By Davao Today
When news broke out of police operatives killing three suspected kidnappers and rescuing a kidnap victim in a downtown area reported shoot-out, social media network was swarmed with comments from Davao netizens who either praised the local authorities’ tough act against criminals or questioned the excessive use of violence.
Davao development worker and columnist Mags Maglana referred to the common reaction of Davawenyos as a “not-in-my-backyard” attitude.
Davao Today gathered some comments all around social media sites and did found this attitude in posts such as this, which says “there’s no place for crime here… either they die in the shootout or Digong (Duterte) kills them.”:
Maglana said such attitude is understandable, as it “indicated a pride of place — Davao is heartland for many; its local government and people have numerous laudable accomplishments, and we should rightly be proud.”
Maglana, however, found some comments as overboard with some posts “disturbing” like admonishing the suspected kidnappers for daring to come to Davao, or going to the extent of over-praising local officials such as Mayor Rody Duterte known for his tough stance against criminals.
Pride for Davao’s brand of anti-criminal governance went to such extremes as attacking an independent blogger who questioned the pervading violence in the city. Sher Urdaneta, a blogger who once lived in Davao, was at the end of online attacks and bullying.
Garnering 400 comments, Urdaneta’s piece “Duterte and the scary culture of impunity” posits:
“Arrest the criminals, wound them if necessary, but shoot them with the full intention of killing them is another story. Whatever happened to the due process of law? If summary executions can be carried out by the authorities, how then do we distinguish who commits the actual crime? I mean, how are we different from the criminals, when we thirst for their blood? Doesn’t that make us all the same, criminals and non-criminals alike?”
Some posts bordered on cyber-bullying:
One post came from Juanito who said his mother was one of the employees in the bank where the shooting took place. He gave a lengthy comment and argument that the end justifies the use of force against criminals.
Urdaneta had her blog deleted when davaotoday checked Saturday, but her article still remained on an online news website.
In her post, Maglana criticized extreme pride saying that:
“…the emotions we currently feel no matter how rousing could end up becoming misplaced and hollow sentiments. If we are not careful we could become victims of our own hubris – exaggerated pride, in literature the kind often preceding downfall.”
She added that:
“I would rather that we move from NIMBY to NIABY – Not In Anyone’s Backyard. We have to work so that the problems to which we are objecting do not, cannot occur, well to put it bluntly, anywhere.
For his part, popular Davao blogger, Blogie Robillo, shared his sentiments with Urdaneta saying he “finds it disturbing that fellow Davawenyos are cheering the killing”:
Robillo also raised the issue of how information has been fed from authorities to the media and to the public.
Little is known on how the police knew of the kidnapping and the whereabouts of the suspects, a point also raised by former New York Times and Interaksyon writer and now Human Rights Watch coordinator Carlos Conde:
The Commission on Human Rights has called for an investigation over what it called “clear murder” of the suspected kidnappers. (davaotoday.com)
