BGC banning ‘young stunnas’ is not it
There was no escaping the discourse this month. Whether you were lurking around and getting ragebaited on Threads or the news popped up on your Facebook feed, there was only one thing Manileños could talk about.
And that was the “takeover” of the so-called “young stunnas” in Bonifacio Global City (BGC)—specifically, the High Street area, which sees the highest concentration of people, especially on weekends, as it has reached its peak form as the tourist trap of the locale.
For weeks, the user-submitted videos trickled in: short clips of young boys of a seemingly lower socioeconomic class starting little, pathetic skirmishes at the crosswalk between Central Square and One Bonifacio, where the 3D billboards are. Nothing really dangerous or fatal, just annoying and/or hilarious at worst and disruptive and harmful (to each other) at best.
But it all came to a head over the weekend when another user-uploaded clip saw a BGC marshal approach a group of these kids and tell them they’re not allowed to ruin the vibes of the upscale enclave.
And that’s where the real problem begins, friends.
Elitism is elitism, even with “good” intentions
A little backtracking, first.
While this controversy was still simmering, I got into a little tiff with some people on Threads because elitist middle-class attitudes were already brewing and frothing. Not only were these people demanding better behavior from the crowd they’ve judged as “not aligned with BGC’s population” (to put it really nicely), but some of them were even in favor of literally gatekeeping those who don’t match the vibes, all because of the actions of a bunch of dumb kids. (Who, by the way, will always be dumb kids regardless of socioeconomic status—take it from this private school alumnus.)
When I called them elitist for demanding that those people act right, they bristled. “Is it really elitist,” they ask, “when you’re just calling for people to behave properly?”
This is going to piss a lot of people off, but the answer is, yes. Especially in this case, when you’re debating about who gets to enjoy a place like BGC. “Prim and proper” behavior is inherently elitist because we’ve made the assumption that this refers to the behavior of the refined, sophisticated, and civilized.
And by this logic, that thinking must mean that the opposite end—the way the “young stunnas” and those who are generally disruptive—is the behavior of the “poor.”
I’ve been working in BGC for six years now, and before any of this happened, I’d already heard stories of inebriated rich conyo kids picking silly fights at the Palace and professional basketball players throwing punches at fast food restaurants in the area. How come no one tries to gatekeep them, too? Because it’s a lot easier to make fun of the weird “jeje” kids, right? Because they don’t have any powerful connections that’ll get someone in trouble for shipping them out of BGC.
It isn’t wrong to demand better, decent behavior from people who are sharing a public space within BGC, but let’s stop acting like you’re not being elitist when you’re aiming your moral superiority over one class of person.
Actual insane discrimination
Which brings us back to that clip of the BGC marshals speaking with the young stunnas.
You can break up and punish an actual street fight going on among the kids—that is the actual peacekeeping duty and responsibility of the local authorities—but you can’t actually go all “Minority Report” and tell people to leave based on what they’re wearing, or when your “Spider sense” acts up and the hairs on your arms start to tingle.
That’s not how law enforcement works. Okay, actually, it’s how it works here in the Philippines, so I guess I should be saying that that’s not how law enforcement is supposed to work.
It sucks that I have to repeat something like this, but that’s straight-up discrimination, especially if this is going to be the case for all people dressed a certain way afterward. Obviously, it stands to reason that not everyone who’s dressed up like they’re in a rap music video is going to start trouble in the streets, no matter how much we want our judgment and assumptions to be true.
And any middle-class/bourgeois individual who supports a measure like this is really no different from fanatics who support extrajudicial killings in the name of keeping the streets safe. The truth very few want to hear is that uniting to gatekeep BGC is just a tamer, more middle-class-friendly version of the war on drugs because no blood is being shed, no lives are being taken, and no poor families are being deprived.
But hey, all we want is to just maintain the immaculate vibes of High Street while we pretend nothing is wrong with our country, right?
******
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