In the age of social media, perception is everything. From this reality, the Philippines’ campus “activists” have been on the run. Rather than step up to the challenge of facing and correcting any perceptions about them they believe are wrong, they are instead digging their heels in and doing the same thing. It’s a form of insanity, indeed — expecting different results whilst doing the same thing over and over.
Most baffling of the habits of these campus “activists” is their continued drum-beating about a so-called Duterte-US “regime”. For that matter, looking over the last several decades, we should really be replacing this with a template slogan they use: their “Ibagsak ang rehimeng US-[insert current president here]”. They often cite “parallels” between the current (or, for that matter, any incumbent administration) with the “Martial Law Era” and refer to a so-called Martial Law “playbook” as being behind the agenda of any sitting president. And then they wonder why Filipinos have long dismissed campus activism as a quaint sometimes-annoying feature of university life. These “activists”, as a matter of habit, insult the intelligence of ordinary Filipinos.
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If, indeed, being “reg-tagged” (i.e. associated with communism) is “unfair” on many “activists”, then this perception needs to be corrected. Nobody disagrees with that. The trouble is, there seems to be no serious will to do that. There are, to be fair, activists and they are being undermined by the merely “activist” amongst them. What separates a genuine activist from the pretend “activists”? There is no short answer to that, but clues lie in how well activism has so far delivered results.
Modern marketers and businesses that invest in advertising rely on data and analytics to measure how effective their campaigns are and how much bang per buck spent is delivered. Insights gleaned from continuous data analysis are used to evaluate campaign designs which are then continuously tweaked to improve potency. Correlation is used to establish track record and A/B-testing is used to established causation between said tweaks and effectiveness.
Activist campaigns are no different. They aim to persuade people and shape opinion with the intent of influencing politics and governance. A lot of time and warm bodies are put into the mobilisation of activist campaigns (i.e. those protest rallies that erupt every now and then). Most disturbing of all, the wellbeing of young impressionable students (some of whom are minors) recruited to be operatives in these organisations are put at risk, not to mention the disruption to their academic commitments (the whole point of their being in school, to begin with) these extracurricular activities cause.
The question is, how effective is this “activism”.
Where are the results?
It is difficult to determine because there is a layer of dishonesty to sift through before we can ascertain what defines success for communist-flavoured “activism”. For one, it is difficult to reconcile the conventional communist dogma of violent “armed struggle” that aims to establish a “dictatorship of the proletariat” with the seemingly “legit” activities of certain polticians affiliated with these camps who seem to participate in politics through legal democratic channels. In the vernacular, ano ba talaga?
The fact that the communist “cause” and the satellite front organisations that orbit around it continue to be associated with the terrorist New People’s Army (NPA) provides the simplest answer to that question. The alternative answers — the standard rhetoric parroted by their “thought leaders” and their defensive responses to “red tagging” — are, in comparison, hopelessly incoherent.
Indeed, the simplest explanation is, in most cases, the most sound one.
As such, the message to the broader community of activists who aim for true authenticity and genuineness in intent is clear:
Ditch the commies.
It’s simple, really.
benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.com.
If that’s the quality of education they’re getting, then who’s to blame. The segregation isn’t inherent. It comes from the thinking that one’s fortune is disentangled with the other.
The activism that we are seeing are not for the Filipino peoples’ sake…It is for the Aquino Cojuangco political axis, trying to gain back their lost political power.
First, they cheated in the 2016 Vice Presidential election; putting Lugaw Robredo, as the fake Vice President… Former COMELEC Chief Andres Bautista, facilitated the cheating, thru the HOCUS PCOS and SMARTSWITIK voting machines. The crook, Andres Bautista, was bribed with multi million pesos, to accomplish the election fraud. He is now in the U.S., as a TNT, enjoying his bribes.
After the election, there was a vigorous Senate Inquiry by Trililing Trillanes and the crook/drug dealer Leila de Lima, on Duterte’s EJKs, for the purpose of impeachment. Duterte instead jailed De Lima and neutralized Trililing Trillanes. Then, these impeachment conspirators, went to ask help from international organizations ; from the European Union ; from U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio ;from the U.S./C.I.A. ; from the International Criminal Court, etc…
Nothing came out from their activities…Duterte is as “tough as a nail” to remove…So, they initiated the campus activists, who are addicted to rallies to go on with their daily rallies…they also used the leftist organizations : especially the CPP and the NPA, the Anak Bayan, Gabriela, etc… to show their political strength. The Roman Catholic Church, with its priests , nuns and bishops also were used, in the attempt to remove Duterte, and replace him, with the Fake Vice President Lugaw Robredo. Still, Duterte is hard to remove.
Finally, they tried the Project SODOMA, with their “Poster Boy Bikoy”, to help in the coup d’ etat. With Tililing Trillanes, Lugaw Robredo, “walang panty” Hontivirus, and the defeated otso diretso senatorial candidates to assist in the coup d’etat efforts. The Project SODOMA, blew on their faces. Their “Poster Boy Bikoy”, instead became a turncoat…and they are now charged with Sedition…
The Aquino Cojuangco political activism will continue, until Duterte is impeached and they will again gain back their political power. This is how greedy and corrupt these people …
It is like we are back in the 1986 EDSA era again. Same tactic : the Left using the Right…the Right using the left, with the Roman Catholic Church bishops , priests and nuns getting into the fight….the only thing is : the y don’ t have the support from the U.S. /C.I.A. and the U.S. State Department …
U.S. President Trump is busy with : the Hong Kong – China problem; the Maduro Venezuela regime; the Kim Jung Un North Korea missile testings ; the Iran U.S. confrontation; the festering Israeli Palestinian problem; his Democrat opponents using the Russian Trump collusion delusion issue; the pouring of fake asylum seekers in the U.S. Mexican borders; the China U.S. trade deal and his own re-election…
Like I’m saying, if a revolution is taking a long long time to end, it’s not a revolution. It’s been almost sixty years since, since the so-called “rebellion” had been launched where casualties are nearing to a million and still no end in sight. Sixty years is a very very long span of time to convince people to make them join in their so-called revolution, but if in this amount of time, they find it that the people are still reluctant to accept their idea of change, isn’t it about time to pause for a while and think, “there must be something wrong in what we are doing?”