, the rebellion of pirates (which
the government encourages), and forced labor. The people were not protected by Spain from
foreign invaders and pirates. With no weapons to protect themselves, they slaughtered the
indigenous people, burnt their villages, and destroyed their lands. As a result, the Filipinos were
forced to become nomads, lost faith in farming their lands or restoring the closed-down
industries, and were solely submissive to God's mercy. This is such a hypocrisy that while
Spaniards are the reason why they were like that they would call the early Filipinos as indolent
people. This is such a hypocrisy that Spaniards will call the early Filipinos as an indolent people
when they are the reason why they become like that. They are omitting the fact that they forced
themselves in our country and ruthlessly erased their identities. To tell the truth, no one would
actually admit that they are the reason behind it. And it would be probably also a propaganda of
the Spaniards to instill to the minds of the Filipinos that they are useless so they will not attempt
to start a revolution against them.

Rizal also criticized the colony's horrible situation as well. The cutting off of trading
between the Philippines and China and Southeast Asia countries drives the Filipino merchants
and laborers out of business, as Spaniards had shut down the established trade.  In comparison,
the trade's appeal contributed to the negligence to trade and agriculture of the Filipinos. People
were also forced to work in shipyards, to build roads and buildings, and to destroy their innate
love of work as they were also compensated with little amount of money. Their resources were
also seized by coercion that they arguably refused to work harder as it will only bring them in
unwanted situation like their goods being seized for free, or paid poorly, and even taxed so
excessively that they ended up not worth the effort.

Rizal also noted that gambling is another factor why Filipinos have grown to be lazy and
it bred “dislike for steady and difficult toil by its promise of sudden wealth and its appeal to the
emotions, with the lotteries,” as said by Rizal. Finally, he pointed out that failure of education is
also one of the reasons why Filipinos have been indolent. The friars’ false teachings, which
centered more on faith than on the secular and practical, became the conduit of the mistaken
notion of not working as they were told that rich men would not go to heaven. Those increasing
attributes have contributed to mental stagnation that stops social and political justice from being
accomplished by not only one but all people. In his explanation of the Filipino's lack of national
sentiment, he pursues this subject further. Where there is no sense of government, no joint effort
can be made to grow the region. The Filipinos' lack of cooperation and knowledge of the
country's current situation and how the government stole away the eyes and ears of its citizens
through its deceiving and countless promises had culminated in the devastation and misery in the
lives of the masses.

When we spend our entire lives seeing the cruelness and inhumaneness of your society,
forced upon us by strangers who do not even know our great nation, we are bound to get tired
and be indolent after a while. The early Filipinos are not fools; they are not puppets who will
simply do as what they were told. The early Filipinos have their own identity beyond from
forcedly imbedded culture brought by the Spaniards, they are motivated by the will to
accomplish great things, and who strive for the preservation of their race. So I therefore conclude
that we cannot blame the early Filipinos to be idle when they are immensely denied of rights
while they erased their own identity. As what Rizal said, “the cause of the malady's continuing or
the effect of the bad treatment that prolongs its action."