Caution: Strong language ahead. Cover your ears, or go play your “Pokemon” outside while I try to mull over the sociolinguistic implications and impact of the infamous expression, *drumroll, please*, “Putang Ina!”, which as of press time is being attributed yet again to Pres. Duterte.
There are variants - “Anak ka ng puta!”, meaning, “You’re a son of a bitch!”, and “Puki’ng ina mo!”, or in English, “Your mother’s cunt.”, among others.
“Putang ina!”, literally meaning, “whore mother, or bitch”, is the Filipino version of the all-time American favorite, “Fuck!”, and it is an expression of extreme disgust, dismay, or frustration.
In real-life Manila slums as in Filipino action movies, the expression is common among winos, louts and other shady stock characters whose dog-eat-dog, no-holds-barred communication skills include smashing beer bottles and faces of enemies in sight; and, shouting matches either as daily vocal exercise or, to simply show who’s boss.
Cue in Eddie Garcia as the beer-guzzling good-for- nothing father to superstar Nora Aunor in the award-winning “Tinik Sa Dibdib”. But I’m digressing...
When boiler-tempered Duterte rose to power, the expression thusly has also slowly taken center-stage alongside other Filipino swear words.
Why, the guy is a self-confessed child of the slums, so cussing should come naturally.
Duterte’s utterance is rather smooth and crisp, nary a hint of narcissistic consciousness that is typical of the ubiquitous young and mobile; and hearing it come from the septuagenarian in his sandy vocal register for the first time, I went, ‘Wow!, check this out, that’s really cool.’
When my mother looked at me like I was the one who was cussing in front of her, I said, well, let him swear now, then let the voting public weigh in at the poll center later. (Mind you. I do use strong language sometimes, but only when mother is not around.)
For a while, it felt as if the public wouldn’t take any of it, wouldn’t have anything to do with a presidentiable who could swear like a pool hall loser.
Why, because hypocrite elite Filipinos think they are the staunchest ambassadors of, uhm, class and style? Any Filipino language or sub-language will always be treated as the language of the second-class citizen.
Don’t look at me like that. Go watch and listen Kris forking Aquino run her trademark ‘Arnean’ mouth on national TV.
Duterte’s elitist rivals in the presidential race all took notice, slighted him even one way or the other.
The picture of a swearing chin-wielding president sounds almost sacrilegious to the image of the highest seat of power.
But he won. Popular vote surprisingly cannonballed him to power.
That only meant one thing: other than his simplistic military-driven platform and bullheaded stance on almost anything Aquino, the voting populace must have loved the swearing. And now they’re growing into it.
When he said, “Putang-ina, mumurahin kita diyan sa forum na iyan. Huwag mo akong ganunin.” (“Fuck, I will cuss you out at that forum. Don’t do this to me!”) –Duterte was merely expressing extreme disappointment over a perceived situation.
The scenario playing out in his mind —wherein he is questioned by Obama like an overlord to a serf — sounds frustrating that he gushed rather well, colorfully with the infamous expletive.
Duterte was mad at an imagined communication situation. The projectile of his snarkiness was not personally hurled at Obama.
Had he wanted to go below the belt, he would have said, “Putang-ina mo, mumurahin kita…” Take note of the pronoun “mo” (you) that signifies the direct object of the expletive.
In short, according to Ben Zimmer, a linguist at the University of Pennsylvania, wrote in his blog, “Language Log”-
“Since there is no pronoun present in what Duterte said, it appears he is using it as an interjection or an intensifier rather ran insulting Obama directly.”
But forking media adore Duterte’s colorful language so much they tend to stretch his pronouncements out of proportion.
In this particular situation, the misinterpretation somehow reached Obama, who responded rather negatively.
Technically, and as some of us do have short fuses, there’s nothing wrong with using expletives. They can be used to emphasize a very important subject matter, or as intensifier of a particular pronouncement.
What is wrong is when someone takes it to mean otherwise after splicing a few words in, which categorically is already a slanderous act — and this is what disgusts me most.
It appears that some journalists need to check on their sociolinguistic IQ. To put it simply, sociolinguistics is the science of knowing what and when to say to whom. It’s that simple but there are nefarious forces at work and they are working harder against Duterte.
It is the media’s attitude towards Duterte’s words that has a dichotomizing effect on his noble intents and the public’s judgment.
Okay, so swearing is okay. In fact, a recent study reveals that people who swear are intellectually gifted, or geniuses. But, I disagree. If all who cuss are truly gifted in the noggin, Manila slums must have transformed into a utopian paradise slash mad lab of sort a long time ago.
Now, is Duterte genius? I don’t think that’s the real question.
The question should be - Is Duterte just like any goner who swears people’s socks off for the heck of swearing people’s socks off?
Or, is his mouth only a representation of something even more putrid that’s slowly corroding the cudgels of the government right now, and the country that which he promised to steer off the road towards some kind of rancorous self-destruction?
It’s enough that the media call him names, but to present him as a sociolinguistically incompetent leader is unethically foul.
Duterte Harry knows what’s his doing. Or saying.