Manila, Philippines - I have been a commuter in Manila and in my two and a half year experience living here, LRT (Manila Light Rail Transit) is one of the convenient mode of mass transportation. Everyday, there will be an estimate of 760,000 (2015 data) people riding the trains who are going to work or go to school. It simply is one of the most influential place to put announcements and advertisements and it has, well, mostly for commercial ads.

But last night as I took the train, I was surprised to see three posters that bear valuable social messages to the people. Those were statements of ending violence against women, anti-human trafficking with relevant hotlines, and of favoring gender equality. You might wonder why I used the word “surprised” and the reason is that in my everyday commuting, most of the posters I see on trains and train stations are of commercial ones like different brands of junk food, facial care, lotion, liquor, movies, and even condoms. This has been a big leap.

Photos by Diinsider

As an advocate of these social issues, I was really happy and supportive of the initiative. Although I could criticize them for the fact that they rarely do these campaigns despite being a government entity, but rather I did not bother. Instead, I thought maybe this could be a great start of opening up conversations on these issues and in any way I would like to be supportive of the effort.

So this coming Monday where people return to their jobs and schools from the long Christmas and New Year break, it would be great to think that thousands of people would encounter these posters and that will hopefully spark critical thinking to themselves, a thing we rarely do these days amidst the era of fake news and nonsense internet contents.

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