Category Archive for: the elite

komentaryo

Escalate, Raze, Trigger, Exhaust: Dealing with Duterte propaganda (2)

Dividing critics and conquering criticism, undoing democracy in all ways possible, tagging and attacking the Left is but the first half of Duterte’s propaganda strategy. Yes, this same one that we are unable to contend with, unable to wrap our heads around, even as it is what we need to capture and figure out for us to even move forward. Here, the ERTE, to the first part’s DUT.

Escalate Attacks. As with everything Duterte propaganda does, this is not just about what’s happening discursively on social and mainstream media, but also what is happening on the ground. With the Left, it is clear and present danger: during the campaign season alone, senior citizen peace consultants were arrested on fake charges, activists sleeping on buses were shot dead, farmers and peasants were killed in their homes, youth campaigners were disappeared only to be surfaced with fake charges to their names. The killings have continued from Mindanao to Negros, across Lumad and farmer communities; workers’ picketlines have been violently dispersed; students and teachers are threatened with police presence in schools. Activist leaders are put in fictional matrices and their credibility ruined with petty issues blown out of proportion.

The crisis really is that the Duterte public know little of how the Left works, and whoever is in charge of this  attack propaganda strategy has been able to hit it where it could hurt. The first step was to declare communism as a form of terrorism — as said by Duterte is so many ways — which effectively vilified even just the fact of believing in the communist ideology. “Komunista!” as a pejorative was created and massively propagated, something that we see not just on social media, but actually feel on the ground. And at a time when facts don’t matter, and proper conversations are not had, whatever responses the Left has come out with just have not worked at balancing out the negative propaganda. There is after all no discussion to be had, no proper conversation possible, when the only response is: “Komunista ka!”

It’s a conversation-ender that translates to the reckless endangerment of all critics and activists who are dismissed to be nothing more but terrorist. Sure, many of us don’t believe this propaganda. But we do not matter. This is for Duterte’s base. And as far as that base is concerned, this checks all the boxes: Tatay Digong is correct, Tatay Digong is cleaning up the Philippines, Tatay Digong will be protected at all costs.    (more…)

komentaryo

George Ty tales: One estate, two names, five children

It’s become interesting the reactions I’ve gotten for deciding to talk about George Ty’s estate controversy. Some have come in the form of links and screencaps from anonymous sources; some are asking questions about who his real wife is. But my favorite is a long-ish comment on this page telling me basically that I’m making a mountain out of molehill, that it’s all much ado about nothing, my questions about why George Ty’s declared estate is but a fraction of his P700-billion-peso net worth before he died. According to this comment, it’s all very simple: George Ty had time to transfer his estate to his different children and business interests, and therefore the declaration of but P3 billion is all possible, and legal, and above ground.

But see, here’s the thing: I’m not even asking about possibility or legality. I’m asking about why it’s even allowed. I’m asking about why it’s even being done. After all, just because something can be done, doesn’t make it right.

Here’s the other thing: telling me not to look into something just makes me want to dig deeper into exactly the same thing. And in the case of George Ty, it’s a wonder what simple Google searches yield, given what is a seeming news blackout from around February 2019 to the present. Layer this with being told this is a non-story, and so many sources sending questions and screencaps, and one cannot help but think that there really is more to this than meets the eye.

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komentaryo

George Ty’s estate, Ramon Ang’s airport, Dennis Uy’s city, Ayala’s casino: Duterte sides with the wealthy

You know how Duterte propaganda has lived off this idea that he is angry at the rich? That he is against the elite? That he is against their abusive ways, and anti-people policies? This is how refusing to give the Lopezes of ABS-CBN their franchise is justified; this is how the Prietos of the Philippine Daily Inquirer lost their power. This also sustains the idea that Duterte is pro-poor, para sa masa, si Tatay Digong kakampi ng mahihirap na Pilipino.

We have of course disproven this, regardless of what his base believes. He himself has admitted that majority of those killed in his drug war are poor — because the rich addicts are using other drugs anyway, and the wealthy who run the cartels, the drug manufacturing, the drug imports, he has no power to jail them.

But there’s an even more obvious, more blatant, display of Duterte siding with the rich: and it’s in his utter silence about issues that involve his oligarch, taipan, crony allies. Let us count the ways, shall we?  (more…)

kultura

Notes on the intellectual in the time of Duterte

Wrote this for the book launch of “Na Kung Saan” by Teo Marasigan, February 6 in UP Diliman. The task was to talk about intellectuals in the time of Duterte, na nakapaloob sa forum na “Kamalayan at Kultura sa Panahon ng Pasismo.”  

I met Teo in college, in the 90’s, but only built a relationship with him in the Gloria years, in the late 2000s, when so many of us, my Nanay Angela and myself included, ended up using the internet for blogging. This was pre-Mocha, pre-paid mob, pre-Facebook boosting and trolling.  Then, people were still writing long-form articles, well-threshed out yet open to discussion, in fact begging for a discussion, naghahanap ng makakausap tungkol sa mga isyung panlipunan. May biruan pa, may collegiality. These were the years of the Arroyo presidency, before Facebook and Twitter took over the internet — and a chunk of our intellectual culture.

But of course there were many other reasons for the death of blogging and critical-political thought. There was the fact that many of the critical bloggers during GMA’s time were absorbed into PNoy’s three-headed communications team. I remember two years into PNoy’s leadership, being told by one of those writers who had ended up in Malacañang: kayo na lang ng nanay mo ang hindi pa namin nakukuha, ang hindi pa bilib sa’min.” Or something to that effect.

Natawa ako, na nadismaya: ‘yun pala ang ginagawa ng gobyerno, “kinukuha” “pinapabilib” ang mga kritiko-intelektuwal, isang paraan ng pagpapatahimik. (more…)

komentaryo

Populism, the Liberal Party, and a new campaign strategy: Winning VS Duterte

I did not vote for Mar Roxas in 2016, though I did vote for Kiko Pangilinan, Risa Hontiveros, and Leila de Lima, as I did for Bam Aquino in 2013. I didn’t campaign publicly for any of them. In fact the only person I publicly campaigned for in 2016 was Neri Colmenares. Given short memories, it bears repeating that I was heavily critical of the Liberal Party government of Noynoy Aquino. I thought that there was an undercurrent of elitism with which the governance operated, and this revealed itself slowly but surely throughout the six years, in policies, in actions (or lack thereof), and often from the mouth of PNoy himself, sometimes of his Cabinet members. I thought it problematic that they equated social media noise and traction with public opinion; I thought they enabled entities like Rappler to earn from, build upon, false notions of wisdom-of-the-crowd. Information dissemination and transparency were fantastic though, and I miss it terribly now.

It seems like years ago, doesn’t it? An administration like Duterte’s can make us feel this way, with just a little over two years of suffering. This is a governance of chaos-by-design, of disinformation and lies, of destruction and distractions, of literal and figurative violence. It’s exhausting to be critical because nothing is going right, and we are kept in the dark about what exactly is going on. Two years in and there’s still no clear platform for governance, and certainly no clear vision. A constant: Duterte’s rhetoric of violence and vitriol, half the time hyperbole, the other half lies, which we’re told by his men we shouldn’t take seriously. Other constants: incompetence from inflation to traffic to food crises; and Duterte’s threats to leave his post, from letting a military junta take over to declaring a revolutionary government, to railroading charter change and federalism in Congress.

The current state of the nation is enough to build a campaign versus Duterte in the 2019 elections. We know that the more non-Duterte Senators and House Reps there are, the bigger the chances that the people will be represented instead of silenced in Congress, the lesser the chances of any anti-people Duterte law being railroaded. Those of us who might be critical of LP should know it’s time to set those concerns aside for the bigger picture, the more urgent task.    (more…)