Duterte’s comment about shooting insurgent women “down there” really raised a storm, as expected from someone like him. It does after all reflect the culture of those parts, with sexism and rural crassness. I agree it didn’t need to be said that way. But even if Duterte simply said, “then shoot them,” that would still raise outrage from the “disente.” But indeed, some people laughed and perhaps agree that terrorists should just be shot. I don’t laugh, but I’ll admit, I tend to agree as well.
This article started out as an attempt to answer the debate on the causes of terrorism, so I’ll go that way first. Poverty and capitalist exploitation are often cited as causes of terrorism. Supporters of these views would espouse poverty alleviation and anti-capitalist movements as solutions. This would lead to SJWs (social justice warriors) saying, give dole-outs, give to the “poor” what they want, force money from the rich, etc. But this is not the real motivation of terrorists, as I see it.
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This observation should be common already about terrorists: the leaders, the ones who start the terrorist agenda itself, are usually educated and not poor. Bin Laden and other Al Qaida leaders, people in Northern Irish terrorism, in Arab-Palestinian terrorist groups, nearby Southeast Asian terrorism, those who formed the CPP-NPA and Muslim insurgencies, including Hapilon and Maute, received formal education.
Being educated however does not mean they have common sense. Some “educated” people seem to develop delusions of grandeur. They begin to believe that their vision of a “better world” is superior to everyone else’s. And when they realize people don’t always subscribe to their views, they get hurt and all that, their search for validation is ruined… you know the drill. Pusong mamon (cake heart) people don’t like it when others have a different or even opposing opinion. So they decide that the solution is to use force, that they must eliminate or subjugate those who disagree with them. And, in order to do that more successfully, they seek to put themselves into power. A terrorist initiative is born.
Thus, I have concluded that terrorists want power and control first of all.
The other theories about poverty, climate and related do not hold water on why terrorists groups are formed. Poverty may be a factor in why people such as farmers would join terrorist groups – but as cannon fodder. The founders of terrorist groups are not poor people. They take advantage of poorer people and manipulate them into becoming their henchmen.
Look at Daesh (the should-be name of ISIS). What they wanted to do was set up caliphates – effectively states – all over the world. This means they want to rule over people and dictate them, and in a harsh fashion, knowing the nature of Arab culture and Shariah law. If they want their own territory and own state, then they want power.
Yes, when terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in 2001, they didn’t take over the country. But they felt power over people in sowing fear into them through an attack on their home soil. One would argue, what about the times when terrorists simply demanded the release of prisoners? That’s only part of the story. The prisoners they wanted released were likely terrorists themselves, and once out, would also return to their sinister activities in trying to gain power.
The desire for power is the great hubris of the human race. It is probably the root of all abuse and corruption in the world. But power isn’t just held by the ones in government halls or celebrities who are worshiped and applauded in society. It is also held by private people, especially those who are moneyed and “educated.” Indeed, such people are thought to be the actual funders of terrorist activities.
Youth like her are deceived and sacrificed for selfish people’s ideals
There are terrorists… and there are people who act like terrorists. Or, at least people who subscribe to the same idea, that their ways are superior and they should force their way on others as a hegemony, and anyone who disagrees should be put down. People in mass media could be guilty of this. SJWs can subscribe to terrorist ideals, such as the many youths led astray by the New People’s Army, among them Jo Lapira. One of the most laughable things to hear from them is that their rights are being violated; yeah, sure, except that they are among the greatest violators of human rights. For example, many of the pawns they deceive with “you can change the world” drivel, like Lapira, are sent to the frontlines to die.
Perhaps these people need more education, the right kind. This would include lessons of how validation is a useless thing, how pride leads to a fall, how “social justice” isn’t what it seems, that the world isn’t yours to control, and more. Indeed, it would also learning to accept that their ideals and ideologies don’t deserve to be a hegemony or dominant force. It’s what GRP has been giving pride-addicts; humble pie. Before you want the world to be a better place, you have to eat your own humble pie and give up seeking control over others. Instead, change your own world; work with your own life and do what you can to help and be a worthy example to others. Instead of force, inspire others with better, more meaningful ways to change the world. One article says involving youth in civics and community activities helps reduce the likelihood of being radicals, probably because it teaches them the concept of responsibility.
So some people would say, be merciful to the terrorists, just capture and “indoctrinate” them to accept the world. Teach them love and honey and flowers. Okay… but what if, after so many attempts to convince them to stop their violence, they don’t budge? They won’t change, they still believe in destroying the parts of the world that don’t agree with them. Thus, many people would agree that the only good terrorist is a dead one. In the end, if a young insurgent is charging at you with a gun, chances are they’re not doing it to have their gun autographed. Better to beat them to the punch, or more appropriately, to the shot.
I believe, as my cohorts here do, that what Filipinos embrace as their culture is what actually pulls the country down. And those who seem to be anti-dictators, who may also believe themselves to be “heroes,” are the real dictators.
The problem with terrorism is some group of people believes they are the chosen one by God to commit mass murder in the name of God. The other problem is, some communities have this ‘See no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil’ attitude on terrorism. At the end of the day, as long as people believes their religion is the only true religion and all others are false, there will be no world peace, no end to terrorism and all anti-terrorism effort will be futile.
I agree with JP Janecek when he said communism is one of the worst religions around.
The terrorist NPA and their leaders are the parties which should properly be brought before the International Criminal Court for their adherence to their ideology of arm conflict as their instrument of national policy.
Such adherence is a deliberate violation to the provision in the 1987 Constitution according to which “(t)he Philippines renounces war as an instrument of national policy xxx.”
Hmm, that provision could also apply to people who want war with China over the islands. I should have mentioned that. Thanks.
As usual Dueterte proves he is a Class-Less Neanderthalic Moron. The leader of a country making such remarks makes him a laughingstock, as in, “Lets see what this idiot does next !”….and Dueterte see’s this and thinks to himself, like all well trained dogs:”And now, for my next trick..”.
Getting the message across as in “I’ll give you a medal…”, has a slight bit of decency in it, even if it is ,again, the leader of a Banana Republic gone horribly wrong, saying it….
“Shot them between their legs”, “Blow their private parts to pieces” -these are the commands of Pres. Duterte, in fighting New Peoples’ Army female soldiers. I agree with Pres. Duterte; the NPA female soldiers, is not there to charm you. They are as deadly as the male NPA soldiers.
Terrorism has many causes. Their goals are mostly in different kinds. The Islamic terrorists, want to die for their God: Allah, and receive a reward of 72 virgins in Paradise. They want Sharia laws to be the law of the state. All non muslim will be second class citizens, like waht the OFWS in the Middle East, are being treated. Some may end up dead in a freezer, like the murdered Filipino OFW… The Irish Terroists want for the independence , and self governance in Northern Ireland. The NPA terrorists want the Philippine government, to become a communist Maoist state.
Look at the uniforms of the NPA terrorists. They are like the uniforms of the Peoples’ Liberation Army of the late Mao Tse Tung. So, with their political ideology; our country, when they ever gain power will be like China, in the years of Mao Tse Tung’s reign.
There will be a dictator, who will become the NPA chairman, maybe “Chairman Jo Ma Sison”. He lives in Amsterdam , Holland in luxurious living, and will continue to live in luxurious living. While the rest of us, will be his slaves, and slave of the state. No one will own any property. All properties will be owned by the state.
Everything will be rationed: food, clothing and other basic necessities. We all will dwell in communes. Housing will be communal. The Lazy will be lazy; the industrious will be industrious. But, on the political communist ideology. We are all equal. The dumb will be equal to the smart. Everybody will be presumed dumb, except the communist rulers, who will dictate everybody what to do.
“Chairman Jo Ma Sison”, will write his , ” Red Little Book”, and all will worship him for his wisdom. Anybody who will oppose the communist rule, will be sentenced to lifetime of slave labor in a slave labor camp. Immediate firing squad will be done to all reactionary forces, or anti revolutionary.
Of course, the rulers of the “Philippine communist state”, they and their families, will eat better; will dress better; will have better housing; and will live a luxurious lives. While the rest of us , will live poor miserable lives.
This is the “workers utopia”, that the communist theorist, Marx and Engels, had written. It is just a theory. It was tried in Soviet Union, to remove the Russian Czar. It was tried in China, in
the reign of Mao Tse Tung. The communist theory was a failure. It simply did not work.
While I’d broadly agree with your analysis of the cause of terrorism, there doesn’t seem to be any point in shooting terrorists until that cause has been addressed.
Certainly you could blast away at the cannon-fodder, but unless your rate of killing matches the rate of recruitment you’re not going to win. You’re just going to be knee-deep in the corpses of stupid people, with no apparent end in sight. There are plenty of historical instances of this kind of thing happening: sometimes the terrorists actually come out on top, because the killing accelerates the recruitment.
No, people are disgruntled and discard the methods you suggest because those methods are explicitly forbidden to them (and because there are a lot of stupid people – it’s my belief that this is deliberate government policy to ensure a gullible voter base, but it cuts both ways). The average person who wants to make the Philippines a better place will find government, local Barangay officials, the mayor, the oligarchy, and most of his neighbors arrayed against him. Perhaps we should count those people as terrorists who are deliberately keeping this country poor and miserable – which they are – and simply shoot them?
Consider: why is it that intelligent, power-hungry people should find fertile ground for terrorist activity (ie., a surplus of the cannon-fodder you mention) in the Philippines, but not in “developed” countries? In the US or Europe, such people are far more likely to start businesses, charities, or social-change movements. The might merely be seeking power, but many of them do real good. Even in the worst case, the money-obsessed businessman creates jobs along with his business empire, and he knows that he has to treat people well and give them real opportunities to make the most money; in the Philippines that’s less likely to happen because various social and economic factors conspire to drive the businessman to treat his employees like serfs.
Good points raised. I’ll admit, it may have been a mistake to change the original ending of my article. Instead of saying a young insurgent, I originally said “kill especially the leaders.” I still agree with the policy of offering the cannon fodder to surrender and start off on the good side again, but it’s the leaders who abuse them who deserve to be dispatched. Problem is, once in the thick of battle, when the young uns become combatants, they become targets. They’re not victims of the soldiers who shot them, but the terrorist leaders who sent them there. Thus, I hope the terrorist leaders get theirs. I hope that clarifies it.
Nevertheless, I acknowledge the issue of exploitation you mentioned. I did mention the farmers and other people in the rural parts who have their grievances and thus join the NPA. But when I thought of underlings joining and their getting fooled, I was thinking not of the farmers, but the young students who get fooled by this idea that capitalism is inherently evil and you have to violently destroy it to make the world a better place. That’s admittedly the audience for this article and my last one about communism. I think that since the students have no chickens being stolen or fields to be trampled, and they’re the types to go to Starbucks to discuss Marx, they’ve no real reason to join. But yeah, they’re young and sometimes dumb, so they go willing to join the cannon fodder for the ideal. It is sometimes hard to convince such people to not fall to the false allure of the “cure-it-all.” So I hope going to the source, taking out the big bosses, will be done and these deceptions will end.
You did explain those points pretty well in the article; but again, killing the leaders won’t help because new ones will arise in their place. There’s no shortage of “intellectuals”, same as there’s no shortage of cannon-fodder.
I think the vast majority of Filipinos (especially those bleating about the evils of capitalism) don’t appreciate that the country isn’t capitalist: the thing they want to destroy doesn’t remotely resemble capitalism, which at its best is nothing more than a system for facilitating trust, trade, and profitable social interaction. The irony of student leaders calling for a Marxist government is that the present economic/political system is, broadly speaking, cookie-cutter standard National Socialism (as I’ve mentioned before). The overlap between Marxism and National Socialism is so broad that some analysts draw no distinction. The theoretical difference is that National Socialism is led by a central government while Marxism is led “by the people”, but in practice neither one happens: in both systems, there’s always some power balance maintained between central government and a self-appointed oligarchy. There is strong pressure towards centralisation because, as you said in not so many words:
“Power is not a means; it is an end. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power.”
The TRAIN law is the most explicit pronouncement of National Socialist principles so far. It appropriates roughly 50% of economic output for government-led projects. This means there is little or nothing left for private initiative, which is the main driver of economic progress (historically speaking). Since public works in the Philippines are hopelessly corrupt, the net effect will be to destroy the economy. A new generation of terrorist leaders will (correctly) assert that the law prevents peaceful economic progress, and will then (incorrectly) assume that they have to pick up guns, and thus violence begets violence.
Now, I’m not suggesting that just implementing laissez-faire capitalism will magically fix the economy and make the terrorists go away. Even if the government did that (and there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell) there would still be tens of millions of people who wouldn’t know what to do with themselves, and several million who simply enjoy making mischief. You WOULD still have to deal with those people who imagine that killing, violence, and theft are normal. The problem is, those people don’t all walk around with a red-starred hat and a flashing neon sign on their back saying “terrorist”. Some of them are your neighbors. Some of them are in government offices. It’s always very comforting to think you can fix everything by putting bullets in the right heads, but history suggests we’re very bad at identifying who those people are.
To clarify again, I’m talking about terrorists, not socialists already in the government who’ve basically laid down their arms (although the case of Ronald Llamas with an AK-47 in the trunk puts some question to that). Put bullets in the heads of those who still want to put bullets in the heads of others first. Sort of, “he who lives by the sword should perish by the sword,” being carried out. Searching and ready dispatching of known terrorist leaders like Osama bin Laden and the Mautes without dawdling about. Fair point about identifying who those people are, but I think it is possible to identify correctly who they are, dawdling about just delayed things. For one thing, they usually have killed innocent people already.
Kindly convince me that this isnt some moro moro because that guy has been all “mabuhay ang npa” and “just pay them” etc etc etc. Stragedy daw? I am all ears. Coz all this talk of “the npa and isis will attack manila” smells of red herrings and false flags
Oh, even if the NPA and ISIS may not successfully reach Manila, they still have that goal and the mentality that innocents are still worth killing in order to real that goal, so so the same, the draconian solution will have to do here.
1. “terrorist” is more of an emotional propaganda term and quite useless. In the vietnam war for example, the viet cong were called terrorists. But American strategic bombing and “free fire zones” killed far more, are we just going to excuse that as collateral damage. Who is the real terrorist? Our army has a similar record in their regard for civilian lives
2. In my experience in mindanao, the reason people join the NPA is soldiers enter their village, kill a few of the men to scare them from joining, rape some of their women/daughters, steal some of their farm animals for food. how much of that can you take
I’m kinda skeptical about the number two thing. So soldiers regularly do that and power trip? That one needs to be checked out, or it can be fake news. Perhaps that happened years ago and rarely happens today. But raping women and stealing, perhaps that’s the NPA disguised as soldiers, or from what I’ve heard, NPAs do that without disguises too. NPA are also abusive. Between the army and NPA though, I’d go for the army because it’s their job to protect society, and they did that in Marawi.
Vietnam won the Vietnam War, and of course there were atrocities by the Americans. But it seems the Vietnamese still wised up and thought, pure communism isn’t doing us good, especially when they considered China’s status now. So they decided to loosen up as China did, and so they have American companies in there. America doesn’t seem like the “terrorist” to them now.
Duterte is inciting FEAR to the enemy when he said that, but some groups are too sensitive. It is a strategy to disband the enemy and finish the war.