The youth are the foremost victims of the Reproductive Health Bills pending in both houses of Congress. It is our generation that will face the reality of the many risks so intimately involved in this measure. It is our welfare that is on the line. It is our voice that we seek to be heard today.
We are for responsible parenthood and we, too, desire to see every Filipino family free from the burdens of poverty. However, spending for a measure to fiddle with demographics is a gross misallocation of scarce resources. Addressing needs for quality education and opportunities for employment hits poverty at its core. Massive government spending for contraception and mandatory sex education in all schools enlivens the risk of aggravating the decline of our demographics, of eroding our values, and of reshaping our society after the designs of foreign intervention. There is no warrant against this. This is a gamble of our future.
We are for reproductive health and we, too, intend to shield mothers and their children from the risks of complications at childbirth. However, pregnancy is not the disease that can find a cure in contraception. Massive government spending for products with known health detriments is tantamount to a government serving our people harm. Improving access to pre- and post-natal care, of which the RH Bills speak so scarcely about, addresses maternal mortality directly. The RH Bills, instead, advocate reproductive health by heavily promoting mismoderated use of artificial contraception, neglecting the impracticability and impossibility of “informed choice” in the poorest, most populated hospitals and health centers. This ultimately risks the rise in the number of victims of contraceptive failure, the development of a contraceptive mentality, the erudition of family values, and the eventual demand for abortion. There is no warrant against this. This is a gamble of our future.
We are for population management and development and we, too, dream of progress. However, genuine progress can never be achieved until our government invests genuinely in our people. Our population is an asset. Government must treat it as an asset. Rural development, entrepreneurship, improved standards of education, expansion of opportunities for employment, intensified thrusts for scientific research and development, cultivation of our arts and culture – these constitute genuine investments in our people. This is the way to secure our future.
While the RH Bill posits itself as a comprehensive attempt to relieve our people of a particular ill, it is this very claim of comprehensiveness that blinds it from its cons. We cannot afford to gamble our future. We cannot afford to legislate what constitutes harm to our people.
The youth, in defense of our welfare, can and will invest our support in legislators who know how to genuinely invest in us.
In solidarity, we declare our opposition to the RH Bill. This is our voice. This is our vote.
ELIAS JAYSON TOLENTINO
College of Social Sciences and Philosophy | UP Diliman
News Writer, Philippine Collegian
Member, Center for Nationalist Studies
Convenor, UP For Life
Convening Member, UP Scholars Choose Life Coalition