If You Idolize Duterte as a Parent, What Values Are You Teaching Your Kids?

I’ve made plenty of mistakes as a parent.

Sometimes I speak out of frustration. Sometimes I over-explain when silence would’ve worked better. But there’s one thing I’ve always tried to be careful about—what values I pass on. What I defend. Who I admire.

We worry a lot about what our kids see online. We talk about screen time, social media, influencers, YouTube algorithms. But maybe we forget the most powerful influence in their lives is still us.

The things we say.
The people we cheer for.
The beliefs we defend without question.

Parenthood isn’t just about feeding, schooling, and keeping them safe. It’s about teaching them what’s right—and doing that right thing in the process. That’s where it gets hard. Because when you admire someone like Rodrigo Duterte—when you proudly call yourself a Diehard Duterte Supporter—you’re not just choosing a political side.

You’re building a template your child will follow.

Duterte may be out of office, but many still hold him up as the kind of leader this country needs. Tough. Fearless. Ruthless when necessary.

But when a leader justifies killing as protection, silences critics with threats, and mocks morality as weakness—what happens when your child sees you idolizing that?

What do they learn about justice, about empathy, about truth?

And what kind of adult are you preparing them to become?

Blind Loyalty vs. Critical Thinking

In many Filipino homes, obedience is love.

You don’t talk back. You don’t question. You say opo even when something feels wrong.

Political scientist Aries Arugay captured it in one line:
“Why would you be critical about your father? You accept your father regardless.” (Spheres of Influence)

And that’s exactly how many Filipinos saw Duterte.

Not as a public servant.
Not as a president.
But as Tatay Digong—a father figure who demanded loyalty, not accountability.

So when DDS parents defend him—no matter what he says, no matter what he does—the message to their children is loud and clear:

Power is not to be questioned.
Authority means you're always right.
Criticism is betrayal.

That’s not just a political stance. That’s parenting by proxy.

I was raised by one woman—my adoptive mother. She was fire and discipline rolled into one.

She didn’t spare the rod. Not even close.
Your parents may have stuck to slippers and belts.
Mine reached for whatever was within reach—wooden spoons, books, ashtrays. Her creativity came with pain.

I joke sometimes that our home was a frat house. Hazing was part of life.

But I survived.

Bruised, battered on some days—but whole enough to know I didn’t want that kind of discipline passed on.

So when I became a parent, I made a decision.

It ends with me.

No raised hands. No raised voice unless necessary. And definitely, no blind obedience.

But here’s the twist.

The same woman who punished me also shaped my mind.

She was deeply anti-Marcos. Not a rebel, not an activist. Just a woman with strong convictions and a shelf full of books. She believed in the country more than she believed in any man who claimed to lead it.

And from her, I learned something that would stay with me:

Loyalty to your country should never be confused with loyalty to a politician.

Her “bias”—to borrow the favorite word of Duterte supporters—wasn’t rooted in blind hatred or bitterness. It was rooted in history. In reading. In questioning. In watching carefully.

That’s the kind of bias I inherited.

So when I see DDS parents model unconditional loyalty to Duterte, I worry—not just as a citizen, but as a father.

Because children are always watching.
They pick up on who you defend.
They mirror who you praise.
And when they grow up seeing you excuse violence, mock critics, and shut down disagreement, they’ll learn to do the same.

But worse than that, they’ll learn to never question anyone in power—especially when that power comes wrapped in a smile and a promise of safety.

We like to think we’re raising good kids.

But what if we’re raising obedient ones instead?

And what if that obedience costs them the ability to think?

Let that sink in.

Because one day, they might need to stand up against something unjust. And if we taught them that silence is respect, and questioning is betrayal, they won’t stand at all.

They’ll bow.

And that’s not parenting. That’s programming.

Normalizing Aggression and Violence as “Tough Love”

How do you explain state-sponsored violence to a child?

And what happens when the man you admire the most is the one pulling the trigger?

Rodrigo Duterte spoke often of protecting the next generation.
He talked like a father cleaning house—tough, tired, and unapologetic.
And many parents listened. Many believed him.

They called it discipline.
They called it tough love.

But love doesn’t leave children without parents.
Love doesn’t break into homes and leave silence where laughter used to live.

Duterte’s drug war has orphaned countless Filipino children.
Some watched their parents die. Others heard the stories repeated over dinner.
One 5-year-old boy, after witnessing his father’s killing, became violent himself (Human Rights Watch).

If you're a parent who defends that war, how do you explain that to your child?

How do you say, “Those people had to die, anak, so you could sleep better at night”—and still teach empathy, compassion, and the value of life?

Parenthood is already built on ethics.
If you’re Christian, as many of us are, the bar is even higher.
You’re taught to forgive. To show mercy. To protect the innocent.

So what happens when you celebrate a man who did the opposite?

What does that say about your faith?

And more importantly, what does it say to your child?

Gaslighting, Truth Decay, and Ethical Flexibility

When facts are inconvenient, do you change your values—or just deny the facts?

Kids don’t learn honesty from textbooks.
They learn it by watching the adults around them.

They hear how you talk when you’re caught in a mistake.
They notice when you change the story to protect your pride.
They watch you pick between truth and convenience—sometimes without saying a word.

And if you’re a parent who defends Duterte, they’re watching that too.

During Duterte’s presidency, we saw more than violence.
We saw gaslighting become a public service.

He denied the existence of extrajudicial killings, even as corpses piled up in alleys and gutters.
Critics were dismissed as bayaran, biased, or destabilizers.
And supporters followed suit—dismissing evidence, mocking reports, accusing anyone who asked questions of being dilawan or communist.

Never mind the facts.
Just discredit the source.

This mindset doesn’t stay online.

It trickles into the home.

When a parent shrugs off credible human rights reports, or tells their child, “fake news ‘yan,” without even checking—what lesson is passed on?

That truth is flexible.
That facts don’t matter if they make your side look bad.
That loyalty is more important than honesty.

And then there’s the contradiction we all saw—but many refused to name.

Duterte vetoed the Positive Discipline Bill, a law meant to protect children from physical and degrading punishment (GMA News).
At the same time, his administration pushed for values education in schools through DepEd’s GMRC program (PNA).

Respect. Integrity. Compassion.

Good values, taught in theory.
While brutality was modeled in practice.

So what happens when a child hears "respect your elders" in the classroom, but sees adults defending a leader who curses at bishops, mocks the dead, and laughs at rape jokes?

They learn that morality is situational.
Rules are optional.
And values are just slogans used to win arguments.

If you defend power by twisting facts, your child will learn to do the same.

And one day, when they’re old enough to hold influence—when they’re the ones in the room deciding right from wrong—

Will they choose truth?

Or will they choose whatever helps them win?

Justice, Inequality, and Selective Compassion

Do your children believe all lives are equally valuable?

Or have they learned that some people deserve less mercy—just because they’re poor?

Duterte’s drug war didn’t hit every neighborhood the same way.
Those with gated communities, paved driveways, and legal connections were spared the brutality.
But in urban slums, the guns rarely slept.

One study found that wealthier drug users were often just given warnings, while the poor were treated with zero tolerance—even suspicion was enough to get them killed (Cornell International Affairs Review).

And when DDS parents defend that disparity, they teach their children something chilling:
Justice bends.
And it bends in favor of those with money, status, and power.

They might not say it outright.
But kids don’t need it spelled out.
They hear the tone when you say “eh kasi adik naman ‘yan.”
They see how quickly you scroll past the face of a teenage boy killed in a police op, but share a post about a stolen cellphone like it was national news.

They learn that some lives matter more.
And some lives don’t matter at all.

That’s how compassion becomes conditional.

Children don’t come into this world with a sense of who deserves empathy and who doesn’t.
We teach them that.
With every story we share, every word we use to describe victims, every time we justify cruelty as “discipline.”

And little by little, they start to believe that poverty is a crime.
That kindness must be earned.
That mercy is only for those who look like us, talk like us, vote like us.

What happens to a child who grows up with that kind of moral math?

They take it with them.
Into their classrooms, their relationships, their careers.

They become the manager who favors the loudest, not the kindest.
The adult who blames victims for their own misfortune.
The parent who passes the same twisted equation to the next generation.

So if your child one day sees injustice—and feels nothing—will you still be proud of the lessons you taught them?

Authority vs. Worship of Power

Do we teach our children to respect authority—

—or to worship it?

It’s a fine line.
One demands accountability.
The other demands silence.

In DDS households, that line is often erased.

Duterte isn’t viewed as a president who should answer to the people.
He’s treated like a king.
Untouchable.
Above criticism.
Walang mali. Walang sablay.

And what we idolize, we excuse.

The things we tell our kids to avoid—mocking women, disrespecting elders, cursing, bullying, threatening violence—somehow become forgivable when Duterte does it.

What does that teach a child?

That rules are flexible, depending on who’s in charge.
That power doesn’t need to be earned—it only needs to be feared.
That strength means never apologizing, never backing down, never listening.

Respect, when taught right, comes with limits.
It comes with reason.
It grows from fairness, not fear.

But in a DDS household, authority is often framed like divinity.
It’s the same logic used to defend abusive fathers: “Hindi mo naiintindihan. He only wants what’s best for you.”

That same energy is now pointed toward the nation.
“Duterte may be harsh, but he only wants what’s best for the country.”

So when kids watch you defend power no matter what, they learn that power is always right.

Not truth.
Not justice.
Not decency.
Just power.

And one day, when they’re the one holding the power—at work, at home, in their own families—will they remember how to use it with restraint?

Or will they believe that being feared is the same as being respected?

Civic Responsibility and Accountability

When was the last time your child saw you call out something wrong?

Not in politics.
Not on Facebook.
Not during a family gathering when someone said something completely out of line.

Just… wrong.
Injustice. Abuse. Corruption. Any form of it.

Because if your kids never see you speak up, what will they learn about citizenship?

In many DDS households, loyalty is taught like a virtue.
But not loyalty to the Constitution, the truth, or the people.

Loyalty to a man.

Even the mildest criticism of Duterte gets dismissed with a label—“biased,” “dilawan,” “wokescold,” “communist.”
Kids hear those words used like weapons, thrown at journalists, teachers, activists, even neighbors who simply ask, “Is this right?”

What they learn from that is simple:

Truth is flexible.
Questioning is betrayal.
Good citizens obey.
Bad ones ask too many questions.

But that's not citizenship.
That’s submission.

The law itself—Republic Act 11908—says something different.
It calls on parents to help raise children who are prepared for adulthood and responsible civic life (LawPhil).

That means not just being loyal followers, but engaged thinkers.
People who can say, “I love my country—so I will question the people who lead it.”

Because silence doesn’t keep a country safe.
It keeps the corrupt in power.

So ask yourself:

Are you raising someone who will blindly follow—
—or someone who will bravely care?

Reimagining Parental Role Models: From Obedience to Critical Citizenship

It doesn’t have to be this way.

Cycles can be broken.
Lessons can be rewritten.
We’re parents, after all—we get to choose which values stay and which ones stop with us.

Parenthood isn’t about creating perfect followers.
It’s about raising decent human beings who can think for themselves, speak with kindness, and know when to call out what’s wrong—even when it’s uncomfortable.

If your child only ever learns to follow, how will they ever lead?

But here’s something we don’t talk about enough:
You can’t pass down what you never had.

Critical thinking is a skill.
It’s not inherited—it’s taught, practiced, lived.

And if your own childhood was rooted in obedience, survival, or silence, then questioning things might not come naturally to you.
You were probably raised to fall in line, not push back.
To obey, not to reflect.

That doesn’t make you a bad parent.
It just makes you someone who was never shown another way.

But it’s never too late to learn.
You don’t need a college education to ask, “Is this right?” or “Is this fair?”
And when you begin asking those questions out loud, your child learns it’s okay to ask them too.

The Positive Discipline Bill—the one that aimed to protect children from physical punishment—was vetoed (GMA Network).
But it had massive support, even from the very children it was meant to protect.
That says something.
Our kids don’t want fear. They want to be heard.

We already have cultural models that emphasize dialogue and shared humanity.
Kapwa. Hiya. And the bodong—a traditional peace pact from the Cordillera region where conflicts were resolved through conversation and mutual agreement, not domination.
Before politics turned everything into a loyalty test, these were the values we held close.

And maybe it’s time we held them close again.

As a parent, one of my biggest fears is raising an uncritical child.
Because doing so would be an injustice to her future, her career, and the kind of adult she’ll become.

I’ve been called a “yes-man” more than once—usually when I’m dealing with hopeless people or pointless situations.
There are times I’ve stayed quiet because the fight wasn’t worth it.
But I never wanted that silence to become her legacy.

So far, my wife and I are thankful that our daughter is critical.
She questions. She thinks. She pushes back when it counts.

So when I see my daughter question things I would’ve just let slide, I feel relieved.
Because I know that means she won’t just survive this world.
She might actually change it.

And isn’t that the point of all this?

What Kind of Future Are We Really Building?

In the end, this isn’t just about Duterte.
It’s not even just about politics.

It’s about the kind of people we raise inside our homes.
The kind of citizens they become outside of them.

Every day, our children watch us.
They see who we excuse.
They hear the things we defend.
They learn, not by what we tell them, but by who we cheer for when no one else dares to clap.

And when we idolize someone like Duterte—not just tolerate, not just vote, but idolize—we’re not just taking a stand.
We’re handing our kids a mirror.
And saying, this is what strength looks like.
This is what power should sound like.
This is the kind of person you should admire.

But if that mirror is cracked—
if it reflects fear instead of courage, control instead of compassion, silence instead of truth—
then maybe it’s time to ask:

What kind of future are we really building?

The good news is: it’s never too late to choose better.
To model better.
To raise children who don’t just follow orders but ask the hard questions.
Who know that love and loyalty are not the same thing.
Who understand that kindness isn’t weakness—and that silence, in the face of wrong, is not respect.

We don’t have to pass down our trauma.
We don’t have to pass down our blind spots.
We can raise a generation that sees more clearly than we ever did.

But it starts with us.
And it starts now.