I really don't get some people who have to resort to mimicking accents just to have a laugh

I really don’t get some people who have to resort to mimicking accents just to have a laugh

On the jeepney ride home earlier, I noticed a bunch of students who were talking about how their day went. And they were all laughing about the funny episodes they had. Suddenly one of them started blurting out something about how funny Cebuanos talk in Tagalog with their accents.

Faking a Cebuano (or Bisaya as they called it) accent, he said pwidi. Which was supposed to be a funny way of saying pwede but with a supposed stiff Bisaya accent.

And then his companion added “baka naman sinasabi nya pido,”(maybe he was trying to say pedo) with emphasis on the pedo being pronounced as pido (again supposedly mimicking a Bisayan accent).

I felt my ears ringing. I was building an argument against the ethno-lingual slur in my head while waiting for them to come up with another “funny” thing about Bisayans or Visayan-language speakers. Good thing they stopped and moved on with the other humorous events of their day.

Had they come up with another slur against people from my neck of the woods down South, I would have had a verbal exchange with the group. And it didn’t matter to me if they were a group. When it comes to pointing out errors and misplaced humor, I don’t care how many I encounter as long as I know I am right.

Really, the things people do against other people just so they could feel good about themselves.

I guess that’s the problem with us Filipinos. We seem to take delight at the expense of the physical deformities of others; their speech impediment; their lack of education; or their supposed lack of style or class.

When we laugh at others because they are unable to speak in the same way we do or act in the same manner we act, does that speak more about their ignorance or our arrogance? And if we take delight in these things does this not betray our supposed to be “educated” selves? Does not the act of exacting humor out of the ignorance of others only reflect our shallowness of thought?

Seriously.