By Wilnard Bacelonia | Philippine News Agency
The Department of Education (DepEd) on Thursday warned that efforts to prevent school violence should look beyond social media, saying violent content from foreign incidents, YouTube, and even regular television programs may contribute to copycat behavior among vulnerable young people.
DepEd Undersecretary Malcolm Garma raised the concern during a Senate hearing on the recent school shootings in Tacloban and Zamboanga City, pointing out that violent incidents abroad can now reach Filipino students almost instantly through digital platforms.
“If we really would like to call out yung platforms natin, baka hindi lang po yung sa local, hindi lang yung nag-emanate here in the Philippines but also those emanating from other countries,” Usec. Garma said.
He cited a shooting in Thailand that had gone viral shortly before the Zamboanga incident, although he stressed that DepEd could not say whether it influenced what happened at Ateneo de Zamboanga University Junior High School campus.
Garma said the broader concern is the possibility of imitation.
“Copycat is actually a phenomenon po. Kaya, there’s really [a] strong tendency that it can be copied,” he said.
He added that DepEd has received feedback pointing to YouTube content as an influence in the earlier Tacloban case, highlighting the difficulty of controlling the wide range of material accessible to children online. But Garma said the issue should not stop with the internet.
Children in areas with limited connectivity may still be exposed to violent themes through traditional television, prompting him to suggest that policymakers also examine the content of regular programs.
“Baka it’s also high time to review the content of our regular programs. If you can observe, marami ho tayong programs, yung mga regular drama programs natin, has something to do with hatred, with anger, with revenge, with the use of firearms,” Garma told members of the Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality.
He noted that television remains widely accessible even where internet access is limited, making traditional media another potential source of influences that children absorb.
The concern forms part of DepEd’s broader effort to examine how external influences, individual motivations, and behavior interact in cases of school violence while strengthening security and preventive interventions inside schools.
DepEd has also been strengthening school threat assessments, psychosocial interventions and preparedness measures as it seeks to prevent another violent incident without turning campuses into heavily fortified environments.
