Monthly Archives: July 2011

Union Bank Warns Me About Phishing

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Just receive an email from Union Bank warning me about Phishing. I guess other UnionBank client especially those who got the debit card from them which is called EON Card got the same email too.

Here’s the content.

Dear UnionBank Client,

As an Internet user, you should know about phishing emails. They can appear to be from a well-known company but may put you at risk.

A phishing email generally asks you to click a link in the email and provide, update or confirm sensitive personal information. It may refer to a supposedly urgent or threatening condition concerning your account.

Please note that UnionBank will never send you an email asking for your personal information. You should NOT respond to such email or reveal your PIN or PASSWORD to anyone. Also, Do NOT visit the phishing site, as it is likely to contain a virus or otherwise compromise your confidential information.

I posted it here just to let you know their advise on how to avoid getting phished by phishers.

Reproductive Health Care (RH) Bill and Me

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Guttmacher Institute Argues

The Inquirer published the argument of the Guttmacher Institute which clearly accused Dr. Raul Nidoy of distorting the evidence to support his personal opinion.

The Guttmacher’s letter tries to correct the misuse of its findings by Dr. Nidoy on his letter to the Inquirer, including his opinion against the artificial contraceptives including and particularly birth control pills.

What he actually does is distort the evidence to support his personal views. …

The Guttmacher pointed out:

  1. They found the abortion rate in the Philippines would be reduced by 83 percent if all women who wanted to avoid pregnancy were able to access modern contraceptive methods and use them correctly and consistently.
  2. They also made clear that the claims that the birth control pill is abortifacient is false and a contradiction to all scientific evidence. Birth control pill does not terminate a pregnancy, but only prevents a pregnancy.
  3. They also claimed that Nidoy misrepresents the findings of the Guttmacher study “Relationships Between Contraception and Abortion: A Review of the Evidence” by failing to mention that the study found that in cases where abortion and contraception rose simultaneously in a given country, it was because fertility desires were falling and contraceptive use was not increasing fast enough to meet the desire for smaller families. The study also found that once fertility rates stabilized, abortion rates fell as contraceptive use continued to increase.
  4. They also accused Nidoy of ignoring the evidences that prove the positive effect of having access to the family planning services.

Dr. Raul Nidoy

Dr. Raul Nidoy actually involves in pro-life movement. He is the Director of Personal Formation of Parents for Education Foundation or PAREF as what has been told in his blogger.com profile page.

Talking about Pro-Life, people involve in this movement believe, if I was not mistaken, that sex should be done according to its main purpose which is for procreation. They are against to the use of artificial contraception or any means of birth control including the calendar because they interfere the natural purpose of sex, therefore, should not be used. And I think, this belief is similar to what the Roman Catholic Church teaching.

In contrary to their belief, some protestant sects and other churches, upheld the teaching of the Bible that sex is the gift of God for married couple (man and wife) not just for the procreation purposes but for the couple’s pleasure as well. They also believe that the Bible doesn’t prohibit the use of contraception considering that natural or artificial contraception is used to avoid conception but not to abort any conception.

I Support the RH Bill

Everybody knows that I am member of the Iglesia ni Cristo. The church has already released its official stand and support to the RH Bill. But before this, I was already expressing my support to the said bill here on this Make Money Online blog.

Well, at least I am now sure that my stand regarding the use of safe contraceptives is in accordance to the teachings of the church (INC). And it also clearly means that my spirit is still one with the spirit of the INC administration, not like what happened to a Jesuit priest in De La Salle.

A certain Fr. Bernas openly expressed his positive thoughts about the RH Bill. I don’t know if he really supported the RH Bill. But his thought about the RH Bill is in contrast to the official stand of the church he was affiliated with which is the Roman Catholic Church. The Catholic Church until now teaches its members that the use of artificial contraception is prohibited. I was even confused to its belief that any means of artificial contraception including the use of condom are abortifacient.

I don’t know if my understanding about abortifacient is correct. For me the term abortifacient refers to something or some ways that will result to abortion. And based on what I learned from science as thought to us since elementary, life begins when the egg cell of woman has been fertilized by the sperm cell of man. So, I think, condom should not be considered abortifacient considering that condom is used to avoid the fertilization of the egg cell by the sperm cell.

But why I am supporting the RH Bill?

I know that the RH Bill still needs to be refined. However, I believe that our country needs a law on reproductive health not just for the benefit of women and children but for the whole Filipino families as well.

What about the pills and injectibles? They are abortifacient! And the RH Bill promotes these abortifacient devices!

I know that there are pills and injectibles that are abortifacient or are used for abortion. But not all pills and injectibles used for contraception are abortifacient.

Actually, my wife uses injectable contraceptive. But its use is mainly to avoid ovulation. And when there’s no ovulation, then there will be no egg cell that will be fertilized by the sperm cell. And since there is no fertilization happened, then there is no conception. Therefore, there will be no abortion.

Besides, it is clearly stated in the RH Bill that abortion is still unlawful. In other words, those abortifacient medicine and devices will not be included on the artificial contraception that will be promoted by the government to its citizens.

But isn’t it true that God told men to go to the world and multiply and fill the earth? Controlling the population growth is clearly against God’s teaching!

I don’t think that God told men “to go the world and multiply and then fill the earth” ONLY. I am reading the Bible too. And what I found here is that God told men to:

  1. Be fruitful
  2. Multiply
  3. Fill the Earth
  4. Subdue it

So, controlling or subduing the multiplication is also a commandment of God. But we should take note that what has been written in the Bible is just “Subdue It” not “Stop It.” In other words, we are told to control the multiplication but not to stop the multiplication.

But what should we use to control the multiplication? Of course, we should use the methods and devices that do not violate other laws and teachings of God.

For example: God told us not to kill man. So, we should not kill anyone including the fetus inside the mother’s womb. Aborting the pregnancy is an act of killing, and therefore a violation of God’s commandment.

Finale

I still have lots of things to say. And I think, I will just update this post later. I know some of the things I said here might touch your pride. I understand that everyone of us has our own opinion regarding the RH Bill and or the artificial contraceptives. And what I said here are my opinion too.

Thank you so much for reading this.

Sustines Laplana

Google Plus, GoDaddy and Blogging

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Vacation is Over

I have just returned home from my more than a week vacation in Oteiza with my family.

My stay in Oteiza was just short but it’s worth a year already. It was actually my first time travelling from Leyte to Mindanao through the Suzuki Carry. At first, I felt nervous when I was on my way to the Ferry boat considering that we’re experiencing heavy waves brought by the typhoon Falcon at that time and I was afraid that I might make mistakes in going inside the ro-ro vessel. I just felt better when I was successful in properly parking the van inside the vessel.

But when the ro-ro vessel started to cross the Surigao Straight, I was in trouble again when my wife and our son, CJ, felt dizzy. I prayed hard at that time asking God that I might be saved from dizziness. I should stay firm because they were already weak after vomiting for several times.

I was thankful that we’re aboard the Super Shuttle Ferry which is the fastest ro-ro vessel in Liloan-Lipata terminal. We arrived in Lipata (Surigao City) in three hours. If it happens that we’re aboard the Maharlika vessels, I don’t know what will happen to us because these vessels are too slow.

Visited Enchanted River in Hinatuan

Along with my brother and sister and her husband, we went to Hinatuan – Surigao Sur to attend the wedding of our neighbour. But we just directly proceeded to the reception because we’re late. By the afternoon in our way back home, we visited first the Hinatuan’s Enchanted River.

The Hinatuan’s Enchanted River is one of the tourist destinations in Surigao del Sur, along with the Tinuy-an Falls in Bislig, Britania Islets in San Agustin (Oteiza), and Lanuza’s Surfing. It is located in Barangay Talisay, Hinatuan, Surigao del Sur. It’s at least 12 kilometers from the National Highway. And with the Suzuki Carry which is obviously a smaller car, we travelled through the unlevelled, uncemented or not asphalted road for almost an hour in going to the Enchanted Hinatuan River location and almost 30 minutes in going back to the National Highway.

This tourist spot features a wonderful river where water flows from the underground river. I don’t know yet how deep the featured part of the river is or the part near the cave’s small opening. The guy that I talked with told me that there were divers who tried to measure the depth of the river but they failed to rich the floor. The water looks blue which certainly main that it is really deep. There are times, however, that it is very clear of which you can almost see the bottom of it and the fishes in it.

What really makes this river wonderful is the presence of the small and big fishes. At 12 noon to 1:00PM visitors are not allowed to swim in the river for it is fish feeding time. But you’ll enjoy watching the fishes jumping from the river to catch the food that the handler throws into them.

San Agustin’s Great Britain

On the next day, we visited our town’s tourist spot, the Britania Islets. Actually, we did not hop from islet to the other. We just toured the shore of the Barangay Britania (San Agustin) especially the facilities of the La Entrada Resort, including the low-cost hotel accommodation, cottages, the restaurant, the islands’ view deck and their boat that will carry tourists during their island hopping activities.

The La Entrada Resort is owned by our former Mayor, now Vice Governor Manuel Alameda. We’re thankful to our neighbour Exomar Quevedo who served as our tour guide.

By the way, there are 7 islets that you can hop with, if I was not mistaken. Among these islets are the Hiyud-hiyuran island, naked island and Boslon island. When Ms Quevedo told us the names of these islets, I just couldn’t control myself from laughing. These names seem “bastos” to me.

Google Plus

By the way, I just learned today that Google has launched its new social networking site that will compete with Facebook. Google called it, Google Plus or Google+.

I tried checking it immediately but Google Plus is available only to those who received special invites and those who are not invited to try the new product will received this message:

Nasa limitadong Pagsubok sa Field ang Google+1.

Sa ngayon, sumusubok kami kasama ang maliit na bilang ng mga tao, ngunit hindi magtatagal bago maging handa para sa lahat ang proyektong Google+1. Iwanan sa amin ang iyong email address at titiyakin namin na una kang makakaalam kapag handa na kaming mag-imbita ng higit pang tao.

Palagi Akong Balitaan

Naimbita na? Pansamantala kaming lumagpas sa aming kapasidad. Pakisubukang muli sa lalong madaling panahon.

I wonder if people will spend their time creating new accounts and connecting with friends at the Google Plus just like what they did from Friendster to Facebook.

GoDaddy

Another thing that got my attention is the news about the selling of the GoDaddy.com.

According to the reports, GoDaddy or the company who owned the Godaddy.com was bought by a group of private investment firms for 2.25 Billion Dollars. These firms are KKR, Silver Lake and Technology Crossover Ventures. The sale was announced by GoDaddy on Friday.

Actually, I was a member of the GoDaddy for several years already. I managed to register and maintain several domains with them. But the number of domains that I owned is just nothing compared to the total number of domains that Go Daddy has registered. According to some sources, Go Daddy is currently managing more or less 48 Million domain names already.

I am currently wondering if it is still safe to stay with GoDaddy or I should start looking for another domain registrar.

Finale

Before, ending this post, thank so much for reading this journal. I don’t know when could I write again articles about blogging and making money online.

Yours,

Sustines Laplana