Teodoro Locsin Jr., the Philippines’ top diplomat, believes that it’s his duty to stop stupidity, and that’s why he is never getting off Twitter.
Locsin said this today during an interview on the ANC talk show Headstart, where he also expressed his regret for calling Vice President Leni Robredo “stupid” on Twitter.
The former journalist has gotten into trouble several times because of his tweets. Aside from the Robredo episode, he courted controversy in 2016 after he tweeted anti-Semitic remarks, which he later apologized for. He also caused confusion when he tweeted in January that a contractor in charge with printing passports stole the public’s data, only for the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) to later say that all passport data is “safe” and remains in their custody.
Asked by host Karen Davila today if he has any plans to leave Twitter because of the controversies his tweets have gotten him into, Locsin said he can’t even if he wants to.
“No. I would want to get out of Twitter but then I can’t. I have this obligation which was inculcated in me by my father, [when I was] working in The Philippine Free Press [Magazine] that I cannot allow stupidity to flourish,” he said.
Locsin believes that by tweeting, he’s fulfilling his obligation to obliterate stupidity in society.
“When it lies in my power to do something about it, I feel it’s my patriotic duty to stop stupidity. It’s the greatest threat to our country.”
This stupidity, he said, is prevalent on Twitter.
“I encounter, how politely can I put this? I encounter less than the intelligence that I can expect from a fellow human being [on Twitter]. Then I blow up, but sometimes I don’t. I let it go.”
His tendency to “blow up” became apparent late last month after he lambasted Robredo in a tweet when the vice president called out the DFA for its decision to cancel all diplomatic passports following Hong Kong’s refusal to let former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario enter the Chinese special administrative region. Del Rosario used a diplomatic passport to enter Hong Kong.
Robredo, a lawyer, pointed out that the law prohibits the government from canceling del Rosario’s diplomatic passport because he has done nothing wrong. This led Locsin to lash out at Robredo on Twitter but later apologized for his behavior.
Locsin still appeared apologetic for what he said to the vice president today.
“I said sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I then realized that not only have I hurt her feelings, but I hurt her children’s feelings [too]. And I hope they’ll never forgive me for that because you never hurt children.”
When asked if he has personally reached out to Robredo, he said, “As far as I’m concerned, I wouldn’t accept me reaching out to her. That’s just the way it is. I never fool myself. When I do wrong, I do wrong.”
Locsin said that he’ll do his best to control his emotions whenever he’s online, but he also has a warning for those who annoy him on Twitter.
“I’ll make a great effort to try to change that but sometimes I will fail. Therefore, this is a warning to all of you out there. I will do my best but don’t push me.”
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