MANILA, Philippines ? Years ago, on the occasion of my birthday, I was brought to a strip joint on San Francisco?s Broadway Street by a couple of friends who wanted to show me what the City by the Bay was all about. Being, as it were, fresh off the boat then, I felt rather overwhelmed. It was like stepping into an X-rated movie. I had barely sat on a stool when a blonde, perhaps barely out of her teens and, save for high heels and oversized earrings, bare as she was when she came out of her mother?s womb, came up to me and started grinding her butt on my groin.

My pals were as boisterous as hyenas circling their prey. ?It?s ok,? one yelled over the din. ?We?ve taken care of that already.? The other piped in, ?If you don?t like her, there?s plenty more out here.? And he was right. Girls in various stages of nakedness were roaming like livestock in a fair.

Saying thanks but no thanks, I gently shoved the girl away. I wanted to look for her father and beat the crap out of him. What self-respecting father would let his daughter go into something like this? I also wanted to bolt and go home and hold my then two young daughters as tightly as I could.

I felt so sad that night.

I relate this passage in the rippling wake of the video sex scandal starring Hayden Kho and an assortment of unsuspecting young women. I was asked to write about it from the perspective of a father?as in, what would I do if one of the girls in the videos were my daughter? My instantaneous reaction was: You know what? My daughters would know better than get involved with a sleazebag like that.

But the question does persist: What if? Well, I?ll drop everything and be with her until she gets her head back on her shoulders. I will let her cry as much as she wants and tell her everything is all right because she?s in her Daddy?s arms and no harm will ever come to her again. I won?t even ask her to tell me anything. No explanations, no excuses. If I have to tell her anything at all, it would be to remind her that I?ll be there for her and that it?s time for her to move on.

But what about the guy? Well, what about him? Wouldn?t I want to rip his thing off him? Not really. That, for me, would be descending into the sewer.

Would I be at least angry with him? More sad, actually, than angry. By doing what he did, he has destroyed himself.

In fact, I feel rather sorry for Kho. He seemed to be young enough to be my son. And if he were my son? I?d tell him to suck it up and face the music. I?d also tell him I would still be there for him, though at the back of my mind, my question would be: How did this guy ever get a medical degree? And without being too judgmental, if that were possible, what kind of upbringing did he have?

Still I hope that one day, he could redeem himself. And he could start by shedding his cowardice and taking responsibility for his acts, instead of blaming drugs and all the piffle he has been pathetically dishing out.

But what I am really angry about is the hypocrisy swirling about this sordid issue, and I am not just referring to the congressional phonies (led by a senator, whose self-righteous pronouncements remind me of the pot calling the kettle black) who have largely ignored the more critical issues, such as the immorality of tampering with the Constitution for personal gain, the ZTE broadband scandal, the Joc-joc fertilizer scam, etc.

I am referring largely to us, as a society. Not too many of us are really incensed by this desecration. Check out spankwire.com, or in isohunt.com, type in ?Philippine scandal? or, que barbaridad!, ?Ateneo de Manila Sex Scandal Part 2,? (Was Hayden an Atenean?) and see how many hits these sites have gotten.

Many Filipino fathers would rant about tearing Hayden?s head off, if those were their daughters in the video, but later they?d be salivating over these illicit images in the secrecy of their computers.

They?d also be disappointed at the video which also features an alleged Brazilian model, because the webcam was aimed too high toward the ceiling. ?Harang!?

I am also sure not a few men and women alike, knowing that one of the girls in the videos is a ?bold? (Do they still call it that?) actress, are saying she, the unsuspecting ?star,? got what she deserved for acting like a slut in the movies.

We rail and wail against the corrupt and the immoral, and yet we hail and thus aspire to be like them.

Once, over dinner with friends, the editor of a leading newspaper asked in the wake of another Arroyo scandal: ?Where is the outrage??

If we take a collective look at ourselves in the mirror, I?m pretty sure we?ll know where the wrath has gone.