Category Archive for: gobyerno

komentaryo

no apologies, no excuses: on The Manila Hostage Massacre*

On August 7, 2011, the History Channel premiered its 48-minute documentary on the bus hostage drama that happened in Manila a year ago on August 23, 2010.

For a full week after the premier, this same documentary would be replayed every day, sometimes three times a day, on cable TV. There was no noise about it, barely any media mileage other than what looked like press releases from the History Channel itself, where the documentary is sold along with the rest of the channel’s offerings for August.

For a nation that prides itself in having a powerful online and mainstream media, for a nation that can pick on a private citizen like Christopher Lao, and an artist like Mideo Cruz, we sure as hell know when to keep something under the radar. We sweep it under the proverbial rug, so to speak, just in case we might also be allowed to forget it. Speak no evil, see no evil, hear no evil, means we cannot be seen as evil? (more…)

komentaryo

Kulo: before/after hysteria

Going to art exhibits and events since 2009, I find that what I enjoy most about it is the solitude and silence. I’m not known in art circles (or any circle for that matter) and can go around unobtrusively; on “gallery days” it’s rare that there are other spectators, least of all someone I know, in these art spaces. It’s a gift, a break I take even as it requires trips to places from UN Avenue in Manila to West Avenue in Quezon City. The time becomes mine, the art I own with my gaze.

It was with this same gaze, within the same task of going to see as many exhibits as I can, that I went to Kulô at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) on July 2 2011. I was doing Virgin Labfest 7 marathons, and made sure to come early to spend a good hour at the gallery. A day or so after, I virtually happened upon participating artist Pocholo Goitia and told him how much I loved the exhibit, the best of the Rizal efforts I’d seen so far; a couple of weeks after he tells me in passing that it’s gotten into some controversy or other and I brush it off: who has cared about art in the past three years that I’ve been engaging with it in my own way(s)? Given Kulô’s premises I also thought the only ones who’d wrongly take offense would be the University of Santo Tomas (UST), alumni as the exhibiting artists are of the said university, the Goitia essay particularly placing the exhibit within, beyond and against the said institution.

When the noise about Kulô became real to me, I couldn’t even believe it was about Mideo Cruz’s “Poleteismo.” My experience of the installation as part of the exhibit was limited to two points of interest: one, the manner in which the various works of Cruz were curated and put together into this one installation that allowed it to be powerful from outside without the crucifix and without zeroing in on what else was attached to those walls; and two, the fact that it still seemed to work for me, old as the work was. Context could only be the reason for the latter, and in the case of this exhibit which consisted of many old works, context was key: there’s the fact of UST no matter the individual relationships of the artists with the institution, and there’s the 150 years of Jose Rizal, a UST alumnus.

the rest is here.

komentaryo

the gay gaze & the men in briefs

been living under a rock, or just in the midst of book production and thesis writing, that i only realized people were finally angry with Bench for their darn sexy ads when the Philippine Volcanoes’ images (the National Rugby Team for you) were removed from the Guadalupe northbound stretch of billboards. Now know that on this stretch I have seen too much of Kris Aquino, strangely photoshopped Calayan beauty clients, and recently fully-clad Bench boys doing pretend-dancing, that when i saw photos online of the Philippine Volcanoes’ billboards i was overwhelmed with regret: why oh why did i NOT see that when it was up?

yes i am exaggerating (sort of), because really, from afar (and i mean zoomed out on my computer screen) those billboards looked no different from the other fictional men i’ve seen top naked, o sige na nga, bottom na rin kung naka-brip lang. i mean  at this point we’ve seen them all topless: Piolo, Dingdong, Aljur, Derek, and the question could only be: what was wrong with the Volcanoes? or the Azkals for that matter. before the uproar, there was that Century Tuna billboard of Phil Younghusband, topless; and the Ally Borromeo billboard on southbound Guadalupe, about which all i thought was: baket naka-pucker ang lips ni kuya?

Aly Borromeo with puckered lips.
Aly Borromeo with puckered lips.

but the straight men in government weren’t looking at these men’s faces, and for the Philippine Volcanoes it was their lower halves that was reason for offense. when i say straight men i mean Mandaluyong Mayor Benhur Abalos, Valenzuela Mayor Sherwin Gatchalian who covered his nieces’ eyes when they passed through EDSA lest they see the men in briefs, as well as MMDA chair Francis Tolentino. which does beg the question: bakit ngayon lang? not even related to all the skimpily-clad women in billboards, but in the context of all those other men we’ve seen in briefs before?

ah, the truth of the matter is in MMDA assistant general manager for planning Tina Velasco’s words:

How can it be that we will not contest what is executed at the billboards right now, when we see bulging crotches and excessive voluptuousness.

bulging crotches! voluptuousness! the straight men in government might not have wanted to articulate it, but they knew of it enough to take offense. and in which case it seems that they don’t mind bulging (augmented and otherwise) boobs, or the woman’s crotch since walang bulge ‘yon? they don’t mind women’s and men’s come-hither looks no matter how voluptuous, as long as walang bulge? got it.

Michael de Guzman
kapag side view, o likod, ni Michael de Guzman, ok lang?

that this reeks of gender politics is the foregone conclusion, but the more important assessment has to take into consideration the gay gaze, the one that the liberated men of the Philippine Volcanoes and the Azkals, and every metrosexual man in between, have ceased to mind. if all i saw in the Borromeo billboard were his puckered lips, and if all i thought when i finally saw those boys of the Volcanoes in their underwear is: ang babata naman ng mga ito! then i obviously ain’t its market, as it might be every kafatid, vekz, vekla who passes through EDSA.

they're just boys!

call me a girl but i will swoon at a man’s eyes on a billboard (Derek Ramsey’s), and his moreno smile (Jericho Rosales’), and his silliness (John Lloyd Cruz) fully clothed as he might be. kebz sa kung may abs siya o wala.

oh, but Mayor Gatchalian insists that his goal is to:

Regulate everything regardless of gender. Again, it’s for the good of the general public… I will push for stronger regulation and censorship of billboards. Gov’t should regulate ads irregardless of gender.

sige sir, lagpasan ko muna ang paggamit mo ng salitang irregardless, i want to know if you cover your nieces’ eyes when you pass billboards of skin whitening products and boob jobs. no seriously, sir. because that is our little girls’ enemies if the goal is to bring them up confident in themselves, with as little superificiality as possible, comfortable in their own skins. whitening in the land of morena skin, beauty clinics in the the third world? that is what’s ultimately problematic about our billboards; celebrities who are white to begin with selling whitening products? that is the lie little girls will grow up believing.

at least with a real man’s body on a billboard — bulge and all — they won’t grow up afraid of the crotch. unless those are the kinds of little girls we want to bring up: afraid of men, afraid of her own brown skin, afraid of being themselves? que horror.

meanwhile let me end with this: if we’re against bulges and suggestive images here let’s be clear what the rules are. because the ad board is right: if we’re selling briefs, then damn it show me the body that will wear them! so dear straight government official, pray tell: how big is an acceptable boob? because you know a D-cup looks obviously augmented, but so do C-cups in the land of Asian women. and how big is the acceptable bulge, given the fact it would seem strange for bulges to be missing, in tight fit jeans or board shorts, and i’m sure you don’t want your kind to look castrated, yes? and while we’re at it, how seductive can the eyes be? are puckered lips now disallowed? how about men’s hands? because you know i find those sexy.

Arnold Aninion and Darran Seeto
Arnold Aninion and Darran Seeto: nothing like some arms and hands for some sexy eh?

and then there’s this question, one that i truly wonder about: should we remove men’s feet from billboards altogether?

because you know what they say about big feet.

all photos via benchtm.com.

komentaryo

have cemetery, will thee wed

1. possible precursor: this pre-nuptial photo shoot of rockstar Jay Contreras and Sarah Abad, in a provincial cemetery. it isn’t the cemetery of heroes and had no crosses, but it sure seems like the peg for the irreverence in the current more controversial pre-nup shoot of Ruskin and Priscilla at the Libingan ng mga Bayani. so no, Priscilla and Ruskin weren’t quite “breaking conventions in pre-nup shoots here.” they were in fact doing a copy of a photoshoot that happened in 2009.

Jay & Sarah, 2009, via mangored.com

2. the fact is the Libingan ng mga Bayani is different. it is where our heroes are, soldiers and past presidents and vice presidents, national artists. i get that.

but too, this wasn’t the first time a photo shoot, and a pre-nuptial photo shoot, happened in the Libingan ng mga Bayani. someone must be earning something somewhere, and that person is the first one to disrespect the heroism that this space stands for.

3. a question: do the couples who have their prenup shoots here necessarily disrespect this space? it’s entirely possible that they don’t even think about it, that a cemetery is a cemetery is a cemetery to a couple in search of the perfect setting for their chosen pre-nup theme. and no Ruskin and Priscilla are not the first to do this.

Al & Meg, Jan 2011, via http://anapleaday.blogspot.com

4. so the question becomes: what did Ruskin and Priscilla do differently from these other couples? is it that they were laughing versus brooding? that they were enjoying versus looking into each other’s eyes, or looking into the camera? it seems that it was that they were doing a version of the Sara-Jay prenup photoshoot, complete with cigarettes and alcohol, and some crossdressing, too.

5. this is the apparent extreme that the online public cannot take. it’s the way in which Ruskin and Priscilla’s shoot used the crosses, as something to hug, something to sit on (versus lean on, see Al & Meg above), something to drink to, smoke with. all considered disrespectful and crass and everything in between.

6. of course the drinking and smoking says more about what we think of both as vices, which is also really a matter of taste, as are the cross-dressing photos. that this has been done before in a provincial sementeryo forces us to ask about what we think of our dead in general, what we think of our heroes, and how this recent industry of the pre-nuptial photoshoot now necessarily means a struggle between creativity and decency, at least in our shores.

7. but too maybe we should consider the fact of Angelo Reyes, dishonorable suicide and all, being buried here as “hero.” it might be said that that was the first stone cast at disrespecting all the real heroes at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.

8. PS: i think Nick Joaquin, National Artist, San Miguel Pale Pilsen drinker, would’ve loved that there was finally some alcohol in the house. *clink*

via Wikipedia Commons

komentaryo

Walang K ang K-12

School year 2011-2012 is the first school opening under the PNoy administration.

The government may be new, but the problems of education remain the same. The stars of this crisis are the lack of teachers, classrooms, toilets and school desks. Look at these numbers:

  • 101,612 — shortage of regular teachers
  • 66,800 — shortage of classrooms
  • 2,573,212 — shortage of school chairs
  • 135,847 — shortage of toilets

These numbers are based on Dep Ed.

In front of Batasang Pambansa, at Batasan Hills National High School, each class has 80 to 100 students, with many classes without school chairs, and students seated on the floor. Also near the Batasan, at Patayas B Elementary School, each of their 24 classrooms have been divided into two, and 60 to 70 students are crammed into those half-classrooms.

In other words, on its first year, the PNoy administration has failed to respond to the problem of shortages in the educational system, and Secretary Armin Luistro’s promise to Congress that they will fix these shortages in the first two years of this administration is far from happening.

But the focus now is on the Aquino administration’s only program for education, K+12. This year marks the beginning of K+12’s implementation, particularly universal kindergarten or kindergarten for all five-year old children.

We are united on the importance of universal kindergarten. This is a crucial step in lessening the number of students who stop in the first four years of elementary school. Last year, 1.5 million children were enrolled in kindergarten: 500,000 in private schools and 1M in public schools. This year, Dep Ed opened the doors of kindergarten education to 1M more 5-year old students.

In the past six months, the Dep Ed aggressively promoted and enjoined the public to enroll their children. This is a historical moment when the State decides to shoulder kindergarten for all, especially for the poor. For the longest time, only those who are well-off and the rich could afford kindergarten.

This is why it’s in the interest of all to implement universal kindergarten properly. Sadly, based on what we are witnessing on the first few weeks of classes, this isn’t happening.

Let’s begin with budget. In the 2011 GAA, only 2.33 billion was allocated for early childhood education. Because of this there is a lack of 34,900 teachers and 26,500 classrooms for kindergarten.

How does Dep Ed respond to this problem? On May 4, Secretary Luistro released Dep Ed Order No. 37, the “Policies and Guidelines on the Implementation of the Universal Kindergarten Education for SY 2011-2012.” This is how he proposes to respond to the lack of classrooms:

  1. Schools without kindergarten classrooms shall utilize available classrooms, library, science laboratory, home economics building, resource center, and other available spaces.
  2. In cases where classrooms and other spaces are not available within the school premises, school heads are urged to link with the Local Government Units (LGUs) for the use of existing day care centers and/or barangay halls.

Does this sound like the policy of a good credible government? They will enjoin all 5-year olds to enroll in kindergarten, when there are no classrooms to put them in, and instead they will be forced into “any available spaces”?

And to respond to the lack of kindergarten teachers, Dep Ed Order No. 37 states that Dep Ed will use Kindergarten Volunteer Teachers. These are the requirements for becoming such:

  • Bachelor’s degree holder in education or education related courses;
  • Preferably resident of the community where the school is located; and
  • Registered as volunteer in the school and/or division office.

Notice that Dep Ed doesn’t require a PRC license of its volunteer teachers, a license that can only be obtained by education graduates who pass the Licensure Examination for Teachers. In other words, it’s now Dep Ed policy to hire unqualified and unlicensed teachers to teach kindergarten. Would we allow an unlicensed nurse to work in a hospital? Would we allow a building to be built by an unlicensed engineer? Why is Dep Ed allowing unlicensed teachers into our classrooms?

This is not just a shameless act of sacrificing the quality of education, this is a clear violation of the law, particularly RA No. 7863 which is the “Philippine Teachers Professionalization Act of 1994.” Section 27 states:

“No person shall practice or offer to practice the teaching profession in the Philippines or be appointed as teacher to any position calling for a teaching position without having previously obtained a valid certificate of registration and a valid professional license from the Commission.”

According to Dep Ed, volunteer teachers will be paid an honorarium of P3,000 per month.

It is obvious that this is unjust, if not inhuman, compensation. In fact the lack of applicants for volunteer kindergarten teacher is proof of how low this compensation is.

As representative of teachers, I condemn this scheme of hiring volunteer teachers, which is even worse than contractualization, and which disregards professional qualification in teaching, as well as establishes the government’s refusal to justly compensate teachers.

Nakalulungkot mang sabihin, pero dahil sa mga nabanggit, malinaw na “walang K” ang K+12 ng administrasyong PNoy. Walang kahandaan, walang kalidad, at walang karapatan.

If this is the way PNoy’s government will implement its flagship educational reforms, then it is clear that K-12 should not push through, and our Filipino children should not be forced into the program.

Rep. Antonio Tinio’s Privilege Speech on School Opening and K+12,Batasang Pambansa, 6 June 2011. Translated from Filipino, 17 June 2011, slightly edited.