Reflections on human rights

In the last few months, I wanted to write about a lot of subjects that affected my life since the time I moved to the Netherlands. I wanted to talk about my studies– the inspirations, frustrations and chances it brought. I wanted to talk about my graduation project that I did with ‘Pinay sa Holland’, which enabled me to combine food, storytelling and new media. I wanted to share with you my summer vacation that I spent with my family, who finally was able to visit me here. I even mentioned in my previous article that I would write about possible interactive media applications for the Filipino community.

However, all of that will have to wait. I feel compelled to simply share my thoughts on the one thing that’s farthest from my life now here in the Netherlands, and yet, ultimately so close that I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck rising whenever it crosses my mind.

I’m talking about the unabated killings of activists in the Philippines. During the first half of the year, and especially when Proclamation no. 1017 was set into motion, the assassinations of activists rose so sharply that there were reports of two to four killings per week. Until now, even after Macapagal’s condemnations of the killings (but not the killers) and the creation of the Melo Commission, the corpses are still piling up.
This has taken a more monstrous form in my mind with the arrival of September. It has been 34 years ago since Marcos declared Martial Law, and yet political persecution still has the country in its grip. Those who oppose are quickly labelled disloyal and subversive, or worse. Being called a leftist, activist or communist is like getting 666 stamped on your forehead. Or a huge X that marks the spot where the bullet will hit.

But what is more frightening than the mark of death is the seeming indifference, cynicism or despair of the people. Where is the rage that should accompany such injustice? Where is the wrath against the perpetrators who act with such impunity? Where are the people who would protect human rights and demand the ouster of an illegitimate head of state?

If we can get pass our judgments and assumptions of activists, leftists or communists; if we can get pass the stereotypes and red scare propaganda, we would see that these so-called subversives are no different than your friend, brother, teacher, mother or priest. Than it would be easier to realise that the next time somebody gets killed for living their principles, it can be you or me. The next time the bells toll, “…it tolls for thee.”

All these thoughts swarmed in my head while seated in the train going home. These and other facts and figures criss-crossed my mind, which I want to share with you in the hope that this will arouse questions and set reflection in motion:

250 and 720:
As of this writing, the number of fatalities in the attacks on leftwing activists
since Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo became Chief Executive in 2001 as recorded by the Inquirer and leftist groups respectively.

What we need to remember if we don’t want to regret our indifference today:
No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices.
— Edward R. Murrow, a pioneer of television news broadcasting, whose series of TV news reports helped lead to the censure of Senator Joseph McCarthy.

Origin of Gloriarism
McCarthyism:
A term describing a period of intense anti-Communist suspicion in the U.S. from the late 1940s to the mid to late 1950s. The term derives from U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, a Republican of Wisconsin.

During this time people, primarily those employed in government, entertainment industry or education, were accused of being Communists or sympathizers and suffered aggressive investigations and questioning before various government or privately run committees and agencies.

Many suffered loss of employment, destruction of careers, and even imprisonment. Most of these punishments came about through trial verdicts that would later be overturned, declared unconstitutional, or dismissed.

What we don’t have enough of:
“Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
–Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet and writer

What GMA, Gen. Palparan and Norberto Gonzales should adopt as mantras:
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
— a summary of Voltaire’s attitudes, based on statements he made in Essay on Tolerance, by Evelyn Beatrice Hall

N.B. Defend to death ones right to say their beliefs, not bring them to death for opposing.

What I’d want to tell GMA in person:
“Look around — there’s only one thing of danger for you here — poetry.”
— remark made by Chilean poet Pablo Neruda when Chilean armed forces searched his house during the military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet

What I keep telling myself::
“We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason if we dig deep in our history and doctrine and remember that we are not descended from fearful men, not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes which were for the moment unpopular. We can deny our heritage and our history, but we cannot escape responsibility for the result. There is no way for a citizen of the Republic to abdicate his responsibility.”
– From the March 9, 1954, “See It Now” television broadcast on Senator Joe McCarthy.

And so I propose:

“If we do not struggle with all that we can have and do all that we can to vindicate our rights, we not only condemn our rights to death; we also condemn our hopes and dreams, our present, and our children’s future. Which course shall we choose?”
–Jose Diokno