by— Ina Alleco @ 4:27 am

Rafael Baylosis

Intro:  Rafael Baylosis was not known to me until I attended the Cordillera Day 2011.  Rafael Baylosis is the consultant for the Comprehensive Agreement for Social and Economic Reform (CASER) during the Cordillera Day.  I dug around the web and found that one of my favorite bloggers already work with Baylosis. Below is a copy entry of her blog.

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I first wrote this blog entry in 2005; and this same piece was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer in April or May 2006 as part of a series of essays on Fathers’ Day.

I decided to repost this in the light of the upcoming peace negotiations between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the National Deomocratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). Rafael Baylosis is an NDFP adviser on socio-economic reforms, but there is a major hindrance in his being able to partcipate in the talks because of the completely false and fabricated criminal charges filed against him by the GRP.

Despite the implementation of the Joint Agreement on Security and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) which gives protection and immunity for NDFP consultants and staff — particularly those participating in the peace talks– Ka Raffy’s safety is still in question.

What sort of man is Rafael Baylosis and why is it important that he be able to attend the talks? Why is he being persecuted by the GRP? What does he stand for and believe?

These questions cannot be answered in one sitting; but I wrote this entry in tribute to one of the two people who have helped shape the way I view the world and how life should be lived as a national democrat.

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Sensei

Sunday, August 21st, 2005

When I was in college, I was a member of the UP Karate Association. Our sensei — or teacher — was shihan (synonymous with teacher, or master) Jerome. He was a tall, well-built man who was on the quiet side. He was friendly but firm. He wasn’t a perfectionist, but he demanded that his students — us UPKA members who kicked and punched and leaped and jumped like sweating lizards in white gis within a red dojo)– perform the exercises or kata with a little more than plain dexterity. I think he wanted us to be graceful. Not surprising, what with karate-do a sport of grace, not unlike ballet.

So there I was trying to control my breathing, steadying my legs (which in the beginning hurt like heck from having to bend and squat halfway for 15-20 minutes at a stretch every hour), focusing what physical force I had in my fists and aiming at invisible opponents. I learned how to place well-aimed blows; how to make the proper fist (thumbs tucked under the other fingers to secure them from being broken upon impact with a hard object like, say, someone’s skull); how to make the air whistle with kicks swiftly delivered then retracted; how to pivot, with my center of gravity nearer to the ground and my body below hitting range. I learned to slow-breathe, focus and meditate.

It was exhilarating. Sensei Jerome was a great teacher. He hardly spoke, but he communicated volumes with a nod of his head, a gesture of his steady hands, or by executing an absolutely perfect, graceful yet very powerful movement such as blocking a blow with his arm.

Now, a decade later, I have a different sensei. I’m not studying karate anymore (I wish I was, though. I miss it, my body misses the light and weightlessness of feeling), but I’m studying something more difficult and demanding than karate.

My sensei’s name is Rafael Baylosis. He is alleged to be the secretary general of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) before he was imprisoned by the Marcos dictatorship until he was released in 1995. Now, as a strictly legal, above-ground civilian, he is the vice-chairman of Anakpawis National Political Party and a consultant on socio-economic concerns in the peace negotiations between the National Democratic Front (NDF) and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP).

I’ve had the honor of working with and learning from Ka Raffy since 1998 when I was still in the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) labor center as propaganda officer, and he was the Political affairs secretary. It was from him that I learned to get up at 6am and be ready to begin writing 15 minutes later (he was always my wake-up call. Used to bug the hell out of me).

He taught me how to be consistent with my work habits (and I try to imitate and adopt his own work ethic — constancy, timeliness, economic but determined movements, sharp awareness of developments. I still lack patience and cool-headedness, though. I’m still trying to overcome my tendency to become quite the monster when confronted with upsetting things) and how to recognize, analyze and then resolve political contradictions in concepts and ideas.

He taught me to push the limits of what I used to believe as the limits to my abilities and skills.

But apart from these, I learned and still learn from Ka Raffy how to live with integrity. I know this sounds stilted, but this is the only way I can describe this.

Rafael Baylosis is a great father, a loving husband, a supportive comrade, an intellectual and a dreamer. He has, since he became an activist at 18 in UP Diliman, a friend and comrade of the likes of then 21- year old Jose Ma. Sison and other veterans of the First Quarter Storm and the Diliman Commune, lived plainly and simply; but always his actions and thoughts have been profoundly in service to a cause greater to himself.

After presiding over important campaign or consultation meetings, he washes the dishes after meal times in the Anakpawis headquarters and cleans the conference room.He always ask after the health of Kasamas, or how they’re doing in their respective line of work. He makes silly and corny jokes that people often laugh at, not so much because the jokes themselves are funny, but because they are amused at Ka Raffy’s boyishness.

He is a calm and confident leader in rallies and demonstrations, a fiery public speaker, a well-read ideologue, a lover of music, and a great cook (well, they say he is — I’m too finicky an eater to actually try his more complicated Ilocano dishes made up of, well, various vegetables. I’m not crazy for vegetables).

Ka Raffy is capable of compelling such fierce loyalty, because to put it plainly, he is such a good person and worthy of the highest respect. Approachable and light-hearted, young activists like myself can always rely on Ka Raffy to give comforting but well-grounded advice. While an understanding and tolerant person, he is strict when it comes to the core activist principles and their application to work and living.

I am no end humbled and awed at how such an evolved human being, a well-known and highly-respected individual in the Kilusan sees it fit to trust me with his confidence and guide me through my political work and growth as an activist.

Though right now (and often in the last seven years) I give him headaches because of my stubborn nature, it is one of my life’s highest ambitions to make Ka Raffy proud of me, because I am so proud and honored to say that what I am today and what I am capable of doing and achieving for the Kilusan is largely because of his influence. He is my Jedi master, and I hope never to be like Anakin Skywalker but to be as Obiwan Kenobi. He trains and teaches by example, and this, I think, is the best way to teach. He, along with Crispin ‘Ka Bel’ Beltran are the biggest political and personal influences in my life. From them I learn not only how to be activist, but to be, hopefully, a good person.

Often, to be worthy of one’s teachers, to be a good person are the highest and best things one should hope to be.

BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO

Bulatlat.com

Eman Lacaba, poet and warrior

The tenth of December is marked as International Human Rights Day. The first International Human Rights Day fell on December 10, 1948, when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which declares all people to be free and to have equal rights and dignity and enumerates all human rights, was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly.

On International Human Rights Day, it is fitting to remember the late Filipino writer and revolutionary Emmanuel Agapito “Eman” Lacaba. He was born on the very day the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the UN General Assembly. He lost his life at the height of martial law–a victim of a human rights violation.

Eman Lacaba was born and raised in Pateros. In an essay he wrote as a high school student, “Personal Statement of Emmanuel Lacaba”, which his brother Jose, more popularly known as Pete, believes was written in connection with his application for an American Field Service (AFS) scholarship, he described his family thus: “Our family is neither rich nor very poor. At least we have enough to live on.”

Enfant Terrible

Eman Lacaba has often been compared to the French poet Arthur Rimbaud, a fact he himself alluded to in one of his poems, “Open Letters to Filipino Artists”, where he told of his being called “the brown Rimbaud.” The comparison stems from the fact that he was, like Rimbaud, an enfant terrible, a literary virtuoso at a very young age–he started writing poetry at 14—and did so like a master even then. The similarity between them became all the more striking when he lost his life without reaching his fortieth year–just like Rimbaud.

He began to display vast and varied talents at a very young age. He learned to read early and was a very voracious reader before he was in high school—reading everything, as he said, “from the Bible to Mad, from newspapers to encyclopedias, from physics to law and business books, from mathematics to poetry.” From first grade to his last year in high school, he was at the top of his class. A brilliant and prolific writer at a young age, he became editor-in-chief of the high school paper. He was also a versatile athlete; he

played basketball, soccer, and was into track and field. He was an excellent actor on the stage. In recognition of his leadership skills, his schoolmates gave him many of the top positions in school organizations–he was class president from fifth grade to his last year in high school, he became president of the High School Drama Club and the High School Student Council.

He received almost all of his pre-university education from the Pasig Catholic College. While still a student of this school, he applied for and received an AFS scholarship, through which he got to spend an entire school year in the United States.

After high school, he had the chance to choose among no less than three scholarships from the University of the Philippines (UP), the Ateneo de Manila University, and De la Salle University. He chose the Manuel de Leon scholarship at the Ateneo de Manila University, where he took a Bachelor of Arts in Humanities, and maintained it until he completed his course. This, despite the fact that he spent much of his time away from the classroom, writing or doing research.

Writer-Activist

If there is something Eman Lacaba is most noted for, it is for having been a writer-activist. He was a poet, essayist, playwright, fictionist, and scriptwriter who joined the protest movement in his student days and later lost his life as an armed revolutionary.

It was at the Ateneo that he began to be involved in social and political causes. He was part of a group which fought for the Filipinization of the university administration, which was then largely American-led, and the use of Filipino as medium of instruction. His group also called on their schoolmates to immerse themselves in the issues which had begun to galvanize their fellow students at UP.

In his early days as an activist, his poetry began to show signs of the road he was to take for the rest of his life, with his increasingly frequent use of the image of Icarus, a Greek mythological character who burned his wings, fell to the sea, and died because he flew too close to the sun–an often-used symbol for those who perish in the pursuit of lofty causes.

He also joined Panday Sining, the cultural arm of the militant Kabataang Makabayan, and is believed to have participated in the First Quarter Storm.

In his college days he frequently commuted between the Bohemian life and activism. It was only after college that he would turn his back on the former.

Before he graduated from college, he won a major literary award for Punch and Judas, a short novel depicting the transformation of an intellectual, Felipe “Philip” Angeles, from Bohemian to activist.

After college, he taught Rizal’s Life and Works at UP and got involved in the labor movement. He also became a member of the militant writers’ group Panulat para sa Kaunlaran ng Sambayanan. Just two months before the declaration of martial law, he was among a number of picketers at a small factory in Pasig who faced threats and truncheons from the police while the strike was being dispersed. He was arrested and briefly incarcerated.

After that, he became active on the stage, writing and acting in plays. He also assisted in film productions, and among his compiled writings are a number of unfinished film storylines. He wrote the lyrics for the theme song of the Lino Brocka-directed movie Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang, which takes potshots at the hypocrisy of society.

In 1975 he set out for Mindanao to cast his lot with the armed revolutionary movement, to become a “people’s warrior”, as he later called himself in a poem.

Such was his passion for writing that he wrote even while leading the life of a revolutionary guerilla. It was in the hills, in fact, that he wrote one of the poems he is best remembered for, “Open Letters to Filipino Artists”, where he wrote of the armed revolutionary movement thus: “We are tribeless and all tribes are ours./We are homeless and all homes are ours./We are nameless and all names are ours./To the fascists we are the faceless enemy/Who come like thieves in the night, angels of death:/The ever moving, shining, secret eye of the storm.”

Death of a People’s Warrior

At dawn sometime in March 1976, death came for Eman Lacaba. At this time he was set to go back shortly to the city for a new assignment that would have used his writing skills, and had even agreed to write a script for Lino Brocka once he got back there

It was not yet six in the morning. Eman and three other companions were having breakfast in a peasant’s hut. Outside the house were their wet clothes and shoes, left there to dry.

Elements of an armed team made up of Philippine Constabulary (PC) men and members of the Civilian Home Defense Front (CHDF) were with a certain Martin, a member of Eman’s unit who had earlier been captured by the military. They happened to pass by the house where Eman and his companions were having breakfast. Martin recognized the clothes and shoes and pointed out the house to the PC-CHDF team, who immediately opened fire without calling on the occupants to surrender. After a brief gunfight, two of the hut’s occupants were killed including the leader of Eman’s group, while Eman and Estrieta, a pregnant teenager, were wounded.

The PC-CHDF team headed for Tagum with Eman and Estrieta, with villagers carrying the corpses. However, a few kilometers from the village, the sergeant of the PC-CHDF team decided not to bring back anyone alive. Estrieta was the first to go. The sergeant then handed a .45 to Martin and ordered him to shoot Eman. He did not want to, but in the end Eman himself said to him, “Go ahead, finish me off.” A bullet was fired through his mouth, crashing through the back of his skull. As he fell, another bullet was fired at his chest. He was 27. Bulatlat.co

Testament of an Unknown Revolutionary

by Robert Whymant

Published in the Guardian on January 21, 1974

Whether Solita Esternon is her real name, her alias in the revolutionary movement, or an arbitrary invention still remains unknown to the interrogators in the military prison at Sorsogon.

What they have established so far is that the woman they are holding is a 24 year old university student and a cadre in the Maoist guerrilla organization, the New People’s Army (NPA) until she was caught in December. They have found too, that she is four months pregnant.

According to her captors, the para-military Philippines Constabulary, she’s a “hard-core” case, she was carrying a loaded .3 calibre pistol when arrested, and is believed to have been entrusted with the delicate task of establishing a base in Sorsogon City.

Her rigid espousal of the necessity for armed struggle, her refusal to compromise by disclosing information about her comrades’ whereabouts will make her a tough subject to re-educate, they say.

It is seldom that anyone outside the immediate family is given access to a political prisoner especially to one as unrepentant as Solita. Lieutenant-Colonel Villanueva, Philippine Constabulary commander for Sorsogon province, at the southern tip of Luzon apparently decided to allow my visit to prove that charges of martial law brutality, aired by President Marcos’s opponents, are ill-founded, at least in Sorsogon.

The commander, a seemingly kind-hearted man, may also have thought to alleviate the loneliness of the one among 30 prisoners in his care whom nobody ever came to see — though he blamed this on her obstinacy in refusing to disclose her true identity and the place she came from.

In the unsupervised privacy of her cell, Solita confirmed to me that she personally had never been ill-treated, even if as an attractive woman, she was forced to endure the coarse suggestions of her guards.

Consistently egalitarian, the young Maoist complained instead of the contrast between the generally chivalrous treatment accorded her and the soldiers’ tough, sometimes brutal behavior towards the men–not only to captured NPA members but also to innocent suspects rounded up for interrogation.

Later, in another cell a male NPA member showed me thick red scars on his chest and back, while another said his ribs had been damaged during a beating by Constabulary soldiers.

There was no evidence of systematic torture, however, nor did I hear complaints of any. “They generally only get rough when they’ve had too much to drink,” I was told.

Solita recalls the clumsy attempt of an interrogating officer to intimidate her into disclosing the whereabouts of comrades in the mountains. “He told me, ‘You’ll be inside for 30 years and then you’ll be an old woman and you won’t be able to get married. I was shocked that he thought that such a threat would frighten me. I told him, all right. I said, I’ve been married once already, and that was enough to last until I die.”

Her marriage, to an NPA regular lasted less than half a year. The wedding was a simple promise made over a Filipino language version of Mao’s red book, witnessed by other members of her cadre group. No bible, no priest, and, Solita says firmly, no double standards.

“Having a second wife or mistress is punished very severely in the NPA. Look at the double standard in this camp. Every constabulary officer has his mistress. Filipinos abuse women, though they treat them chivalrously.”

Five months after her marriage her husband was killed in an encounter with Constabulary soldiers.

Solita says she was never a member of any left-wing organization while at the University, where she studied Literature until her money ran out the year before she could graduate. The seeds of her political education, she says, were sown before martial law came into force in September 1972, when there were fierce anti-Government and anti-American demonstrations in Manila.

When martial law was imposed she was not among those activists students, who, fearing arrest went to the mountains to join the only opposition force that could still operate effectively, the NPA.

But some of her friends were there, though Solita refuses to explain how she personally was recruited, for fear of implicating comrades. “One thing though: I was not converted. I objected to the religious, forcible connotation of the word. I was clear about what I was doing.”

The New People’s Army grew out of the ashes of the Soviet-oriented Huk Army which was strong in the 1950′s until it was wiped out by the Government with U.S. help. The NPA, pro-Peking in its ideological line, is thought to comprise only 1,500 armed regulars, supported by two or three times that number of political cadres.

At the grassroots level of the village organizing committee–where Communist ideology sometimes wears quite thin–there are an estimated 30,000 to 50,000 supporters. Outside its stronghold in Isabela province, in Northern Luzon, the NPA support is today concentrated mainly in the Southern provinces of Camarines and Sorsogon (though there are suggestions too, of a common front with the Muslim independence movement in Mindanao).

The fundamental tenet of the NPA is redistribution of land, in order to “free the impoverished rural masses” (who make up some 70 percent of the Philippine population) from the “exploitation and oppressive grip of the landowners.”

The description is that of Marcos’ Secretary of Agriculture; some of the bite has been taken out of the NPA’S agrarian revolution by the Government’s own land reform program. Yet after 16 months’ vigorous promotion under martial law, there are signs that land reform may soon grind to a halt.

What would have been clear from the beginning–but for some faulty arithmetic–is at last sinking in: there are simply more tenant farmers than economic-size holding available, and 80 percent of landholdings are smaller than the 17 acre holdings which the Government could not possibly carve up without angering the small bourgeois landowners on whose support it depends.

It appears doubtful that more than 40 percent of tenants will ever attain the promised state of emancipation under the Government’s programme.

The NPA’s recipe is simple: to redistribute the coconut, sugar and other plantations which are not affected by land reform–which is confined to rice and corn lands. Moreover, emancipation through NPA would absolve peasants from having to repay dispossessed landlords, as they have to under the present system.

It is not difficult for the Communists to enlist support for their proposition that no burden of debt lies with the tiller, who may have to give half of every harvest he reaps to an idle landlord.

Solita found that “the people in the barrios (villages) wanted to know all about “communism”. They had strange notions, such as one that in communist societies old people were made into seasonings to use for cooking.

“We tell them that under communism there will be no landlords, that the land will really be theirs, and their families. We teach them about the problem of bringing about communism in feudal society like the Philippines; that the first stage of the struggle would be to industrialize the Philippines, but that this cannot be done as long as we are a semi-colony of U.S. Imperialism.”

In groups of six or seven, cadres may stay in one barrio until they have set up barrio organization committees, the mass base of the NPA. In Solita’s group there were two other students and four peasants.

They were well received by hut villagers, they slept in their houses, ate their food, and helped in the fields. The task of another of the cadres was to provide food for the NPA regulars, who have no permanent base in Sorsogon but are constantly on the move. NPA military operations, it seems, are confined to ambushes of government forces–the principal method of collecting arms–and the liquidation of informers who betray their presence.

The Government makes much of these killings, and of the alleged extortion of food and money by the NPA. Keen to downgrade the ideological nature of the movement, the military authorities and the controlled media seem to impress that the communists are “bandits,” “rebels,” “Mao-Maos” (goblins). Female members like Solita are referred to by the same sources as “Amazons.”

Solita appears to be undaunted by the prospect of indefinite detention, without much hope of ever seeing a charge sheet or being tried. Soon, when the interrogators at Sorsogon see that they can extract no more information from her, she will be transferred to another prison, to undergo two hours a day of “re-education” until she agrees to accept President Marcos’ New Society. She does not know how she will respond, but she believes that there is no difference between the “New Society” and the old, except that in the old one political power was shared by several politicians and now it is concentrated in one man. #  This was reposted from Remembering Lorena Barros

Courtesy of Getty Images

When disgruntled former senior inspector Rolando Mendoza of the Manila Police District (MPD) stormed and hijacked a tour bus carrying 25 people, 20 of whom are from Hong Kong on August 23^rd of 2010, he set the world’s eyes on the Philippines and the world was about to find out the inadequate handling of the Justice and Legal system that Filipino families have lived through for generations.

On Tuesday, the Department of Interior and local Government (DILG) and National Police Commission (NALPOLCOM) chairman Jesse M. Robredo had been on the job for only 6 months before scandals littered his office with inquiries –

What will the Police Commission do to discipline and guide the department out of a national crisis?  150 dismissed cops became the scapegoat to a larger issue of corruption.

Policeman in Manila tortures a man for stealing

A Youtube video gone viral internationally also showcased the Philippine National Police (PNP) who swore an oath to serve and protect the people but tortured a man for stealing.  The tortured man was whipped and had his genitals pulled by a rope.

From the cases, it was learned that two top DILG officials who are responsible for the day-to-day operations of the Philippine National Police (PNP) were “not seeing eye-to-eye” and were fighting over the department’s resources and control.

Failure from the government to properly and diligently handle the police crisis prompted several foreign governments to issue a traveling ban to the Philippines.  Worst, the Filipino people were ashamed and alarmed of the national scandals that seemed to make headlines every week.  Filipino confidence in their protectors eroded.

Since then, nearly 800 policemen faced dismissal, almost 700 policemen were forced to undergo retraining of PNP values and ethics, 14 more cops were implicated in rape and kidnapping within the first week of the new year, and the PNP Chief Director Raul Balcalzo was implicated in connection with Jueteng.  If the PNP are the civilian’s watchmen, then who watches the watchmen?

It is no wonder that many Indigenous communities in the Cordillera who have always protected their land, people, and resources through Indigenous practices are wary of PNP outsiders to disrupt the order of peace.  If there are PNP retraining, let this be a serious wake up call.  The police should not be above the law and should also be retrained to answer to the people they serve and the nation they represent.  Since this government and police force is tainted with corruption, graft and theft, civilians and third party watchdogs should be watching over the PNP for any corruption and human rights violations.

New Text Books

Dallas, Texas – Texas State Board of Education is ready to enact a new Social Studies curriculum that will portray America as a nation rooted in Biblical values and the virtues of low taxes, limited regulation, and free enterprise.  In other words, capitalism is what makes this nation great but don’t forget that the bible is also rooted in our laws.

Remember during the times of slavery, we excused it by saying it is in the name of god.  Yes, free enterprise helped come up with the convenient excuse to use Christianity to further exploit a group of people.  Also, the conquering of the Native Americans was to civilize the pagans in the name of God.  The expansion of the American Empire was known as the “new frontier”.  It was considered new because Americans did not considered the Natives as people.  The endless massacres, displacement, wars, and breaking of treaties signed was to further the gains of this empire ruled by free enterprise in the name of god.

God is often used as a convenient excuse to expand wealth to land owners and commercial businesses.

Manifest Destiny – a term used by American Expansionist to conquer and expand in the name of god.  The Philippines, Haiti, Hawaii, and Somoa was to become America’s burden during the 19th century.  It was up to the Government to “civilize” the people so that they too will be close to god.  The Americans did this with a notion called “Benevolent colonization” through education.

Now, Texas Board of Education wants to make sure that children understands the “great” legacy of the American Empire by associating its terrible past with the biblical roots.  Instead of teaching about the appreciation of culture, the working class that helped build America including its legacy of Immigrants, many of who weren’t Christians, the Texas Board of Education will get last public comments in before submitting the new Social Studies curriculum.

More than 1200 Historians and college faculty members have signed a petition calling the academic curriculum “shoddy”

Los Suns

The Owners and Players Union salute the Suns management and players for standing up for immigrant rights in a time where diversity, education, and the working class is being attacked by racist law makers and American extremism seen in Jim Crow Era.  Since the introduction of Los Suns, we had Los Spurs, Los Mavs, etc..

Phil Jackson, however, has indicated he is strongly for the “protection” of this country by encouraging Arizona law makers to be harsh toward illegal immigrants.  Law Enforcement will be given the right to question and ask for identification with anyone who looks illegal with the passage of the Arizona law.  Vanessa Bryant, the wife of Kobe Bryant, has been seen donning the “Do I look Illegal?” shirt, a direct criticism toward Jackson’s lack of support for basic human rights.

I hope people can also start observing when is an immigrant “good” and when is an immigrant considered “bad”.  During periods of good economic times, we welcome immigrants to take on jobs most American’s do not want yet when the economy tanks, we are the ones to blame immigrants for taking the jobs.  Immigrants are generally the scapegoat during poor economic times with politicians taking their powers to introduce legislation showing that they are protecting Americans and the economy just like Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner are doing in California.  We’ll see who can out dumb-each other for California’s Primaries.

To understand immigration is also to understand displacement.  American’s and citizens of this world need to understand why so many people are poor.  Humans aren’t born poor.  There are those who exploit and those who get exploited.  See any third world countries and tell me if there are any foreign corporations taking the raw materials or outsourcing their work to make more profits.  American’s know this first hand when American Car companies started to outsource their labor elsewhere.  Now the great Car unions in the American Industrial belt is wiped empty with ghost towns.

Steve Nash and the Phoenix Sun, you make the NBA, the fans, and the people of America Proud.

Pleasantville's storyline, cinematography, themes comes together brilliantly

Pleasantville (1998) came out when I was still in High School.  It was written, directed, and produced by Gary Ross and starred Tobey Maguire, Reese Weatherspoon, and William H. Macy.

The film is possibly my favorite movie from the 90′s.  The sharp themes here critique contemporary culture and history in the mainstream and portrays the ridiculous behavior that can arise from our own fears.

I’m no Tobey Maguire or Reese Weatherspoon but Gary Ross did a fabulous job with weaving the storyline and getting the most out of his actors.

Old vs New

The constant theme that runs through this movie is change- the old, the familiar-that which we are comfortable with is shown in black and white while change and adjustment is shown in color.

Old ideas and traditions sometimes has to be broken – Women depicted in the American past were shown as just housewives responsible for  cooking and greeting guests, new ideas were considered dangerous, and, in the extreme case, books were burned or laws were created to stop the spread of new ideas.  In history, art was used as a weapon to challenge the status quo.

Segregation

The reference in the courtroom, showed the colors sitting on top which mimics the treatment of African Americans in America during the jim crow days.  The rationale behind the laws which mandates the segregation is based on fear of difference and fear of the unknown.  In American society, this fear was manipulated by the landowners to portray African Americans as slaves and hypersexualized beasts you would want your daughters to be near.  However, landowners frequently raped their slaves or servants.

The Bible

Perhaps one of my favorite scene is when Tobey Maguire’s character receives an apple from his date while on a picnic near the lake.  This is the exact reference to the Garden of Eden except no one is corrupting anyone although the film constantly refers to the old thinking that introducing new concepts and ideas is a form of corruption, a disease that must be dealt with.  Contemporary society, we can still see the manifestation of this craze, that the notion of evolution is beyond belief while the notion of god is a constant reality not to be challenged.

I can’t stand bad movies-a waste of 2 hours of my life.  Pleasantville on the otherhand, is a movie I recommend to those who never seen it.

SMARTMATIC's glitch

With all the problems with this year’s election, can we really celebrate the success of it?  PCOS Machine failures, failures to transmit, Vote buying, Long queues… The COMELEC was warned of these issues but continue to push for the May 10th Automated Elections despite the warnings.  They did little to nothing to bring Clean and Fair Elections.

Change?  The people went to the polls to vote for change.  We came out with  Marcos, Aquinos, and Arroyos still in power. The guy that helped author the much despised Value Added Tax (VAT), Ralph Recto, will he’s still in power too.  In fact, most incumbents who were in power are still in power.  The media did little to promote candidates platforms.

Even Partylists systems were a failure this year.  Partylists nominees are suppose to come from the marginalize sectors.  However, several of the former President’s administration reps enter the Partylist system as a backdoor entrance to congress.

So much for clean and fair  2010 automated elections!  That doesn’t mean we should wait til next election and HOPE for change.  The people should still demand change and hold the “elected” body responsible.

Why do they leave?

Majority of Filipinos who leave the Philippines are not tourists, rather they leave the country to seek opportunities.  Very few opportunities for employment exist in the Philippines.  7 out of 10 students who graduate are unemployed.  3 out of 10 generally compete with the rest of the labor market and previous unemployed out-of-school students.  Most do not get a job related to their field of study.  When the intellectuals and workers can’t find jobs in their homeland, they seek work outside.

Modern Day Heroes

The former president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo says its a sacrifice that must be recognized as Modern Day Heroes.  The Filipino migrants are known as Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs).  The Philippine economy is held together by the hard work of these migrants.  Yet, these very same migrants are taxed heavily for the application and testing process prior to leaving, they are taxed in the airport, and their remittances are taxed as well.    More often then naught, they have been modern day slaves.

Many migrant Filipinos also suffer from discrimination and violence from being abroad on top of being homesick.  Pinays get sexually molested.  The U.S. military is partially to blame for some of those incidents. Adam Corolla’s comments about the Philippines’ doesn’t exactly help.  In the Mid-East, some Filipinos are enslaved inside of their employers house.  Sometimes the Filipino gets executed without the help of the consulate general.

With the rise of Ethnic Tensions in the United States since 9/11 to current day Juan Crow laws (see Arizona’s recent anti-immigration, anti Ethnic Studies ban) should Filipinos really leave their country in midst of danger?

Indeed these Modern Day Heroes should be recognized as the former president mentioned, how can we protect them from the dangers of a foreign land?

What is Solution?

The Philippines owes it to their people to nationalize their job industries to provide quality jobs.  There are so many brilliant and hard working people forced to leave to provide for their families, this doesn’t have to be the case.  The newly elect, President Aquino should use his mandate to win the hearts of the people.

There are so many raw and natural resources that the Filipino people can enjoy.  The dams have enough power to power the whole Philippines so why charge ridiculous power rates.  At times, the power bill at the Philippines is more expensive then the ones here in the United States.  With so many poor people, who can afford it?  Drop the profits?  Profits only benefit the manager.  Spread the cost savings to the people or use that money to invest in better infrastructures and jobs instead of paying the executives.  Invest in solar clean power.  This one is a no brainer, when there are droughts, solar power should replace the energy lost from the energy garner from dams.

Roads needs to start from the farthest communities inward.  These are the most poverish areas that suffer the most.  Education needs to also be nationalize as well as the language.  The former president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, made english the national language.  Okay, this isn’t America and it shouldn’t be a colony of America.  The people have their right to speak their native dialect with a national language being developed (Filipino).

Last but not least, the majority of the Filipino Population are land tillers, Peasants, but they’re landless.  They work the land and pay land owner’s “rent”.  Sometimes rent can be as high as 50% of all your work.  Today, we know that as stealing.  The President elect, Noy Noy promised to go after thieves.  He’s going to have a tough time  bringing down his own family who are responsible for the Hacienda Lucieta Massacre in 1995.  Once land is redistributed out, the feudal practices of the past should fade away with time as culture starts changing.  Migrants won’t be forced to leave and society will progress