As a final step towards fascism, the Implementing Rules and Regulation of the Anti-Terror Law has been released in October. Lieutenant General Antonio Parlade, Jr. was quick to red-tag celebrities, duly-elected officers, and critics of the administration.
If DepEd were to make sense, now is the "perfect time" for honesty—from their end. The agency has to admit that the absence of teacher supervision makes learners primarily responsible for their own learning progress.
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.
Teachers are demanded to grade objectively. Students are commanded to deliver. And while this seems to be the most efficient way to identify who “passes” and who “fails”, it disregards the human aspect of education. In fact, it is this obsession with efficiency and production that reveals how misplaced the priority of our education system is.
Every year in October, anesthesiologists celebrate or commemorate Anesthesia Week. I will write this time about the anesthesiologist as victims and victors. My column got its inspiration from Roger Water’s (or Pink Floyd’s) song “Comfortably Numb.”