E-Sabong: Cockfighting’s Billion-Peso Pandemic Response Measure
From the bustling cockpit arenas to the comforts of people’s homes, how did sabong successfully pivot?
Many admired the game fowls in ancient Greece. The cock’s natural aggressive instinct was perceived as a peerless embodiment of the Greek soldier’s unyielding mettle. Historians believe that the animal was so highly regarded that at the zenith of the Greco-Persian wars in 480 BC, Greek soldiers roared battle chants that honored fighting roosters before going into war. These songs are thought to have been sung like the battle cries dedicated to the god of war, Ares — to gain bravery and strength for war and taunt the opponent.
Greeks so greatly admired the rooster that cockfighting events rivaled gladiator battles. Cockfighting events were extravagant gambling occasions typically enjoyed by young, elite, aristocratic bachelors of ancient Greece. It was very popular among the influential few that it helped bridge the gap between the two rival states Athens and Sparta.
In present-day Philippines, cockfighting (colloquially known as sabong) has become immortalized as a popular pastime, hobby, and source of livelihood. It is celebrated in all 18 regions, with over 2,500 stadiums dedicated to the sport.
While the Filipino sabong is derived from ancient Greece, here, sabong is not an elitist sport. Sabungeros or “sabong aficionados” come from all walks of life. The sabong arena muddles class lines and binds income groups together. There are several business moguls known to be avid cockfight enthusiasts and they happily interact with the majority who have a contemporary working-class background — small business owners, taxi drivers, carpenters, and other blue-collar workers.
As enthusiasts relatively come from a diverse background, sabong has a unique culture. The sabong cockpit is one of the few places where a celebrity CEO will be seen standing in parity with the common tsuper sharing the same desire — the immutable promise that a cock, ideally the opponent’s, will die in the ring. Economist and filmmaker Larry Henares says that “it is the only sport in which millionaires talk to the common folk.”
Today, where most brick-and-mortar establishments are backed into corners, sabong continues to prove its strength and emerge on top. It has adapted and acquired a new target market — that may include you.
History: As Entertaining as the Sport Itself
“Cockfighting will never be declared illegal in the Philippines. There’d be a revolution if it were,” quipped Henares.
In March 2020, as a precautionary measure to combat the COVID-19 virus, the government placed the country in a comprehensive lockdown. All cockfighting events were henceforth banned. While these restrictions evidently stunned the world, some animal rights groups were encouraged that these rules would lead to the end of cockfighting.
Enter online sabong or e-sabong. PAGCOR (Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation), the government-owned and -controlled corporation (GOCC) that is also the governing body in charge of regulating and developing the country’s gaming industry, defines e-sabong as the “online/remote or off-site wagering/betting on live cockfighting matches, events, and/or activities streamed or broadcasted live from cockpit arena/s.”
Although online cockfighting is not new, the industry boomed overnight due to avid sabungeros desperate to preserve their game fowl’s appetite for battle. Back then, partaking in e-sabong was considered a criminal offense.
As have most popular businesses, the cockfighting industry tussled with the harshness of the pandemic before it was able to adjust and attempt to reclaim its former glory. Sometime around May 2020, sabungeros started to livestream and broadcast local cock derbies done in remote farms — without official licenses.
The most noticeable difference between physical sabong and e-sabong lay beyond the kill zone and is found in the sidelines. Present in place of what used to be one of the nation’s most vivacious crowds were only one to two commentators and cameras plastered all over, which was absent in the early forms of e-sabong. This stinging silence, however, allowed tension to creep in a more subtle manner, comparable to a brewing Civil War between fighters. The product of this build-up is an explosion caught by a golden camera angle — the secured money shot of the final blow. Broadcasting rights of e-sabong fights ranged from PHP 12,500 to PHP 15,000.
While this complete overhaul of sabong welcomed newcomers, it also drew in more police presence as it interested more law enforcement to the already trending scene. Thus, to preserve the practice, operators contrived the niftiest modi operandi that no cutting-edge marketing technique could ever top. Among these were complicated entry procedures to throw law enforcers off their scent, the reupholstery of honest FX drivers into fictitious account handlers, and so on.
The measures were worth it. PAGCOR chairperson and CEO Andrea Domingo said that underground e-sabong sites were being ran better than casinos — arguably raking comparable to, if not greater than, the profit from other games.
E-sabong’s commercial success comes at a price, however. A few people have been caught in police-manned e-sabong crackdowns, with the most noteworthy ones involving those in positions of power. Six men were arrested while enjoying online sabong on a projector, including three elected Cebu officials, two town councilors, and an employee of the DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government). Four (then) active police officers were also arrested alongside these men.
Slowly but surely, the government began to sing a different tune.
In October 2020, the DILG lifted the ban on cockfighting in places under Modified General Community Quarantine (MGCQ). Soon after, PAGCOR chairperson Andrea Domingo expressed interest in legitimizing online sabong so that its bettors can be protected and, more importantly, regulated.
The curious move was revealed to be a government ploy to recoup funds lost in its gravely substandard COVID-19 pandemic response. At the latter part of 2020, the House of Representatives presented a bill that aims to measure and impose taxes on e-sabong activities (5 percent of their gross revenue). “[T]his proposal will be one of the few rare opportunities to create a painless revenue stream for our economic recovery,” said Joey Salceda, former governor of Albay. This bill, along with Malacañang giving the green light to PAGCOR’s request to issue e-sabong site licenses, seems to be the shift toward proper regulation.
Today, e-sabong operators take “about 5% bets earnings, ranging from PHP 500,000 to PHP 5 million per fight.” Once regulated and new licenses are duly issued, PAGCOR expects to collect an estimate of PHP 7 billion annually from the revenue of e-sabong matches.
But sabong has always been a billion-dollar industry. Now, it has migrated from the squalid ambience of the traditional ruweda to the sprawling landscape of the internet. Through innovation, it can now look what it is worth.
Money: The Cockfighter’s Grail
As it continues to target intrepid clients looking to earn remotely through their electronic devices, people might wonder if the lofty stories surrounding the virtual sport hold true.
Could one still hope to emulate the lavishness of ancient Greek cockfighting with the new online system?
“Millions pwed kang manalo, dpendi sa taya mo” (One can win millions depending on their bet), said an anonymous source through text.
There are anecdotal accounts of avid e-sabungeros raking in plots of land and cash prizes worth PHP 150,000 in a single sitting. At the heart of sabong, notwithstanding the Cockfighting Law of 1974’s provision that prohibits the sport to be an object of commerce, is betting..“Kahit pambili ng isang kilong bigas tinataya pa” (Even the money set aside for buying rice is gambled), says the same source.
E-sabong sites follow a streamlined registration process reminiscent of Facebook’s registration system. Common information required are the person’s name and phone number. Some sites require more than others depending on their policy.
Once registered, all that is left to do is to load credits, hop on the stream, and look out for the cock with shiny feathers (as per veteran sabungeros’ advice). E-sabong players usually take home anywhere ranging from PHP 2,000 to PHP 15,000.
However, alongside this steady inflow of money comes a detrimental consequence — gambling addiction. Talpak is a popular slang term used to denote online sabong, but it doubles as a cautionary acronym that stands for tirahan, alahas. lupa, pundar, asawa, and kwarta, or “home, jewelry, land, savings, spouse, money” — everything that one stands to lose should they dare enter the world of online sabong.
Addiction: The Cockfighter’s Bane
Charlie “Atong” Ang, cofounder of the Ultimate Fighting Cock Championship (UFCC) and revered “gambling lord,” claims that “Ang pagsusugal talaga, lahat ng tao walang panalo” (In gambling, nobody wins).
Bishop Ruperto Santos has dubbed cockfighting addiction as a major contributor to community problems; aside from gambling, it contributes to the spread of tsismis or fruitless gossip. In fact, sabong is so negatively perceived that common perception dictates that sabungeros spend more on their roosters than on their family. Those swallowed by addiction become reckless and do thoughtless acts — throwing their houses into the pot and seeking help from loan sharks who would later haunt them.
Unfortunately, these tales are the reality for some. Jessie Javier Carlos, a cockfighting connoisseur turned Resorts World gunman; Ariel Laurente, a 41-year-old online sabong–addicted driver who resorted to carnapping in 2018; and Moises Yango, estranged Quezon City corporal turned bank robber, all fell into the deep end because of their addiction.
Cockfighting’s appeal draws in Filipinos from all walks of life, but addiction hangs over the head of every sabungero.
In fact, a Venezuelan study that examined a 40-year-old game fowl dealer details that most cockfighting addicts suffer from Social Addictive Syndrome. The condition is identified through the following nuclear traits:
● An existential organization centered on an uncontrollable appetite for the addictive object;
● Possessive conduct of the object by means of an instinctual act — that is, the realization of a drive that is repeated in close by intervals;
● Rewards, positively experienced as self-realization, accompanied by dopaminergic reinforcement; and
● Negative effects on the individual and his family environment.
Apart from this, it was identified that sabungeros are also more likely to suffer from pathological gambling. Pathological gambling is an official disease recognized in DSM-III, also associated with actions linked with impulse control disorders, personality disorders, and obsessive-compulsive disorders.
In a male-dominated macho environment, unbridled rage, burning passion, and self-exaltation embolden and fuel the sabong arena. In a scientific perspective, however, victors’ boosted egos are a result of neuro-signals that activate their brains’ pleasure circuit. This neurological process explains their craving and the cause of their addiction.
The study also illustrates how the game fowl, the cockfight, and the subculture forcibly narrow the viewers’ consciousness and effectively hijack their capacity and judgment. The spectacle of two angry animals battling it out forcibly blurs a sabungero’s consciousness — hence the reduced capacity for control and self-awareness and distorted rationality.
“If your cock becomes tinola [a Filipino soup dish commonly cooked with chicken], that’s like, the downfall of your ego. You just don’t lose money; you lose your face. And in many ways, you lose your manhood,” says Xiao Chua, renowned Filipino historian.
Life: The cockfighter’s banknote
Biboy Enriquez, world cockfighting champion and owner of Firebird Gamefarm, adds a profound insight to Atong Ang’s abovementioned statement, “Nobody gets rich in gambling, except if you’re the operator of a casino, or you’re the house.”
As sabong grows to be an to be an unbridled pillar of Filipino culture, people forget that despite it being a game of bets, it is also a billion-peso industry that candidly contributes funds to the economy and is a prime source of livelihood for some.
Cockfighting, before being a trend, a segment of culture, or a form of animal cruelty, is first and foremost a business. It has hundreds of thousands of stakeholders spread across the nation, and the fighting rooster is the main capital. The 2002 Philippine Central Product Classification recognizes “game cocks or any male chicken for cockfighting weighing more than 2,000 grams” as a device/product of agriculture, forestry, and fishery. Thus, there is a lot of financing in cockfighting as perceived.
To better explain the business of cockfighting, our anonymous source expounds that there are groups that have adjusted their entire lifestyle to better accommodate cockfighting. Some of these groups are as follows:
- The kristos or bookies who take the reins of the rowdy stand side betting juncture in traditional sabong;.
- The gaffers who attach the tari or blade that the cocks use to injure or kill their opponents;
- The sintinsyadors or referees who uphold fairness and dignity in a blood sport like cockfighting;
- The kasadors who ensure that bets on both sides are somewhat even;
- The handlers who rear the chickens into proper apex predator condition, which ultimately give life to one of the most lucrative businesses in the country; and
- The helpers who assist everyone above.
This list does not include those who help operate the online version of the games.
The ban on cockfighting from March 2020 to October 2020 shut down 1,210 registered cockfighting stadiums in the country. It left many to vulnerably toe the thin line between being part of the lower-income class and poverty. It placed 30,000 breeders into financial crisis and 40 million gamecocks into nutritional dormancy.
Sales for game fowl feeds and nutrition plummeted by 50 percent — estimated to amount to PHP 15 billion. Additionally, the government recorded a loss of around PHP 2,406,260 from international cockfighting derbies.
The boldest argument in support of upholding e-sabong is to defend the people behind it. The motion to ban cockfighting nationwide was a good move and a necessary one. However, now that the sport can be held and connect all 18 regions together in a safe and protocol-abiding manner, some argue that it begets more support to assist one of the nation’s most stigmatized and underserved minorities.
In this regard to stifle and regulate gambling addiction, PAGCOR must act and make it a point to include auxiliary therapy, rehabilitation, and other mental health services. It must also secure that cockfighting employees affected by the COVID-19 pandemic are to be furnished with sufficient government assistance.
“A lot of the guys in the arena, Teody [a cockfighting bettor] says, look at the life of a Filipino overseas worker in Saudi Arabia — the strict rules, the low pay, and the constant stream of news reporting horrific treatment — and decide they’re better off showing up at the cockpit,” wrote Aurora Almendral in a report for NBC .
The people who keep the sabong industry alive, whether directly or indirectly, pit cocks against one another not for the pleasure of spilling poultry blood but for the dream that perhaps one day, they would no longer need to wager their lives for that of a cock’s.
Luis Lagman is a 12th grade student from Quezon City. In his spare time, he is usually sifting through catalogues of Instagram thrift stores and managing his weekly allowance. But these days he also spends his time seeking a balance between his social life and college applications.
