"We are overwhelmed by the immensity and weight of everything."
"We are overwhelmed by the immensity and weight of everything."
The Bea-Gerald-Julia thing has distracted us long enough from the pressing issues confronting our society that have been ignored for too long.
What follows is a litany of sorrow, of terror, of frustration. Of wanting better and knowing we are capable of better, but that greed and duplicity on the part of some of our leaders bar us from achieving that, as does our own apathy and sense of powerlessness.
While we were learning about ghosting in a relationship, that patriarchal attitudes still paint the woman the hussy and seducer rather than the man, and that for showbiz people negative publicity is still publicity and therefore advantageous, more important issues were ignored by or went under the radar of the majority of our kababayan. Among them:
In President Rodrigo Duterte’s fourth State of the Nation Address, he basically knuckled under to China, under the reason of protecting the country from superior firepower because war is implied if we stand up to the bully.
This is alarming considering the runaway inroads China has made into our politics, environment, economy, and territorial concerns. Related to this is the news that Chinese developers are eyeing the islands of Fuga in Cagayan province, and Grande and Chiquita in Subic Bay, Zambales province.
Senator Panfilo Lacson calls this move “suspicious” because these three islands are close to the country’s naval facilities. He added that this is a “security concern” especially after some Chinese nationals were observed taking pictures of a naval facility in Palawan.
A connected issue is the practically unchecked influx of Chinese nationals that has prompted National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr. to call them “a threat” and PAGCOR to contemplate creating zones for Philippine offshore gaming operations because of some Chinese nationals’ disorderly behavior.
Two POGO hubs are to be constructed in Clark and Cavite. According to PAGCOR vice president Jose Tria, these hubs are “self-contained communities, na iiwas na natin ‘yong interaction between the Filipinos and the foreign workers,” he said in an interview uploaded to Youtube.
“As soon as…the private participation is able to set up these hubs, then we will be canceling their authority to operate outside these hubs, ipapasok na lang namin sila doon, para easier to monitor,” he added.
The Chinese Embassy expressed its “grave concern” over PAGCOR’s plan and Tria’s words and said it “strongly urges the Philippine government to effectively protect the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese citizens in the Philippines.”
In Negros Oriental, 15 people were killed—murdered—within one week. The casualties included four intelligence officers, a lawyer, and a school principal. Seven of them were killed on one day—July 25.
President Duterte offered a reward of P3 million for information leading to the slayers of the four policemen, and has threatened to impose martial law upon the province, “to quell lawless violence.”
The provincial bus ban in Metro Manila left many people stranded the day it was enforced. A photo taken at 8:00 a.m. on Thursday at Coastal Mall showed pedestrians completely blanketing the northbound lane of the highway.
Meanwhile, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority’s traffic interventions on Edsa last Wednesday had public transport buses choking up two lanes and barely moving, while the rest of the lanes, cordoned off for private vehicles, were ghost-town empty. This prompted netizens to bash MMDA for being anti-poor and coming up with ‘solutions’ that benefit only those who can afford to own cars.
Space constraints prevents discussion on other issues: the alleged ISIS threat in Northern Luzon, the President’s statement that Cory Aquino lost her husband Ninoy Aquino to Marcos, the Iloilo-Guimaras sea mishaps, the Batanes quake, the President’s vetoing of the anti-endo bill, the dengue epidemic in several provinces and the ensuing discussion on whether to allow the use of Dengvaxia again, the President’s mocking of Senator Dick Gordon’s appearance and the latter’s limp acquiescence to the bullying, the ugly and naked ambition bared in Ronald Cardema’s desperate and pathetic attempts to become a congressman, the lawsuits against Vice-President Leni Robredo and other opposition stalwarts for alleged sedition, and so on.
This list is by no means complete.
I suspect we are using the Bea-Gerald-Julia thing to distract us from the larger issues because we are overwhelmed by the immensity and weight of everything, by the sense of pushing futilely against an immense immovable wall of circumstance and consequence.
But the late great writer Toni Morrison had some advice about the role of artists in society during troubled times. Swap ‘we all’ for ‘artists’ and this applies to everyone:
“This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.” ***
*** If art is the soul of the nation, artists are the nation’s conscience, defenders, and builders. /FB and Twitter: @DrJennyO