Roots
Dnt tax d txt!
By Marifi Jara
QUELIMANE, Mozambique—First off, let me say I am not an advocate of textspeak — u knw dat evolvng styl usd 4 txtng. I just thought that title for this piece would sound cool. It drives me crazy sometimes trying to decipher a message written in textspeak. Nkkblw! (Nakaka-baliw). But neither am I against it. Not at all. I actually find it amusing how adept other people are at it, especially our teens and the twenty-something. I do think it is a wonderful lingo, perfectly suited for the medium on which it is used (small mobile phones), the technology (real-time communication), and the MTV culture (restless and raring). And I must say it is creative – example: w8 for “wait”. Took me some time to figure that out first time I encountered it and when I finally did, I couldn’t help but laugh at myself and thought, geez, I must be so not cool.
Now, what I really want to write about: taxing the text.
Coming back here after my recent visit to the Philippines, I was asked to bring some padala to fellow Pangasinenses working here and a common item in a couple of the packages was a SIM card, one was of those that are especially packaged for international roaming and with special rates for texting and calling to the Philippines. This is very telling of how important the cell phone technology is to our overseas workers.
The cell phone, in particular its short messaging system or texting, is the most accessible, fastest and cheapest lifeline of our overseas workers to family and friends back home. Imagine how tough it must have been in the not-so-long-ago when keeping in touch meant waiting for weeks to get news through what we now call snail mail. Chatting and webcaming are, of course, more affecting, but that requires a computer and an Internet connection, not as readily available as the mobile phone that we can tuck under the pillow. The joy of being able to text dear ones back home helps keep pangs of loneliness and longings at bay. The feeling of isolation is somehow appeased. Many an OFW lonesome heart must have surely been soothed by a simple nyt, luv u.
A proposed bill in the House of Representatives is threatening to make that small but invaluable consolation steeper with the imposition of taxes that will not be shouldered by the service providers but by the poor, lonely texter.
The House Committee on Ways and Means has already approved it and a plenary discussion is the next step. Malacanang says it does not want the added cost to be passed on to the consumer but it does support the taxing idea.
Credit must be given to our telecommunication companies as even if they will not be burdened by the added cost with how the proposed law is laid out now, they have stood up and raised strong resistance against it. I’m sure the outcry would have even been more deafening if the tax were to be taken from their revenues. As it is, they have tagged the proposal — authored by Reps. Danilo Suarez from Quezon (yes, that one who claims to have shelled out $15,000 of his own money to pay for one of those lavish dinners of the Presidential entourage during the recent trip to the US) and Eric Singson (of the rich and powerful clan) from Ilocos Sur — with very spicy labels worthy of street demonstration placards: “anti-consumer,” “anti-poor”, “oppressive”.
Definitely not cool.
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