Back when the Spanish Conquistadors first set foot on Philippine shores and claimed all in the name of God and the Spanish king, it would have looked like this all made sense. Christianity, after all, was the “good” religion and Western civilisation regarded as a necessary “civilising” force. Europeans saw themselves as burdened by a duty to “civilise” the rest of the world’s coloured lot which included dismantling all their “pagan” traditions and replacing these with Christian tokens.
Sound familiar?
| SUPPORT INDEPENDENT SOCIAL COMMENTARY! Subscribe to our Substack community GRP Insider to receive by email our in-depth free weekly newsletter. Opt into a paid subscription and you'll get premium insider briefs and insights from us. Subscribe to our Substack newsletter, GRP Insider! Learn more |
It does, because this is the same self-righteous fervour that is driving Western European and North American powers in their drive to ensure the world toes the line today. Things haven’t changed much, indeed. Spears, swords, and guns may have been replaced by trade embargos, sanctions, and visa cancellations, but the selective morality in the manner with which Western powers continue to exert influence over the rest of the world remains the same. They and their lackeys in liberal parties and movements all over the world regard themselves as the “good guys”. So powerful is this paradigm — that the West are the good guys and all the rest are murderous tyrannical regimes — that even leaders who enjoy popular support in “democratic” countries, but don’t toe the Western liberal line, are labelled as “evil dictators”.
The bizarre thing here is that these very same liberal partisan camps, spurred by the extremist subset of “woke” snowflakes within them, also presume to defend the “plight” of indigenous communities, their ways of life, and their traditions. They even pay lip service to remnants of their “nations” and allow token markers that commemorate the territories they lost to Western colonisers. Think about that for a minute. The traditions of these indigenous communities are all non-democratic. Their “nations” were ruled by monarchs, chieftains, lords, warlords, and theocrats. They would all have governed in ways that violate today’s “human rights” laws. Indeed, the biggest affront to human rights today is no less than the Roman Catholic Church itself which, by its very charter, is the antithesis of a modern free Western liberal democracy!
Now, to be fair, freedom, democracy, rule of law, and individual rights are all nice things. Indeed, even presumed “tyrants” like Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte were elected to office by The Vote. Indeed, halfway through his term, Duterte remains exceedingly popular, thus enjoying a mandate to continue governing. No evidence of “tyrannical rule” could be found in the Philippines today. Even the economy is oblivious to all the names and labels being slapped on the Philippine government by Uncle Sam’s agents and media moguls.
The reason, perhaps, why liberals are seemingly in “retreat” (or so they lament) and conservatives and populists are enjoying a resurgence is because people are increasingly aware of just how inherently inconsistent liberal ideologies are. They’ve seen through its extreme form — communism — in the late 1980s, now they are seeing through its more moderate flavours today, such as what happened in the Philippines when its once-formidable liberal bloc lost an entire nation to Duterte.
If liberals want to continue sharing the political stage as respected challengers to conservatists and even populists, they need to get real. In the case of the Philippines’ most extreme liberals, the “woke” Yellowtards who remain rabidly loyal to the Aquino-Cojuangco feudal clan, a massive rebrand and purge of their leadership is long-overdue. If they hadn’t learnt anything from the catastrophic defeat they suffered in this year’s elections, then there is no hope of a return to power for this discredited lot.
Getting real is easy. One just needs to be honest with one’s self first. Once that is achieved, honesty is easily extended to those one seeks to influence. It is imperative that today’s Philippine Opposition learn that simple lesson if they are serious about winning future elections in what remains a fully-democratic Philippines.
benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.com.
The Aquino Cojuangco political axis YellowTards, are still suffering from Spanish and American “hangover” of colonialism. …These YellowTards, are hoping that their neocolonialist masters, will come to their aids, on the reasons of “human rights violations”, to put them into power. Since they cannot win in any fair and honest elections. Hoping for another “rerun” of 1986 Aquino’s EDSA…
We are tired of “Uncle Sam”, of playing to us , ‘good parents” …meddling in our internal affairs, thinking what is good and , what is bad for us. This kind of colonial mentality mindset, is reinforced, when ; the fake Vice President Lugaw Robredo and other opposition operatives, like : Trililing Trilanes and the “fake news poster girl”, Maria Reesa , go to the U.S., and other countries, to “badmouth” , our country and its leadership; to beg for support from foreign governments, and foreign politicians, to put them into power.
They even used the “toothless and powerless” , International Court (I.C.C) , to “convict” Duterte of killing, thousands of people, by Extra Judicial Killings, to remove the duly elected President from power, and replace him with the fake Vice President Lugaw Robredo…so, far I have not seen bodies pile up on the roads, or on the streets… The only mass murders that took place, was when the Ampatuans, who are loyalists to the Aquinos, during the Aquino era, murdered many Journalists and civilians; and buried their bodies with BackHoe…
When will these opposition people learn to be mature ? That to win an election, they have to present to us, Voters, a better alternative program and performance , to what Duterte is giving us. Badmouthing and Demonizing Duterte will never remove him from power; nor can make you win fair and honest elections…the Filipino people has waken up already, by the social media warriors !
Are you saying our country would be better off if we are still living in a tribal society like lapu lapu’s today? For example mexico would still be having slavery, tribal wars, ritual sacrifice for their superstitions if it werent for colonization. get real.
Then again the Aztecs were great astronomers and engineers. If their civilisation hadn’t been obliterated by Spanish colonisers then they would have had a space programme to rival NASA’s in the 1960s.
How about our tribes? We were not into monument-building of any kind…which was why we were easy pickings for the Spanish
Since we also had influences from China and India, we did have some precolonial technology that can hardly be thought of as “tribal” such as guns. We could have developed differently.
There was a lot of animosity between different groups, for example the Visayans agreed to fight the Tagalogs along with the Conquisatadors. This divide and conquer tactic made sense because the topography was conducive to it.
So what if Mexico didn’t colonized by the Spaniards before, then they’d preserved their cultures, religions & their traditions like human sacrifice then that’s OK. At least they won’t be exploited by the corrupt & immoral European mentality & identity just like what this small island in the heart of Bay of Bengal just east of India called North Sentinel Island where the people of that island are didn’t invaded & exploited by the European colonizers for the past 500 years & their cultures, language, religions & traditions are well preserved for more than 10,000 years & never been infected by the deadly smallpox or AIDS in their island that might reduce or eliminated their race: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kionasmith/2018/11/30/everything-we-know-about-the-isolated-sentinelese-people-of-north-sentinel-island/#71def59735a0
Kudos to that North Sentinelese for doing that & they’re much better than North Korea. 🙂