Rage against the dying of the light

I have been avoiding writing about this. Too many people have expressed their views about the political situation in the world, most especially in the Philippines and the United States. For the life of me, I have tried to stick to “safe,” non-political subjects, but there is no escaping from the realities of the day. 

Duterte, Trump, the Supreme Court decision on the Marcos burial, daily EJKs are all upon us. In the US, discrimination against women, race, gender rears its ugly head, leading to violence.  

We can’t help being affected by the Nov. 8 elections in the United States. From the time I was growing up, the US has been the center of the world as I know it. We learned to speak English from the Americans, we watched (and still watch) US sitcoms, we listen to American music, and we like their way of life so much, many of us aspire for all things American.

The recent events in our country and the US have redefined reality for many Filipinos. The presidential elections in both countries have changed everything. The shape of the new reality is still a blur but the details are getting clearer by the day, and it is not pretty. It is a departure from the way we used to know and feel about that country and ours.

Questions arise on how we should react. Should we just accept these leaders — Duterte and Trump — simply because they won the elections? After all, isn’t that what “Vox populi vox dei” is about? Or is this a case of vox populi vox crazy? What I know is, while there are those who are happy with the outcome, there are many of us who feel physically and emotionally threatened by the results. 

I see myself as a liberal democrat and I am in a quandary. Has democracy played a joke on us? 

It was Plato who pointed out the irony that tyranny actually emerges from a democracy. We have seen this in the history of the world. In Germany, Hitler rose to power using the legal route, albeit coupled with cunning and intimidation. Duterte and Trump were both voted into power, but they are extremely polarizing figures. They are dictatorial, with views that many of their citizens not only disagree with, but find abhorrent and threatening. 

To complicate matters, our President is not a unifier. He goes out of his way offend the Catholic Church and isolate those who did not vote for him through the machinations of his paid trolls in social media. His rabid followers threaten, insult and intimidate those who criticize him. I have been the recipient of death threats, too many to list down. 

What should we do when the words and actions of the President go against our moral compass, what we hold true and sacred? Should we just grin and bear it, live in denial, be apathetic? Should we just shut up because our views are against those held by the majority at the moment?

My views have changed drastically these past four months. I am no longer interested in giving an ear to political strategies, or explanations and justifications on why a leader behaves as he does. I have no patience with the spin doctors who are trying to save Duterte from himself. I don’t need them to tell me how to think. I believe my conscience is quite reliable and accurate in sensing what is right and what is wrong. I don’t dabble in shades of gray or moral ambivalence. 

Right is right and wrong is wrong. Injustice is injustice. Murder is murder. The “clarifications” of paid spokespersons of government do not impress me. In fact, they strengthen my resolve to speak out and call a spade a spade. 

An article in the New York Times pointed out that during Hitler’s rise in power, some people actually believed his anti-Semitism was only a “joke.” In another article, Liel Leibovitz, whose Jewish grandfather survived Hitler’s wrath, gave advice to citizens of regimes that sow hate and violence: 

“Treat every poisoned word as a promise. When a bigoted blusterer tells you he intends to force members of a religious minority to register with the authorities — much like those friends and family of Siegfried’s who stayed behind were forced to do before their horizon grew darker — believe him. Don’t try to be clever. Don’t lean on political intricacies or legislative minutiae or historical precedents for comfort. Don’t write it off as propaganda, or explain it always as just an empty proclamation meant simply to pave the path to power. Take the haters at their word, and assume the worst is imminent.” 

This is not the first time we’ve experienced dictatorship. We should have learned our lessons by now. I know I have and I refuse to accept the present situation as “normal.”  

It is far from normal when people are killed without due process. This is an aberration, a monstrosity and a blatant abuse of human rights. If we accept EJKs and stop pointing them out as wrong, the entire value system that has made us tolerant, fair and compassionate to each other will crumble. 

I am 65 years old. I lived two decades of my life under the Marcos dictatorship. I am angry that issues that we thought were already settled a long time ago have resurfaced, this time giving legitimacy and even hero status to a torturer, murderer and plunderer, by our dictator-in-the-making. 

I end with the words of Dylan Thomas that inspired me as a young man during the martial law years: “Do not go gentle into that good night… Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”