At the time of her arrest, Reina Mae was pregnant. She gave birth while imprisoned to an underweight infant, baby River Emmanuelle, who would later be separated from her mother and denied of her mother’s breast milk which could have kept her healthy and prevented her untimely demise according to health experts.
Reina Mae and baby River’s story shows us otherwise. For people with no big names and for activists, human rights are never served on a silver platter. These should always be asserted against the establishment and must be defended for recognition, respect, and protection.
Mother’s milk is, I think, a symbol of compassion. Without mother’s milk we cannot survive, so our first act as a baby together with our mother is sucking milk from our mother, with a feeling of great closeness. At that time, we may not know how to express what love is, what compassion is, but there is a strong feeling of closeness. From the mother’s side also, if there is no strong feeling of closeness toward the baby, her milk may not flow readily. So, mother’s milk is, I think, a symbol of compassion and human affection. -The Dalai Lama
I cannot find the appropriate words to describe how our government is handling the crisis. It is a health issue to begin with. However, the response of the government, noted by its militaristic fashion, appears to be tangential and seemingly unresponsive to the situation.
"An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws." - Thomas Paine, Dissertation on First Principles of Government, 1795