Can the wolf and lamb ever lie down together?

Can the wolf and lamb ever lie down together?
GOD'S WORD TODAY By Manoling V. Francisco, S.J. (The Philippine Star) Updated December 05, 2010 12:00 AM Comments (0)

A mother was in a quandary as to what to serve her children for dinner. The eldest demanded, “As an animal activist I refuse to eat meat. Haven’t you seen how they mercilessly slaughter cows, pigs and chickens? It’s obviously immoral to eat meat! And any rational person can see that.”
But the other son protested, “I don’t care about the feelings and rights of chickens. As a body builder, I need all the protein I can get and so I expect meat to be served in this house.”
Then a daughter interjected, “And I will only eat organic food products. Don’t you all realize how harmful fertilizers are to the earth and to our bodies?”
The youngest daughter asserted, “But most of those organic foods are imported and expensive. As a nationalist, I will eat only what has been produced locally.”
We all yearn for the peaceable kingdom where wolf and lamb, leopard and kid, calf and young lion lie down together. In a pluralistic society of Catholics, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists and many others, we desire to be protected by the State and to co-exist harmoniously.
With regard the RH Bill controversy, I am gladdened that so many Catholic groups are raising their voices, expressing their moral convictions. But I am afraid that many of us Catholics have difficulty navigating, on the one hand, being faithful to our religious beliefs, and, on the other hand, living in a pluralistic democracy.
Various religious communities in our society have varying moral compasses. While the Catholic Church disallows the use of artificial contraceptives, which I do affirm, we must reckon with the fact that mainstream Protestant communities, such as the Methodists and Episcopalians, leave it up to married couples to decide whether to use artificial contraceptives or not. Such Christian communities uphold the conscience decision of married couples among their flock.
On the other hand many Evangelical Protestant communities forbid the use of artificial contraceptives. Like the official Catholic stance, their position is that the prevention of conception when possible is immoral.

But there are many other moral issues that divide us. The dietary customs of Muslims forbid them from eating pork, which may seem trivial to Filipino Catholics who will never give-up on lechon and crispy pata. However, for devout Muslims and Jews, maintaining interior purity by avoiding anything deemed unclean, food particularly, is a serious moral issue.

As a final illustration of our religious differences regarding moral issues, Seventh Day Adventists, popularly known as Sabadistas, consider the practice of blood transfusion immoral. Many Sabadistas will refuse blood transfusion for their child suffering from dengue fever, even though the child’s platelet count drops to a critical level — out of religious and moral convictions.
What happens when we all impose our moral convictions on the State, on Congress particularly, to legislate laws that are in accord with our respective moral frameworks? What if Muslims Filipinos demand Congress to illegalize the sale and consumption of pork? What if Seventh Day Adventists pressure Congress to illegalize blood transfusions? Living in a religiously and culturally pluralistic society demands respect of the other from each and everyone.
On the other hand, does the recognition of the diversity of religious and moral views imply tolerance of any and all actions? Are we to embrace relativism and turn a blind eye to what is morally offensive to us in order to live peaceably with the other? Or does our Constitution as a nation enshrine common ground, such as the inviolability of human life? In this regard, no major religious tradition condones abortion; neither does our Constitution. Hence, the issue is to certify that the sale and use of medically ascertained abortifacients be declared illegal.
The bigger problem has to do with moral issues beyond the scope of our common ground, such as the use of artificial contraceptives by married couples. Whose voice is heard or ignored? Who dominates the public deliberation? Who imposes its moral stance on the State or Congress? On the part of the State, whose moral position is it to favor? The majority’s? The most influential religious group’s? How is the State to serve all its citizens of varying religious persuasions? How is the State to uphold the separation of Church and State?
As Catholics, we still yet have to learn to negotiate living in a religiously-diverse and democratic society. Each of us desires that what we deem immoral be legislated as illegal, so that the laws of the nation prove consistent with our moral principles. Easier said than done, for various communities within the nation, each with rights and obligations to the State and other citizens, have certain common non-negotiables, but also varying and conflicting moral positions.
To end, this does not imply resignation to religious and moral differences among ourselves. Rather, we are all called to know, appropriate and live out the moral teachings of our respective faith communities. Second, our religio-moral convictions compel us to articulate and defend them, which includes denouncing State laws that are contrary to ours. Third, but we will also have to grant others the same right to live out and defend their religious and moral convictions. Fourth, through deliberations with other religious communities and the State, we ideally arrive at common moral principles. Nonetheless, there will always be areas of conflict and difference. Lasltly regarding our differences, the challenge pertains to remaining true to ourselves, while allowing others to similarly remain faithful to their own religious convictions; that is, proclaiming and witnessing to our faith convictions without coercing or imposing on others.

*      *      *

Fr. Manoling Francisco, SJ is a prolific composer of liturgical music and serves on the faculty of the Loyola School of Theology. For feedback on this column, e-mail mailto:tinigloyola@%20yahoo.com

Marcos at the Libingan? Maybe, but with conditions

Marcos at the Libingan? Maybe, but with conditions

By Benjamin Pimentel
INQUIRER.net First Posted 13:59:00 04/20/2011 Filed Under: history, Government, Graft & Corruption, death notices, Human Rights, Politics
SAN FRANCISCO—Ferdinand Marcos at the Libingan ng Mga Bayani?
In the spirit of the Lenten Season, even though some of my friends would probably strongly object, I’ll say: Maybe, but with conditions.
First off, the Marcoses, led by Bongbong, Imelda and Imee, must make the following statement:
“We apologize for the serious harm Ferdinand Marcos caused the Filipino nation during his 21-year reign. Still, we ask that you allow us to bury him at the Libingan ng Mga Bayani based on his service as a soldier during World War II, even if though he did exaggerate his war record.”
That’s it. Roughly 50 words. It’s really a pretty tame, some would even say lame, statement. But we can start there, since there has never been a statement like that from the Marcoses since the fall of the regime.
We’ll take it. We can use it. We can have the statement translated into every major Philippine language, put it on huge plaque, and place it in a prominent spot at the Libingan.
Now that's just Step. No. 1. From there, we move on to another concern: how to rename the cemetery.
Former Senator Rene Saguisag, a veteran of the movement that ousted the dictator, proposes renaming it “Libingan ng Mga Bayani at Pangulo.” Since his supporters are focused on Marcos’s military record, then maybe the name should be “Libingan ng Mga Bayani at Sundalo.”
Now, in case the Marcoses still don’t get the point here, let’s spell it out more clearly.
There may be room for discussion—a very narrow one—based on the fact that Marcos was a soldier (even though he had an overactive imagination in recalling what he did during the war) and an ex-president (even if he did end up on the list of the world’s most corrupt rulers.)
But on one point, there’s no room for debate: Marcos was no a hero—and any attempt to portray him as one is a cynical lie.
In fact, some Filipinos from a small island in the middle of the archipelago take an even harder line. The editors of the Bohol Standard believe that, if Marcoses get their way, the new name should be “Libingan ng Mga Buwaya.” That’s going too far. It would also be an insult to the true heroes buried at the Libingan. And a Facebook user joked that it would be also be an affront to crocodiles.
In any case, the debate rages.
Meanwhile, the son of the most famous victim of the dictatorship is sitting on the sidelines. That’s the most puzzling twist in this controversy. After all, this is such an important issue that the nation’s leader cannot afford not to lead.
Besides, Noynoy’s “I-am-biased-so-I-should-not-decide” excuse doesn’t make sense. For in his supposed desire for impartiality, he passed the buck on to someone who was not exactly neutral during the Marcos years.
Before he became vice president, and before he turned into the Makati political kingpin who out-campaigned Mar Roxas, Jojo Binay was one of the fighting lawyers of Mabini who waged battle on the legal frontlines in the long struggle against the dictatorship.
The first time I saw him in action was in the early 1980s in a Quezon City courtroom when he was one of the lawyers defending the staff of WE Forum, the opposition newspaper Marcos shut down for daring to tell the truth about the regime, including the dictator’s wild fantasies about being a dashing hero during World War 2.
Hopefully, Binay will remember his days as a lawyer-warrior, defending not only the prominent opponents of the regime, but also the ordinary Filipinos who fought back during that dark period.
Hopefully, he will honor the memory of other human rights champions, including the late Pepe Diokno, Lorenzo Tanada and his old ally Dr. Nemesio Prudente, who died just three years ago, and who was jailed and suffered two attempts on his life because of his commitment to social justice.
Hopefully, there won’t be a shameless compromise on this issue, an “areglo” based on a twisted definition of “national reconciliation.”
The fact is many of us who are against Marcos at the Libingan are not against reconciliation. I personally am open to compromise. But not if compromise or reconciliation means distorting history, or worse, manipulating Filipinos into simply ignoring what happened to our country under Marcos.
And clearly, the Marcos forces have been counting on Filipinos forgetting.
And so to the Marcos camp we should say this: Acknowledge what happened and apologize—then the discussions can begin.
Otherwise, forget about us forgetting what happened during the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos.
And forget about trying to repackage that frozen corpse up north into something that it’s not. For Marcos was and will always be remembered as one of the most brutal and corrupt leaders in our nation’s history.
Copyright 2011 by Benjamin Pimentel.

We should not demonize Ferdinand Marcos (Because to demonize him is to make it appear like he wasn’t real)

By Benjamin Pimentel
INQUIRER.net First Posted 14:58:00 04/15/2011 Filed Under: Human Rights, Politics, political killings, Government

SAN FRANCISCO—Ferdinand Marcos’s allies complain that he’s been demonized in the media and the schools. I agree with one aspect of that complaint: We shouldn’t demonize Ferdinand Marcos.
Because to demonize him is to make it appear like he wasn’t real— like he was just some scary, but made up character. Like a villain in a sci-fi or horror movie. Like Darth Maul in ‘Star Wars,’ or that demon who looks like Darth Maul in the more recent movie ‘Insidious.’
Marcos was real. And what our country went through under him was painfully real.
Many are understandably outraged over the ongoing campaign to rehabilitate the late dictator, to transform him into some heroic figure who deserves to be buried in a sacred place.
But there’s at least one good thing that’s come out of this debate on whether Marcos should be buried at the Libingan ng Mga Bayani: We’re talking about Marcos again.
And we should keep talking. And we should get young Filipinos involved in the conversation. For they should know and understand what we went through.
Now, I’m not talking about Nazi-style brainwashing, in which young Pinoys are made to swallow a drab list of facts and figures about the regime. And I don’t think we should teach that chapter of our history in good-versus-evil terms.
Instead, young people should be encouraged to think critically. You don’t do that by censoring information, banning books, or restricting access to the Web. That’s Marcos’s way—the way of tyrants.
Instead, let’s expose young Pinoys to as much information about that period. And we should even include, and perhaps even start with, the information put out by the dictatorship.
By all means, have young Filipinos soak in all the TV coverage of Marcos and Imelda at the height of their power. Let them view hours and hours of footage of Imelda entertaining foreign guests and looking beautiful and glamorous—since some apparently believe that such spectacles were proof of how much better things were back then.
Let them listen to Marcos’s speeches, and have them read all his executive orders and official pronouncements. Heck, even let them read “The Filipino Ideology” (though I suspect that may be considered a form of torture.)
But then, let’s also have them read the books chronicling the abuses of the regime, the reports from the alternative press during those years, those put out by publications Marcos shut down or tried to shut down.
They should see the photos and video clips of those who were tortured and massacred, of the displaced peasants and factory workers who were brutally dispersed by police.
Let’s have young Pinoys watch the brilliant documentaries about that era, especially the classic “To Sing Our Own Song” featuring the late Senator Pepe Diokno. They should go over the thousands of articles and the reels of footage on the assassination of Ninoy Aquino and the upheaval that followed.
I’m sure Amnesty International still has boxes and boxes of files that documented one atrocity after another, one torture after another, one gruesome act of political violence after another.
Young Filipinos should go over those reports and others from other human rights organizations. They should go on field trips to the Bantayog ng mga Bayani, to learn about all the martyrs who fought and died fighting against dictatorship.
By all means, let’s expose young Filipinos to all these materials. Let’s expose them to all the claims and counter-claims about what we went through. There should even be spirited debates. We should acknowledge policies the regime embraced that made sense.
Nothing should be held back.
One debate I personally find useful focused on what it means to have a strong government. For clearly, the Philippines has needed one badly for a long time. But clearly, there’s a huge difference between strong government and brutal government.
Marcos created a brutal government, and one that also landed him on the list of the most corrupt leaders in world history.
I’m willing to bet that young Filipinos, once they get the real, complete picture, will decide that yes, Philippine democracy may be messy and chaotic, and that there’s still much work to be done to create a more just society, but it still is far superior to, and more humane than, authoritarian rule.
This is not about being vindictive or hateful. It’s about learning from our past, so we don’t fall into the trap of believing demagogues and tyrants—those who claim to have all the answers, and who say they deserve all the power.
We should not demonize Marcos. The reality our country endured was scary enough, painful enough to serve as a powerful reminder that we must never ever let anything like it happen again.
Copyright 2011 by Benjamin Pimentel. On Twitter @KuwentoPimentel

ANALYSIS: Marcos burial resolution tears to shreds Edsa mandate

By Amando Doronila
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:53:00 04/11/2011

Filed Under: Congress, Edsa 1
MANILA, Philippines—House Resolution No. 1135 seeking the burial of the late strongman Ferdinand Marcos at Libingan ng mga Bayani turned on its head the policy mandate of the 1986 Edsa People Power Revolution that toppled his 14-year dictatorship.
The resolution signed by 216 congressmen flagrantly defied the sovereign will of the people expressed by their uprising in the streets on Feb. 22-25, 1986, restoring democracy dismantled by Marcos when he declared martial law on Sept. 21, 1972.
The House move signaled the start of the campaign initiated by Marcos’ family and political heirs to restore the dictator’s political legacy through the burial of his body on the hallowed grounds of the heroes’ cemetery, according him the honors of a national hero.
This is all in defiance of the mandate of Edsa I.
The campaign to rehabilitate Marcos immediately whipped up a storm of controversy over the issue of the whether he deserved to be buried at the military cemetery, burial grounds of outstanding citizens of the Republic, including two past Presidents (Diosdado Macapagal and Carlos P. Garcia), military leaders and men of letters.
The charge against the House resolution was led by the powerful Catholic Church, which was the Marcos regime’s principal protagonist during the dictatorship.
The Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP), the largest organized group of Catholic schools and institutions, issued a strongly worded statement on the commemoration of Araw ng Kagitingan, honoring Filipino soldiers who fought heroically to resist the superior force of Japanese invaders in Bataan 69 years ago.
The CEAP called on the congressmen who signed the House resolution to withdraw their signatures, warning them not to be part of the attempt to revise or falsify history. The statement bluntly said the resolution would “desecrate” Edsa I.
The organization pointedly denounced claims of Marcos supporters that he was a war hero as false, and went on to say that the massive corruption of the dictatorship sent the economy to its knees, turning the Philippines into the “sick man” of Asia.
Epic clash
HR 1131 triggered an epic clash over two great political traditions that have defined the themes of political discourse during the past 39 years.
The discourse is framed by the demolition of Philippine democracy and the establishment of a dictatorship in September 1972 and by the restoration of democracy with the Edsa People Power Revolution of February 1986.
For four decades, these traditions have marked the cleavage line along which Philippine politics has polarized.
Once again, the dictatorship-vs-democratic restoration paradigm has been forced up to the surface with the House initiative seeking the political rehabilitation of Marcos and legitimizing the the dictatorial legacy of his regime.
The House resolution was a sharp attack to overturn the doctrine that Edsa I ended the dictatorship. The revolution was an emphatic and direct exercise by the people of their sovereign right to change regimes.
Attack on mandate
No legislative act of elected representatives of the people in parliament can revoke that mandate of the Edsa People Power Revolution.
Thus, HR 1135 clearly contravenes the mandate of Edsa I to abolish the dictatorship and cannot be used by members of Congress to engineer the restoration of the Marcos dictatorial legacy and vindicate the regime with the flimsy argument that burying Marcos at Libingan ng mga Bayani would bring to a closure the dark episode of the dictatorship, promote national reconciliation and allow the country to “move on” toward national unity.
Those who signed the resolution are members of a political institution that was one of the first to be padlocked by Marcos when he declared martial law.
The lawmakers have also become the beneficiaries of a free and independent legislature that was restored by President Corazon Aquino in the wake of the l986 revolution.
And yet they are now at the forefront of the campaign to restore the legacy of the Marcos regime, ignoring in the process the fact that Edsa I was the charter of the abolition of the dictatorship and the restoration of Philippine democracy.
The congressmen are not in step with redemocratization. They are swimming against the historic tide of democratic restoration following Edsa I.
They are backsliding to the era when complicit parliament served as a rubber stamp of the dictatorship. The congressmen would find it hard to claim that their resolution represents the sentiment of the people in regard to Marcos’ rehabilitation.
No accountability
When the Philippines rejected the dictatorship in Edsa I, we didn’t make a clean break with a sordid past. Even with the restoration of democratic structures we have remained chained to the past.
Representatives of the people in Congress have been beguiled by the false argument that the rehabilitation of Marcos is an act of “statesmanship” that can throw wide open the gates of national reconciliation.
Under this approach, there is no recognition of accountability. There is no concession of wrongdoing and no expression of remorse for the plunder of public wealth and the deaths, disappearances and torture of victims in military “safe houses” of the dictatorship’s gulag system.
The Marcos heirs are back to positions of power and influence after free elections, flaunting their wealth, and mocking the Edsa People Power Revolution as if it never happened. There is no reconciliation without justice and no concession of guilt. The House resolution has torn to shreds the people power mandate that rejected the dictatorship.

POVERTY IS NOT A HINDRANCE: Teen Summa Cum Laude breaks 65-year U.P.'s record

(The Philippine Star) Updated April 11, 2011 12:00 AM

MANILA, Philippines -  After 65 years, a teen broke the record of a professor emeritus in political science in the University of the Philippines by garnering a weighted average of 1.016.
Nineteen-year-old John Gabriel Pelias is graduating summa cum laude with a degree in Bachelor of Science in Mathematics .
Except for only three subjects, Pelias got 1.0, the highest grade possible, in his entire stay in the UP Institute of Math. He got 1.25, the second highest possible grade, in other subjects, GMA News reported.
Prof. Emerenciana Yuvienco Arcellana, Ph.D, widow of the late National Artist for Literature Francisco Arcellana and mother of STAR desk editor Juaniyo, held the previous record with 1.02 upon graduating in 1946, whose commencement speaker was President Manuel Roxas.
Dr. Gertrude Gwendale M. Baron was the closest to the record of Arcellana with an average of 1.03 upon graduating with the degree in B.S. Biology.
Pelias is one of UP’s poorest scholars with his family earning less than P80,000 a year.
His scholarship money supported his family for years, Instead of taking a ride, he walked from his home to school, according to the report.
The achievement of Pelias was announced on the Facebook of Jose Wendell Capili, UP assistant vice president for Public Affairs and director for of Alumni Relations, UP System.

"He has unwavering focus and maturity beyond his years. I see him discussing philosophy and political theory with former UP President (Francisco) ‘Dodong’ Nemenzo. I was one having a nose-bleed, not him (when they talk),” Capili said on Facebook.

Aside from Nemenzo, Pelias is a protégé of Math Prof. Fidel Nemenzo and College of Science Associate dean Marian Roque, math Prof. Noli Reyes, and UP Institute of Math Director Balmaceda.
“Pelias is a true iskolar ng bayan (nation’s scholar) who is ready to give back to the country and institution that supported his academic pursuits by teaching in his alma mater when classes resume in time,” said Capili.
He will be this year’s speaker on behalf of UP Diliman’s graduating batch on April 17.

Inspiring Life!

Maine student born without hands honored for penmanship

By Nina Raja, CNN

April 7, 2011 2:46 a.m. EDT

(CNN) -- Born without hands and lower arms, fifth-grader Nicholas Maxim received a unique award Monday for his participation in Zaner-Bloser's 20th annual National Handwriting Contest.
"We submitted his entry because we felt his penmanship was amazing considering he completes most of his work without using his prostheses," said Cheryl Hasenfus, Readfield Elementary School principal.
At those times, Nicholas writes by holding a pen or pencil between his upper arms.
On behalf of Zaner-Bloser, a publisher of educational materials, Hasenfus presented a trophy to Nicholas during a school assembly for his excellent penmanship. The school is in Readfield, Maine.
Inspired by his ability, Zaner-Bloser decided to create a new award category in his honor: Nicholas Maxim Special Award for Excellent Penmanship
"When our team saw Nicholas' handwriting, we were just amazed," said Zaner-Bloser President Bob Page. "Since we started this contest 20 years ago, we've been pleased to get a great response that increases every year, and Nicholas inspired us to encourage all students to participate."

More than 200,000 students are waiting for the results of the competition. Winners will be announced at the International Reading Association Annual Convention on May 10 in Orlando, Florida. Zaner-Bloser estimates that more than 2.5 million students have participated in the contest during its history.

By Brett Michael Dykes
Tue Apr 5, 11:35 am ET (THE LOOKOUT, A Yahoo News Blog)

Japanese nuclear plant worker discusses choice to sacrifice his life

As Japan continues to grapple with catastrophic radiation leaks at the quake-damaged Fukushima Daichii nuclear complex, the plant's remaining workers have shown heroic dedication in the face of a task that amounts to a likely suicide mission.
The global audience following the Japanese nuclear drama has learned a little about these selfless heroes. But some of the most basic questions about them--who they are and what has motivated them to make the ultimate sacrifice--have gone unanswered. Now, however, the Agence France Press reporter Kimi De Freytas has published an interview with one of the Fukushima workers that sheds considerable light on how they understand their mission--and how they are holding up under under the extraordinary, mortal stress they are facing.
Hiroyuki Kohno, a 44-year-old plant worker who's been employed in the nuclear industry since he was a teenager, promptly answered the emergency call issued by his employer, a subcontractor for the Tokyo Electric Power Company. Shortly after last March's devastating earthquake and tsunami produced a power outage at the facility, Kohno's employers sent out an all-hands appeal via email.
"Attention. We would like you to come work at the plant. Can you?" De Freytas reports the email read. Kohno, who has worked at the Fukushima facility for the past decade, said he knew what the implications of heeding the call would be.
"To be honest, no one wants to go," Kohno told De Freytas. "Radiation levels at the plant are unbelievably high compared with normal conditions. I know that when I go this time, I will return with a body no longer capable of work at a nuclear plant."
Kohno told De Freytas that as a single man with no children, he felt obligated to answer the call and join the team that the media has dubbed the "Fukushima Fifty." Better that he face the risk, he explained, so as to spare his colleagues who have dependents counting on them. Besides, he added, the workers in the plant are his brothers and sisters, and he feels an allegiance to them.
"There's a Japanese expression: 'We eat from the same bowl.' These are friends I shared pain and laughter with. That's why I'm going," he explained to De Freytas.
Other workers among the Fukushima Fifty have apparently discussed the dire prospects ahead fairly openly. As the unidentified mother of a 32-year-old plant worker explained in a tearful phone interview with Fox News, "My son and his colleagues have discussed it at length and they have committed themselves to die if necessary to save the nation." Meanwhile, plant officials have sought to supplement the ranks of workers seeking to contain the spread of radioactive contamination from the facility with workers known as "jumpers"—contract employees who agree to complete designated tasks before fleeing in the hopes that they can shun sustained radioactive exposure. Workers in the "jumper" corps are being offered as much as $5,000 a day, Reuters reports—and many are still turning the offers down.
While the fate of Kohno and his fellow workers remains uncertain, their fellow citizens are already determined to commemorate their heroism.

Theres The Rub: BACKLASH

Backlash

By Conrado de Quiros
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:19:00 04/05/2011

Filed Under: Crime and Law and Justice, Justice & Rights, Illegal drugs, Angelo Reyes, Suicide, Heroism, Dictatorship

Most Read

THE BACKLASH came thick and fast.

One text message sender said enough with the hypocrisy. The Filipinos who were executed in China were self-confessed drug couriers. Even their families admitted so. By all means let’s grieve for their deaths and commiserate with those they left behind. But let’s not turn them into the aggrieved.
Another said that while she too mourned for the dead, she could not understand why the media were turning them into saints and martyrs. Drug mules make as much as half a million pesos per delivery. But such has been their transformation into victims that the government has been forced to commit to shoulder the education of the children they left behind. What about the millions of honest souls who are toiling abroad who have been victims of disasters, wars and abuse? Why should government prioritize the needs of those who broke the law and not those who only break their backs for a living?
And one recruitment agency head, Alfredo Palmiery, put it this way: “[The three] were never hired by any legitimate agency, they had no working contracts and working visas…. It is an insult to the millions of OFWs all over the world to call the three OFWs as they had no intention to work in China and were merely convinced to travel as tourists to bring contraband to that country.”
I am glad for these comments. They show we haven’t entirely lost our moral anchor or plain common sense. Or the public does not deserve the media they have, and vice versa. Because it’s the media, particularly the networks, that are hugely to blame for the martyrdom and canonization of the executed Filipinos. The orgy of tear-jerking, or just jerking off, the assault of wailing and tearing of hair, which are not entirely figurative, particularly from the kin of the doomed, was a sight to behold or an earful to take last week. By the end of it, you’d think the three were hapless victims and China a pitiless oppressor. You’d think this country was a respecter of life and China a harbinger of death.
I believe in human interest. But it is one thing to draw an insight into emotional states, it is another to wallow in them. It is one thing to be dramatic, it is another to be melodramatic. It is one thing to strive for pathos, it is another to produce bathos. It is one thing to have a sense of compassion, it is another to have a sense of proportion. It is one thing to grieve for the dead and those they left behind, finding a common bond with them as Filipinos and as mortals whose lives will end one day; it is another to forget their transgressions against the living which have brought them to this pass, finding a fundamental difference between us and them: we are not criminals, we do not contribute to snuffing out other people’s lives while trying to sustain ours and those of our loved ones.
The day the networks see those differences is the day we are spared grief, in more ways than one.
But it’s more than the media, it’s us too, the public. If the media make it a point to create the muck, it’s because we like to wallow in it. The least of our worries is how pathetic we must look in the eyes of the world by this shameless display of lack of perspective. The most is what deeply troubling things this shameless display of lack of a sense of justice, or grasp of the connection between crime and punishment, must tell us about ourselves.
It’s almost as if in this country death by, in, and of itself is a natural claim to martyrdom or heroism or sainthood. Or to having one’s sins forgiven and forgotten, if not having one’s life given a positive spin, and not just in eulogies. Or indeed to having the people who caused the death recriminated against and made to carry the weight of it.
This isn’t the first time this has happened, nor is it likely to be the last. Only a couple of months ago, Angelo Reyes shot himself in the heart and all of a sudden this country’s heart bled for him. Gone was the fact that he had just been implicated by his former subordinates in the Armed Forces of the Philippines in commanding the rerouting of command-directed funds in the wrong direction. Gone was the fact that he had been accused by his comptroller of pocketing a sizable sum by way of a goodbye (in the temporary sense of retirement from position and not from life) gift.
His family and friends extolled him for being a dedicated father and breadwinner. His colleagues extolled him for bravery beyond the call of duty, not least for the way he exited from this world. His supporters extolled him for his heroism, dying as a soldier does with honor intact. And they went after Antonio Trillanes for hounding him in the Senate, the Guardians vilifying Trillanes for having transgressed the Philippine Military Academy’s code of honor by speaking ill of a senior officer.
Just as well, only a couple of weeks ago, the congressmen voted overwhelmingly to bury Ferdinand Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani. And for no other reason than that he was dead. In this country, it’s not just death that gets buried, it’s life too, especially the life dedicated to rot and infamy. Gone was the fact that Marcos had ruled the country illegitimately, pitilessly and viciously for a decade and a half. Gone was the fact that the people had risen against him, crying enough of the lying, cheating and stealing, enough of the murder, torture and disappearances, enough of his shadow falling upon the land like a plague.
At least in this case the congressmen, after transforming him into a hero, stopped short of blaming the country for his death. His political death if not his physical one, though for Marcos there was precious little difference between the two. Thank God for small favors.
And now, this.
Is it a wonder there is no justice in this world—this part of it more than any other?