blame my gun

(O huwag mo kalabitin ang aking gatilyo)

"The lesson today is how to die..."
Which Strange Little Girl would you be?
You have a strong sense of justice, and believe that ultimately people should pay for their crimes.

Sinisipag ako (Part 2)

I realize the irony of giving my last entry the title "Sinisipag ako" and then consequently not updating my blog for some three weeks. I guess I just haven't had the time--precisely because "sinisipag ako." But equally, I haven't lately possessed the will to type type type something about this dreary life and the multitude of appalling things that happen in this world in such a remarkably short span of time. Parang pinagbabaga mo pa ang galit mo sa isang katarantaduhang ginawa ng gobyerno o ng sistema at may sisiklab na namang pangyayari na mangangailangan ng iyong pagtugon. Kaya nga kay ganda panoorin ngayon ng Mount Mayon-- nakakamangha ang tuluy-tuloy na pag-agos at pagsinghal ng makapal na lava, kagandahang tumitingkad ang ngalit habang lalong pusukit ang gabi. Sa imahinasyon ko siya ang bulkang sosyal na sasabog anumang oras. (Pero sa aktuwal, siyempre, isa lamang itong pag-utot ng makapangyarihan at kagilagilalas na Inang Kalikasan, na dulot ay pinsala sa mga katulad nating mga mortal, lalo na sa mga mahihirap nating mga kababayan na nakatira sa ligid ng bulkan).

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Anyway. Kahapon, may blooper na naman ako, yung tipong nangyayari lang sa cartoons. Suki na ako diyan, actually, lalo na kapag kasama yung high school friends ko. Yung tipong tatagusan ka sa wedding ng kaibigan mo tapos gagamitin mong sash para takpan yung tagos yung silver ribbon na dekorasyon sa mga silya, tapos masisira pa yung sandals mo, at mahuhulog ka sa rambulan para di sayo mapunta ang bride's boquet pero ikaw pa rin ang makakakuha therefore kailangan ka suotan ng isang lalaki sa harap ng maraming tao ng garter kahit sira ang sandals mo, may tagos, at kamukha ang bawat silya sa kwarto. So kahapon, hayun, baby shower naman ng friend ko na ikinasal, wala pa akong 5 minutes nakakarating, at pak, naupuan ko ang isang tray ng freshly baked brownies. Yes, at dumikit yung maliliit na square sa pantalon ko. Hindi ko nakita dahil parang nag-blend in doon sa brown na upuan, so yon. Hehehe. Natatawa pa rin ako kapag naaalala ko. Wala lang. Masarap pagtawanan ang sarili, nakakabawas (o nakakadagdag?) ng pagka-baliw.

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Dapat sinisimulan ko na ngayon yung report tungkol sa International Peasant Solidarity Mission na ginanap last week. Yung report na gagawin ko, ita-translate into different languages at ici-circulate sa international contacts, kaya excited ako. Marami-raming tao din akong na-interbyu. Mga naulilang kaanak ng mga biktima ng pamamaslang, mga hinaras at tinortyur at pinagbantaan ang buhay ng militar, mga sinunog ang bahay. Grabe. Doon mo makikita na malaking bahagi rin ng mga biktima ng political repression ay mga magsasaka, at marami sa kanila ang mga ordinaryong magsasaka na walang political affiliation at napagdidiskitahan lang talaga ng militar. Katulad ng tatlong minors mula sa Quezon. Kitang-kita yung trauma noong nakausap ko ang 15-anyos na si Kennedy. Halos pabulong lang ang mga sagot habang nagtutupi ng origami flower. Biro mo, 2nd year high school, nagkokopras para tumulong sa kanyang lola, nananahimik, pero dahil pinagbintangan ng militar, ngayon may kinakaharap na kasong murder, hindi makabalik sa kanila, isa sa daan-daan nang mga refugees na inanak ng all-out war ni GMA. Mga asawa at ina ang nakita kong muling iniyakan ang mga mahal sa buhay na binaril ng mga bonnet assassins. Ang ilan, sa kanilang mga bisig mismo binulwakan ng dugo at nalagutan ng hininga ang mga biktima. Mga balisang mata ng mga kaanak ng mga dinukot na aktibista, hanggang ngayo'y di pa nakikita bangkay man o anino, ang aking tinitigan. Mga garalgal na boses ng mga nananawagan ng hustisya pero bantulot maniwalang maibibigay ito ng mismong estadong nasa likod ng pagpatay ang aking napakinggan. Nakakawindang. Hirap magkontrol ng emosyon. Gayunpaman, isang beses ko lang pinayagan ang sarili kong umiyak-- noong pangalawang araw nang humagulgol ang asawa ni Romy Malabanan, pinaslang na lider-pesante sa Laguna. Because she looked so sweet, miserable, bitter, and angry all at the same time and I had heard enough stories at that point. The rest of the time I kept afloat by grasping onto hard, unassailable facts that prove beyond doubt of the state's culpability in these crimes. And also by chasing after the life stories of those who were killed. It's amazing to dicover the dearth of information about some of these martyrs. Often, their life and struggle are not in the factsheets that only touch upon the circumstances of their murder. The particular goodness of their person; their specific contributions to the welfare of the toiling masses, which campaigns for land and livelihood they led and won, for example; their own nobilities that the state deemed inimical enough to interests of the ruling class to silence forever--these are facts that often slip through the cracks in the flurry for the campaign for justice. Gaano man kasikat ang kaso ni Eddie Gumanoy, dating tagapangulo ng Kasama-TK na pinaslang kasama ni Eden Marcellana sa Mindoro noong 2003, sino ang nakakaalam na si Ka Eddie ay  magniniyog mula sa Quezon na nakapagpaalis ng resikada (na pasanin ng mga magniniyog) sa maraming mga lugar dahil sa pursigidong pagkilos simula pa dekada '80? Kung pwede lang sukatin ang naging ambag ng isang martyr sa pagpapanday ng bagong lipunan, katulad ng kung paano tiyak na naililista ang mga krimen ni GMA o ni Palparan... Oo isusulat ko ito para isigaw ang hustisya, pero sa isang banda rin, para ang body count sa rehimeng GMA ay hindi matulad ng body count sa isang patas na giyera (dahil ang pagpatay sa sibilyan ay kailanman hindi patas). Katulad ng pagsasalarawan ng mamamahayag na si Andy Rooney sa mga sundalong napatay noong World War II: "They put blankets over their faces, and I thought, all these young boys, all so different and their shoes all the same." Hindi dapat maging nameless, faceless, and mahigit 720 martir sa ilalim ng rehimeng Arroyo. Alamin natin ang buhay at pakikibaka ng bawat isang biktima ng di makatarungang pamamaslang.

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There's this insightful column on the Hezbollah that came out in PDI today. It traces the historical roots of the liberation group that Israel, with backing from the US, is trying to crush. To quote from the last paragraph of Randy David's piece: "Israel and the US are bent on crushing Hezbollah because if Hezbollah survives, it will be the model for all the scattered guerilla groups now opposing the American occupation of Iraq. But what is emerging, after a month of continuous pounding of Lebanese towns, is that Hezbollah cannot be destroyed even if Israel kills half of the Lebanese population." The column told of how Hezbollah came about (when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 to pursue Palestinian guerillas); how it is essentially not an Islamic fundamentalist group but one that merely adheres to a commitment against foreign occupation; how it has developed into a broad social movement that has a civilian section participating in parliament, running hospitals and schools; how disproportionate Israel's response was to the hostaging of two of its soldiers when in fact the group merely responded to civilian attacks Israel recently made against Palestine. It contains information that is easily available to one that has done fairly adequate research. Yet sadly, this information rarely comes out in media coverage of the war in Lebanon, for instance, in the backgrounder that ABS-CBN's TV Patrol came out with sometime last week. Delivered by Henry Omaga-Diaz, the spiel failed to explain why the group sprouted and in the end unjustifiably lumped Hezbollah with al-Qaeda and other Islamic fundamentalist groups. Which is exactly what the US government wants-- to showcase this as another legitimate "war against terror" conquest. And so you have these reports claiming that Osama Bin Laden, the mythical bearded hate creature the US itself has spawned, is all praises for Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah. As anything that purportedly comes from al-Qaeda--really a small and fractious group before the Bush administration used it as a launch pad for a renewed round of military aggression-- I treat such information as dubious. But even if it were true, have you ever heard Nasrallah praising Bin Laden? In fact, Hezbollah condemned the 9/11 attacks, calling it an utter disregard for civilian life. Hay naku. Pathetic ang propaganda ng US. Sana naman hindi na ito lunukin ng press. (Pero siyempre, asa pa, eh bahagi sila ng sistema)

Katulad ng mga pasaway na reporters noong Vietnam War. I've been reading this book "Reporting America at War." It contains memoirs of the so-called Young Turks-- David Halberstam, Neil Sheehan, Malcolm Browne-- and other reporters like Homer Bigart and Morley Safer who covered, and after years of getting lied to by the US government, eventually unmasked the Vietnam War for what it really was. Ang galing. That was a brilliant time for war correspondence and journalism in general. But it did have its limits, put succintly so by Peter Arnett:

"What I'm haunted by is the inability of the journalists to get the story out sooner, that this was the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sure, we challenged authority along the way. We did brave coverage in the battlefield and came up with the kind of information that showed early on that this was not worth the price being paid--the price being sixty thousand American lives, two million Vietnamese lives, two billion in capital. We were not able to tell that story in a way that would convince the US government and military leaders that this was not worth fighting. That war went on from 1962, when I first arrived, to 1975, when I left. And my feeling at the fall of Saigon, when the North Vietnamese tanks rolled in, was: 'What a wasted effort.' All those years. All the casualties. All the enormous effort at nation-building. All of it ended suddenly one sunny morning, with no real memory of what had gone on, as though the whole enterprise had been stupid and silly. And at enormous cost to the United State's reputation, plus to so many people. So I'm haunted by the fact that some of the best reporters in the whole world couldn't end that long before it should have been ended."

Which basically shows that there's not much hope that all the honest reporting in the world would by itself stop a dominatrix--the crisis of the world capitalist system is after all at its natural peak and wars in the name of profit are unstoppable at this point. There's only hope in enlightening fellow citizens about the truth behind these US wars of aggression. This would bolster the global anti-imperialist sentiment and struggle and hasten this system's inevitable fall. Of course, one can always anticipate the day when resistance movements such as those in Iraq and Lebanon would kick the US and Israel military's ass (I say this with utmost respect to those blameless US soldiers who are also victims of their government's war). Or that they would at least survive long enough to watch the invaders exit their country with a similar, Vietnam War-like shame.

posted by: ilangq at 13:37 | link | comments |
political chuvachuva

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