This morning, a friend of ours finished putting up our 6-foot tall, 135-ft wide backyard fence.  We were going to hold off on this project, but two separate incidents convinced us it was time to put up a sturdier, more private fence than the dinky one that was originally there.  Three weeks ago, someone tore down WITHOUT permission the original liner fence – more a property marker than a fence, really.  The man was more than halfway through this unauthorized project when I chanced upon him, and I immediately went up to ask what was going on.  The man replied, “Nobody cares about this beat-up, ugly fence, anyway.”   I countered that I did:  “It’s my beat-up ugly fence, and I really want it there.”    I later reported this incident to one of our town custodians, and he suggested bringing legal action against the man for trespassing and destruction of property.  I didn’t want to go there -- the little old fence was not worth getting the headache over.

Three days later, a group of young girls, probably ages 8-13, sprawled a picnic blanket in our yard.  Again, I went up to them and asked what they were doing.  “We thought we’d sit around a little bit in the shade,” one of them answered.  I said I was fine with that, but that maybe next time it would be better if they asked permission first.  One of the girls replied that they didn’t think it was a big deal.  “It’s a big place, and my mom said it would be okay.”  I explained gently that private property was still private property, and for their own safety, they shouldn’t hang out in places where they weren’t supposed to be.  They didn’t like what I had to say.

As these events unfolded, I realized that three things were basically at play:  1) ignorance; 2) indifference/ insensitivity; and 3) irresponsibility.  The man and the girls did not know they would be offending someone with their actions – or if they did, they didn’t care.  Such lack of knowing or even wanting to know led them to do something markedly selfish, totally stupid and potentially harmful.  I could not get over what one of the girls said, “My mom said it would be okay.”  That reflected a disturbing lack of accountability (or the teaching thereof) – and that, I believe, is a major cause of many troubles in the world today.

This came to mind again two days ago when my brother in the Philippines emailed me about an issue causing a stir back home: the season opener of “Desperate Housewives.”  I am not familiar with this TV show, but apparently it enjoys quite a following in the Philippines, as it does here.  In this episode, the character Susan, played by Teri Hatcher, is told by her OB/GYN that she may be approaching menopause.  To this, an irate Susan says:  “Can I just check those diplomas?  I want to make sure they are not from some med school in the Philippines.”

Wow.  That hit me right between the eyes.  One can’t miss the implication that Filipino doctors - my husband included – are inferior and fly-by-night.  How unbelievably dumb!  Then I remembered my “fence experience”, and saw how they relate well together.  Ignorance, insensitivity and irresponsibility … all rolled into one!  Do the writers of Desperate Housewives even know that most of the medical institutions in the Philippines were built right around the time the US occupied the Philippines in the first half of the 1900s?  And that a good percentage of our medical school professors and other educational leaders are US-trained?  That’s a good point for ignorance.

Simply put, the producers of the show just did not research well.  Else, they would have known of the strong Filipino presence in the healthcare community all across the US.  It is hard-pressed to not find at least one Filipino-American in most healthcare institutions.  In our area alone, a good number of Filipino doctors are serving, some have been doing so since the ‘70s, and they are well-respected, well-liked and well-placed in their communities.  One of the most sought-after oncologists in our area is a Filipino.  These doctors have passed all training schedules, exams and other stringent requirements here in the US, and they are well-accepted as members of the medical community.  How unfortunate that the writers did not recognize that, and decided to resort to blatant insensitivity in an effort to be flippant.

Indeed, insensitivity in this case is the active disregard for all hard-working men and women who make up the Filipino medical landscape.  It is an indifference to their contribution.  Ultimately, it presents a sad commentary about this melting pot of races, more so as this really isn’t the first time that the Philippines has been the subject of disparaging remarks by individuals in US media.  Ah, but that is a blog for another day.

With regard to Filipino doctors, I would like to believe that this is isolated thinking, and this really isn’t reflective of what the greater American population believes.  So far, I’m happy to report that my husband’s professional experience largely belies it.  The producers of Desperate Housewives were simply very irresponsible.  Although they have issued an apology to the Philippine government for this careless, uncalled-for remark, saying that there was no intent to malign Filipino practitioners, to me it's still a pretty dull, run-of-the-mill statement, if there ever was one.  And really … how did it get this far? With a whole slew of screenwriters, producers, network management, and all those top honchos … how did this escape them? 

I know why, I know how.  It’s the lack of accountability.  As that young girl said, “My mom said it would be okay.”  The whole culture of the entertainment industry is that “it would be okay” – so long as the ratings go or stay up.  As for the actress, accountability falls on her too, every bit as much as it does on everyone involved with production.  Teri Hatcher could have said no to delivering that line.  She didn’t.  As it is, she has become the face of a national insult.  Did she even think about that?  Have we heard anything from her?  Not a peep.  Publicity is the name of the game, because when we come right down to it, extra publicity, even born out of controversy, is what entertainment feeds on.  It’s the “me” complex all over again, rearing its ugly head with its three “I’s” -- ignorance, insensitivity and irresponsibility.

And so it is that in the bigger scheme of things, far beyond this debacle of one idiotic statement distributed over airwaves, it’s really up to the rest of us who are hopefully more level-minded to help rectify things.  Perhaps we ourselves can start to build fences – proper, sturdy ones to define what belongs to us, hinder others from indiscriminately encroaching, and remind ourselves that we DO have something important to protect.  It’s called “Integrity” – another "i" word -- and that is one that must be growing in measure all the time.