Robinson's Galleria Holdup Incident reveals deep seated emotions lurking beneath the social stratum

Police are hot on the heels of a riding in tandem team who boldly tried to take some money from two bank tellers of a money changer's store right inside the Robinson's Galleria mall this morning. 


At least four people were injured. What's so shocking, it exposed how weak mall security is. Imagine, armed men successfully managed to storm the mall, fire several shots and even lobbed grenades, one exploded and the other did not.


Holdups are something which is quite common, not just here in the Philippines, but elsewhere. However, what sent some chills to several people is the brazen-ness of the act itself. 


Late last December, the World Bank as well as the United Nations already warned several nations, including industrialized ones, of the possibility of the outbreak of violent incidents due to increasing poverty and hunger.


Hunger and the loss of hope are two explosive elements that, when combined, surely causes crimes and violence to rise. When people are pushed to the wall, and when thousands or millions of us go to bed with an empty stomach, you cannot stop some people from thinking of committing violence. 


When fathers see their kids trying to sleep with an empty stomach, when mothers fail to nurse their babies and when people lose their jobs and are having difficulty finding employment, what do you think will happen?


Worse, when people see that there is no more hope, when they only cling to promises of government solving these problems, but is evidently not doing anything, what do you think will happen?


Governmental propaganda has its limits. You can't stop people from thinking of doing other things or committing crimes when they already lost all hope. 


There will surely come a time when every single thing will explode right before the very faces of our Government officials and they will find that they are entirely helpless of solving these monumental problems.


When laughter has lost its appeal to people and when people cannot seem to laugh themselves out of their predicaments, what do you think will happen?