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.   

Raze The Elite. Along with tagging the Left, the Liberals have been incessantly tagged as well for every possible failure that this government has been faced with. And it’s been pretty easy to do. First they set the stage: the Liberals are the elite and elista, the enemies of this government and its supporters, the reason even that Duterte won the Presidency. The propaganda machinery built on the questions we asked of the previous government, the elitism that it had shamelessly practiced. Early into Duterte, “Dilawan!” became a pejorative, and it easily gained traction.

Once they had established this baseline for their target audience (see: Trigger The Base), everything was easy. They declared as enemy the more audible voices from the Liberals and their allies and effectively discredited them: Leila de Lima, Chief Justice Sereno, Bam Aquino, Antonio Trillanes, Rappler.com. They took control of social media and built an anti-elite platform for their propagandists: different voices with varying anti-elite rhetoric, all with the Liberals as primary target. They normalized the idea of the “Dilawan!” versus Duterte, where the former are always to blame, and the latter is always blameless in the state of affairs.

As such, every governance problem is because of what PNoy and his Liberal appointees did or did not do; every Duterte decision that is criticized is because of some law passed, some policy normalized, during PNoy’s time; and every mistake this government makes is not really a mistake, but an action that the Liberals allowed them to do. See: the shrug-dismiss-evade strategy under Undo Democracy.

Now it’s not new for a current administration to blame the previous one. Usually though, it’s not this sustained effort, the way that it’s been the past three years. But the Duterte propaganda strategy cannot let go of this strategy precisely because it’s most useful: it deflects the blame away from Duterte and this government, while it completely destroys the credibility of the Liberals. It’s a win-win situation which, with the Liberals unable to even so much as make a dent in this strategy, should bring Duterte and his men straight to 2022.

Trigger The Base. All of this is about one thing: keeping the Duterte base of supporters by ensuring that their triggers are consistent, and therefore their loyalties are constantly strengthened, too.

So far, it’s been pretty successful — and the 2019 election results reveal that as well. Supporters continue to echo what Duterte propaganda says at any given time, which in turn becomes proof of the strength of this base of support. This is a cycle they need: Duterte’s approval numbers are high, yes, but that’s because government’s propaganda machinery ensures that this base only hears not so much the good that Duterte does, but the bad that government enemies and critics are doing. Those survey numbers are nothing but proof that the Duterte propaganda strategy works.

And it doesn’t just work on social media. On the ground, in their communities, among friends and families built not just on a belief in Duterte, but even more so, united against those who are critical of Duterte and his government. See, we are enabling that unity, and we do so because on the surface, i.e., on social media, we are easy to tag as either Left or Liberal, because our strategies at counter-propaganda remain the same.

On social and mainstream media which is where we all see each other as nation, we are on a losing streak, useful as we are to this propaganda machinery because it gives its base the enemy it needs, someone to blame for the state of the nation, something to unite against in the name of Duterte.

Exhaust the Populace. In the meantime the rest of us — and we are a larger population, really — are just exhausted. And we are so because we are in the middle. We work with the Left and the Liberals, and we see how disunited those two opposing forces are. We are disappointed that there is an inability to unite on the bigger enemy, the bigger cause. We cannot believe — and really don’t understand half the time — the historical ideological differences that have come in the way of unity on our side.

We are also literally tired. With the Duterte government deliberately making living in this country worse, the populace that might be counted on to think and rethink, fight and resist, is pretty drained. Traffic is at its worst and Duterte refuses to do anything about it without emergency powers (so he can blame this crisis on Grace Poe). The high prices of goods have been normalized since last year’s massive inflation, and even when we might want to say hooray to the low price of rice, we are also that social class that’s well-aware of how what this means is that our Filipino farmers are going hungry, their harvest and land rendered valueless by the thoughtless passage of the rice tariffication law under the eye, and for the benefit, of Duterte crony Cynthia Villar. We are shouldering the brunt of taxes as imposed by the TRAIN Law, and with no wage hikes, it means being able to buy so much less for the same amount we’ve always earned.

But also we are suffering under the weight of socio-political issues. Every day is this government refusing to care for nation, and every day we are embroiled in the newest revelation of its utter incompetence, its destructive politics, its violent rhetoric. We see how it has shamelessly sided with big business and oligarchs, China and Chinese businessmen, Duterte allies and cronies versus the people — the poor, the farmers and peasants, the indigenous peoples. Corruption, conflicts of interest, cronyism has been normalized, kowtowing to China has become default, delivering projects to Ramon Ang, the Ayalas, Dennis Uy on silver platters is now government strategy.

We are left aghast and disgusted, but with little energy to even so much as raise as fist beyond the noise we make on social media. This is all of course part of the plan: don’t fix traffic, raise taxes, make living in this country more and more difficult, and you’ve got a Filipino middle and working class that’s critical of Duterte and absolutely disgusted with this government, but is without the energy to come together and figure out how to solve this socio-political crises. We are forced to deal with a small thing at a time — farmers rights, urban poor struggles, workers’ causes — but with all of us spreading ourselves in all directions, there is even less energy to spend thinking bigger picture, thinking resistance. 

There is also very little hope. Our tendency is to live out our lives the best way we know how, to survive as we might, given how exhausted we are.

It is as Duterte and his propagandists have planned. Everything’s in its proper place. ***