16, 17, and counting
Kristel Tejada was forced to file a leave of absence from the University of the Philippines in Manila after she failed to pay tuition on time. Out of despair, she committed suicide on March 15, 2013. She was 16.
Illegal
The concept of “the legal” has become paradoxical in itself. It serves as a license of the state to declare whether something deserves acceptance, dispute or some kind of authoritative might. In instances when something “already legal” contravenes the new will of the powers that be, the state is quick in rallying its force just to abolish what it sees as a stumbling block to its mission of preserving its doctrinal power. The state, then, has a double-edged power in this sense. It has the overarching might to decide what is legal, and the power to destroy what it considers a threat to its survival by proclaiming such as illegal.
Fetishized conscience
The resurrection of these elites – the likes of Marcos and Arroyo – to national political power does not signal any cleansing of conscience from the past. There will never be a repentance that could once and for all purge the history of plunder, corruption and impunity that they themselves nurtured because the very political system that installed them to power remains the system that they now capitalize on.
Fake news and beyond
Fake news suppresses the right of the public to critical pieces of information. But it is not the end disease. It is yet another symptom of a failed democratic experiment in the era of online media.
