Jinkee Pacquiao was never an unattractive woman. I’m even going to say she’s pretty, albeit not in that OMG-she’s-a-glittering-paragon-of-beauty kind of way. She’s not hard to look at at all, and she’s always had that moderately mestiza look going for her, something that a lot of people here tend to fawn over.

As her husband went on to win numerous bouts and make a lot of money, it was no secret that Jinkee began to acquire quite a lot of jewelry and designer bags and clothing. Who can blame her? If you get the chance to make the kind of money the Pacquiaos are making, you’d be stuffing yourself silly with every material good you ever dreamed of having. Of course, along with the wealth, Manny is always reported to acquire some female hangers-on as well, which Jinkee is never ever happy about, the same way any wife would react. Still, showbiz observers note that Jinkee wouldn’t ever give up her life and her wealth despite Manny’s indiscretions, and channels her rage instead into shopping, managing the family business, and making herself gorgeous. That’s why over the past few years, it’s been quite safe to say that Jinkee has become a fashion icon for many, and she hasn’t been afraid to freshen up her look as well, something that people often say is part of her attempt to hang on to Manny and keep him from straying. Who knows if that’s the real reason, but it hasn’t escaped anybody’s notice that she’s been close chums with Vicki Belo and is one of the clinic’s endorsers.

Unfortunately for Jinkee, whoever creates the Belo ads seems to take great pleasure in mangling her face, turning her into someone completely unrecognizable.

Unless they read the captions, no one in his or her right mind would ever guess that the woman in those ads is Jinkee Pacquiao. After every ad came out, I looked up pictures of Jinkee at the time to see if she remotely resembled the woman in the ads. Of course she never did. She looked the way she always did, perhaps her face a little smoother and tighter than it was before.

Still, those ads are nothing compared to Jinkee’s Mega cover.

Now Photoshop is a permanent resident in the publishing world: blemishes are dealt with strictly using a healing brush, rolls of flab and loose skin are erased, ribcages are smoothed out, stray strands of hair are patted in place. Unshopped pictures are practically nonexistent, and everybody’s cool with that. But you know you’ve gotten out of hand when there’s a universal reaction of derision towards your magazine cover. Majority of the commenters on Mega Magazine’s Facebook page have complained that Jinkee is unrecognizable on the cover, with some mistaking her for either Agot Isidro or Kristine Hermosa. Others remark on the power of Belo and Photoshop. A small number has jumped to Jinkee’s defense, resorting to the all-time favorite: “Inggit lang kayo, maganda siya. Kayo siguro mga bitter at pangit” and other comments in the same vein.

This isn’t about being envious of Jinkee’s wealth and beauty, however. What it is is outrage at the fact that the media seem to think that we don’t remember what a person really looks like and that we’re stupid enough to believe everything that is being presented to us. Everybody knows how Jinkee Pacquiao really looks, and she certainly looks nothing like the woman on the cover, even after any work she’s had done. Just search Jinkee Pacquiao on Getty Images and take a look at her face last month. Magazines usually work on an issue one or two months ahead of its release, so if Mega presents the cover as Jinkee’s real face, that’s what you should be seeing in the Getty pictures, which it isn’t.

It would be so nice if Mega were just trolling the hell out of us and making a statement on how Photoshop is taken to ridiculous extremes, and then release a nice new cover.

What baffles me now is why companies and publications are driven to completely alter Jinkee’s appearance and make her unrecognizable. Again, she’s not an ugly woman and it makes no sense for them to chop up and trim her features then claim she’s Jinkee, when a simple side-by-side comparison will immediately run that claim into the ground. Now if those photos were approved by Jinkee herself, then she’s not as fearless as she says she is in her ad if she prefers to hide her real face with the magic of Photoshop.

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Here’s a side-by-side comparison of Jinkee behind the scenes and her cover. I’d love to do one with her behind-the-scenes pic and her real actual face pre-surgery.

I was browsing the Cherry Mobile site earlier to see if their phones are looking any better these days, and I have to say I was impressed with what I saw. It might still be a while before I consider getting any one of their phones, although the R7 certainly looks mighty tempting.

A few hops, clicks, and jumps into the site and I landed on their careers page, taking a look at the page for the corporate communications officer and boy, was I disgusted. The first requirement reads, “Female not more than 28 years old”. It disappoints me to no end how jobs here in the Philippines always seem to discriminate quite happily and fearlessly. Jobs should be open to both men and women, and not a single fuck should be given about how old they are. I suppose if a highly skilled and intelligent 32-year-old man went after that corporate communications officer job, he would be immediately turned away. After all, the primary requirement seems to be that the applicant must be female and 28 years old or younger, skills and experience be damned.

That’s Philippine media, or the unfortunate state of media in general nowadays. Now I do not like Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo at all, but I especially dislike how reporters like turning to Joseph Estrada and asking him what he thinks of what’s happening to Arroyo. The man does not disappoint, often seemingly gloating about the fate that befell Arroyo and wondering aloud why he wasn’t treated as well as she is being treated now. It’s just one of thousands of examples showing that here in the Philippines, the vilified never stay vilified for long, and that years down the line, people will still kowtow to you and treat your opinions like gold.

My mother was a dedicated viewer of 100 Days to Heaven on ABS-CBN. I found the show all right and Xyriel Manabat tolerable, unlike many child stars who are too aware of their cuteness and precociousness, and thus turn up these qualities even further. The show itself wasn’t too bad, but I was really rather put off by a scene wherein Connie Reyes’s character Anna Manalastas was berating Valerie Concepcion’s character, who was villainous. Long story short, Anna was telling Valerie’s character that she (Valerie’s) was a failure, because she was unable to bear a child for her husband.

I found it to be a very grim spot in an otherwise harmless TV show, and potentially dangerous. People here already place such a huge premium on having children, saying children are blessings regardless of whether or not the mother-to-be wants the child or is prepared for it. Because children are highly prized, people may start thinking that kids are their lives’ major achievement, and may see themselves in a poor light if they’re unable to have any. Then there’s also the unfortunate thinking that getting pregnant, giving birth, and being a mother is the only thing that can make a woman complete.

I encountered this sort of attitude indirectly, being acquainted with a couple of women who can’t have children. Rather than being sympathetic to their condition, they have been targeted by fellow women who taunt them for being infertile. Apart from being another example of women’s viciousness towards one another, it’s a stark reminder of how women are still primarily viewed: as vessels for infants and nothing more. We could achieve so many things and expand our minds and horizons, and we’re still perceived to be worthless if we can’t have any children and as if we’re being selfish for being infertile and unable to spawn members of the next generation.