Article - The politics of beauty, Philippine edition

The politics of beauty, Philippine edition

It’s been observed that Filipinos don’t see their own kind as beautiful,  in the sense of putting down people who have the perfect Malay aesthetic. Instead, what we seem to see as beautiful are, well, people who either have a pleasing mix of Caucasian and Malay ancestry, or those who are truly Caucasian in the way they look.

And even if we ourselves don’t look Caucasian, beauty products being sold can “help” us be more “white”: skin whiteners, skin cleaning solutions that make us look less oily (to the point of stripping essential oils from our skin), and hair dye for hair color that is more in the genetic lineage of Caucasians.

So what’s this all about? Why do we have, for want of a better term, an ideal for beauty that isn’t Filipino at all?

Read more at the Philippine Online Chronicle

Article - When science fiction becomes… weird and real

When science fiction becomes… weird and real

Science isn’t all that boring. Scientific inquiry and research are always just a few steps away from going off the deep end. And that’s normal, since science is about discovery – not matter how weird it can be. Here are some of the latest in the world of the weird… for science!

Read more at the Philippine Online Chronicle

Article - Being the unexpected: A personal journey about stereotyping

Being the unexpected: A personal journey about stereotyping

When I first submitted my interest for this article idea, I was thinking, hey, this should be easy. It was a simple thing, for me, to think about how people can avoid being stereotyped. I thought all I had to do was think of why stereotyping happens, and how one avoids it.

I realized, later on, that it wouldn’t ring true if there were no personal experiences involved – and therein lay the rub. Many people do find that talking about how they’ve been stereotyped is either an extremely sensitive matter, or one that is prone to a lot of emotional baggage. It’s a hard topic, because as much as people want to just gloss over it, be mater-of-fact about it, or ignore it, stereotyping is controversial at best. Therefore, I decided that perhaps I should start with my own experiences at being stereotyped, and then link it with the process of stereotyping, and how to get away from it.

Read more at the Philippine Online Chronicle

Article - Is Facebook still cool?

Is Facebook still cool?

Facebook is the reigning king of the hill. This year, the social networking giant celebrated its first decade. Will it survive its next decade or will become another footnote in Internet history?

 
Social Media – In the Beginning?
Social media, or the idea of the online community, didn’t start with the current generation. It predated the Internet, if you take into account Bulleting Board Systems (BBS). What Friendster, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and all the others did was put a friendly face to the concept.
In the past, the concept of online communities was a geeky, nerdy thing. It was, on one hand, intimidating, almost creepy, and on the other, an object of ridicule.
What social media networks did, in effect, was make to it look and feel cool. Ordinary people found social media networks cool, and brought it out into the open.

Read more at the Philippine Online Chronicle

Article - The Art of Tweeting

The Art of Tweeting
 
Today’s world has one foot in the virtual. Just as much as people still meet up to have drinks and exchange stories, so, too, do we have online communities and networks where we spend a good part of our time daily, updating people on what we’re doing in real life, what we’re thinking, or even how we are reacting to some bit of online information or news.

One of the more popular messaging-type social networks is known as Twitter. However, given how peculiar and limited Twitter is, it is actually amazing that it has become so popular.

Read more at the Philippine Online Chronicle