What Colombians value most is family and work. In fact, a Colombian’s mother could be considered the most important thing to them. Even for hitmen and drug dealers, their mother is the most important thing. Pablo Escobar was an example of this, in fact. He valued his mother and his wife greatly.
There’s a very famous story where he ordered an abortion for a child he had with a prostitute because he was married, and it was inconceivable for him to have a child outside of marriage.
For a Colombian, after family and work, God comes next in importance. I’m speaking generally, for example, about the constant duality that some people live in, where praying and sinning go hand in hand. There’s a popular saying: “He who sins and prays breaks even.” “El que peca y reza empata”.
There’s a very popular series in Colombia called La Virgen de los Sicarios (The Virgin of the Hitmen). In the series, it’s common to see hitmen praying to the Virgin Mary for their murders to go smoothly and for no one to pursue them. One might think that this series doesn’t reflect real life because it’s fiction, but that actually happens in reality.
Drug dealers and hitmen wear rosaries of the Virgin. Colombians seem to have internalized this duality in life, where praying brings good luck, regardless of whether what they’re doing is wrong.
People also justify their actions by claiming necessity. Sometimes, people excuse their bad behavior by saying they don’t have money or something similar, but I think that’s a lie🤣🤣
People are always looking to justify their mistakes. I learned to eliminate that from my life because I started spending more time with Americans in business settings and began reading and listening to Naval Ravikant and Nassim Taleb.
Family and Work: The Most Valued
According to data from this survey—World Values Survey, Invamer, and Raddar—it was found that for Colombians, the most important things are family (99%), work as a social duty (97%), leisure time (89%), and religion (77%). The majority agree that “God is very important” in their lives (92%). The most preferred values considered “essential in upbringing” are good manners (90%), tolerance toward others (78%), and a sense of responsibility (73%).
For 95% of those surveyed, it’s very important that their parents are proud of them; lower and middle classes feel a duty to provide care for their parents in old age.
Politics is one of the least valued aspects (72% are not interested), but there is a desire to give more importance to technology (71%). More and more, Colombians value individual effort and hard work as a means to achieve results.
The issue is that, in general terms, I feel that the survey can’t measure the true values of some people because values only come into play when there’s a chance to betray them or act wrongly.
That is, many people might say that family is most important or that they wouldn’t lie, but at the same time, they’d do it without thinking if the opportunity arose. I believe this trait is very characteristic of Latinos and Colombians: they don’t know how to think long-term. They live day by day, to the limit.
Map of Cultures
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