"Jejemon": The Story Within

I don't know where the battle between pro-'jejemons' and the anti-'jejemons' started or where or how. But as far as I'm concerned, the debate and battle between the two major factions (if we ignore the neutral ones) has been utterly misleading.

The time at my laptop is 9:50 PM. I was watching 'My Darling Aswang' and when the commercials were broadcasted, I changed channels, trying to find a good one to serve as temporary source of entertainment while TV5 was broadcasting commercials. Suddenly, my eye caught this text on the tv: "Jejemon: Nakakabobo?". Then my interest shifted, from the comedic and entertaining 'My Darling Aswang' to an episode of 'Mel & Joey' which is around an issue which is fastly gaining popularity in the people. Well, as I observed the two factions present arguments supporting and defaming 'jejemons', one argument presented by the pro-'jejemons' furthered my interest on the topic. This is what happened. One of the host, (I can't remember who because I wasn't paying much attention to what the two host say because I only cared at what the debaters presented) asked 'Where did the jejenese language started?' and one of the pro-'jejemons' said that it begun among Filipinos, saying that we get bored and try to be creative and to keep ourselves entertained and so we text each other and blah, blah, etc, etc. Now there comes one big problem. Because as far as I know, 'jejenese' (the so-called language of 'jejemons') didn't originate from Filipinos and it wasn't intended for texting either or wide-spread public use! The first 'language' that resembled modern-day 'jejenese' is the 'Leetspeak'. Leetspeak is an alternative alphabet for the English language that is used primarily on the Internet. Now, I earlier said that 'jejemon' wasn't intended for public use. That's a fact. Why? Here's the reason: during the 80's, in order to bypass filters used by BBS or IRC system operators in order to prevent people from posting 'illegal topics' (e.g. 'Hacking', 'Cracking', etc, etc), creative misspellings were used. The original users of the so-called 'Jejemon' or more formally, 1337 (leet, which originated from the word 'elite') were what we call 'hackers'. Now, as time passed by, skiddies (script kiddies- amateur hackers who use exploits which were previously used and publicly disclosed by other 'more professional' hackers) begun to use leet, and before we knew it, it's use was widespread in the internet, from BBS's and forums, to the IRC's, to SMS, etc, etc. And because use of the 'jejenese' (leet) was widespread in the Philippines, Filipinos begun to think that 'jejenese' originated from the Philippines and I don't know how, but allegedly, as an argument presented by one of the pro-jejemons debaters, foreigners begun to criticize Filipinos for using 'Jejenese', saying "we're the only race in the world who uses such 'language' widespread"... Although it seems impossible because the fact that leet is widespread all over the world is not negligible, I still can't rule out the possible so, "How can foreigners say such if the leet language originated from them?' And so folks, here ends my blog entry with an instant ending with no conclusion. Bye!