Weak link

The law may be harsh, but it is the law.

Yesterday, we saw law at its harshest. Three Filipino drug couriers, despite all efforts to save them, were executed by lethal injection in China.

Our government invested heavily in this case. We threw principle to the wind and invited global scorn when we boycotted the Nobel Peace Prize ceremonies in a harebrained attempt to appease China. Beijing was not pleased by President Aquino II’s blabbering, linking our participation in the boycott to our pleadings for the lives of drug mules. Not only was this a disaster for the credibility of Philippine foreign policy; it also put Beijing in such unflattering light.

We thought (or at least President Aquino did) the Chinese authorities, like ours very often do, would bend the law in the name of compassion. Ironically, it was they who gave us a lesson on what rule of law was all about.

Although Beijing allowed a minor concession by postponing the executions for about a month, few really believed China’s judicial system would yield a commutation in these three cases. The sheer volume of narcotics the three tried to slip through the borders was simply too large to allow compassion to blunt the force of Chinese law.

There was some suspense yesterday morning about how people in the streets might react to the eventuality of execution. The ghost of Flor Contemplacion hung heavily on the minds of authorities in both Manila and Beijing.

A quick scan of the social media networks reassures. Most Filipinos, principally the young and the literate, accepted the dictates of the law. Most understood that the executions, while they may be harsh, were not unjust.

There is a new generation out there quite distinct from the generation that rioted in the streets after Contemplacion was executed. All due humanitarian considerations taken into account, the new public discourse generally accepts the dictates of laws in place and focuses on the integrity of institutions that enable the rule of law.

There are residues of the old discourse still. The leftist groups were still brazenly trying to score political points by unjustly pinning the blame for the executions on government. Church-based groups organized prayer vigils and peddled the possibility of a miracle. The Aquino administration itself, terrified of a Contemplacion-like scenario, nagged Beijing to no end basically asking the Chinese authorities to treat their own laws with intolerable elasticity.

If there is anyone or anything to blame in the aftermath of the executions, it should not be poverty — as the Left would have us do. The decision to participate in a criminal activity is not predisposed by income level. It is an entirely autonomous personal judgment.

What is clear, however, is that the Philippines has become a weak link in global enforcement of everything from narcotics to terror. If we have become such an important transshipment point for illegal drugs, this is a sad comment on the agencies and technologies we have in place to combat transnational crimes.

What our government should be telling the world, in the wake of the executions, is that we will try to do better in improving our own systems to prevent drug transshipment. The drug mules should be our problem first before they become China’s.

Jan-jan

As of March 29, about half a million viewers watched that Youtube clip showing six-year-old Jan-jan do his rather impressive dance routine on the March 12 segment of the show Willing-Willie. More than three-fourths of those who did indicated they liked what they saw. That is the public speaking, the popular culture asserting itself despite what the self-appointed guardians of public morals might say.

Each day, on the most widely-watched variety shows, little girls come on garbed as Lady Gaga or Rihanna look-alikes. On the street where I live, kids mimic the songs and dances of the icons of pop culture all the time. Some of the arthritic elders in the community might consider the dances a bit too provocative or risqué. But the kids do what they do in all innocence. They all dream of making it to television sometime.

Jan-jan, apparently, wanted nothing more than to make it to Willing-Willie. When he finally made it, bring his act to what is probably the center of his universe, the kid was overwhelmed. He sobbed as he thanked his aunt and his parents for making it possible to be on the show and actually meet the show’s host, who he idolized.

One might disagree with the form and shape the popular culture has evolved, especially as it reveals itself to the very young. But I have realized, over the years, that quarreling with the popular culture is an exercise in futility.

Social welfare secretary Dinky Soliman, my contemporary at the University, has not yet come to the same realization, it seems. She took the variety show’s host, Willie Revillame, to task for allowing the boy to perform a sexually suggestive dance routine, thereby exposing the young citizen to ridicule and stress.

But that is her reading of the event. Jan-jan will very likely disagree — as will the boy’s father, who took pains to practice his son in the impressive dance routine.

It is, of course, Dinky’s job to protect children from all the hazards everyday life poses. It is not Jan-Jan’s job to protect the Social Welfare secretary from exposure to the popular culture.

Willie Revillame, the show’s host who did all to comfort the child during what obviously was a very exciting moment, also disagrees with Dinky’s arbitrary reading of what happened. But he opted to simply apologize for whatever discomfort this performance might have caused anyone.