Okay, I’m just going to rant here because I have seen at least two videos regarding Syria’s plight right now and I’m going to tell you why I think this is unfair.
I’m a Filipino. Most of my Facebook friends are. The pages they share are international, and so you can’t blame them for seeing videos and posts about how awful Syria is right now and how terrible our world is for children.
Surigao del Norte and Surigao del Sur are provinces in the southernmost islands of the Philipppines, in Mindanao.
(Above photos from Surigao del Norte’s and Surigao del Sur’s Wikipedia pages.)
Now, what’s the deal with Surigao?
In September 1, 2015, three people were killed in Surigao del Sur by armed men. One of them was a school head for an alternative learning system that strives to educate the young and old lumad of the region. He was found with his hands bound and his throat slit, his stomach stabbed. The other two are lumad leaders, and were asked to step out of their homes at 4am and killed right before the watching eyes of their community.
Paramilitaries are currently massacring, raping, harassing, and driving the lumad away from their ancestral grounds–their fucking homes–with threats and terrorism. Why? No one is really sure. The more paramilitary-friendly explanation is that these armed men assumed the three community figures are part of or affiliated with the New People’s Army (NPA). How do they know? Well, accounts said that if you had a gun, you were automatically assumed by the paramilitary to be a member of the NPA. The more capitalistic and realistic explanation is that the southern part of the Philippines is good mining ground. A friend of mine who hails from Surigao mentioned that there are actual islands off the coast of Surigao that cannot be seen due to the sheer amount of ships surrounding them, gathering ores and other minerals and extracting money from these resources. No one knows from which companies or countries these are from–and the government seems to pay no mind.
Currently, children are scarred and traumatized. They cannot and do not go to school due to fear and lack of resources. Their families are driven out of their homes, out of their villages, out of the lands of their fathers and forefathers, and are now living in evacuation areas.
(Artworks of some children from Surigao who witnessed the killing of their community leaders. Photos from http://www.interaksyon.com/article/100488/disrupted-dreams–lumad-childrens-art-portrays-their-hopes-and-fear.)
Lumad are a group of indigenous people that refers to the collective ethnolinguistic groups in the south of the archipelago. Lumad is a Cebuano word that means native. They are a slowly dying and yet truly colorful culture due to modernization, and now this. The customs and traditions, the stories and knowledge and wisdom of these lumad are those preserved and alive back in the precolonial days, strong and protected despite the Spanish colonization (Mindanao was hardly touched by the Spanish colonization), even against the Americans (who sought to ally with them instead of conquer them).
Here resounds the lines from Heneral Luna. “Ganito ba talaga tayo? Kalaban ang kalaban. Kalaban ang kakampi. Nakakapagod.”
(Photo from http://www.interaksyon.com/article/100488/disrupted-dreams–lumad-childrens-art-portrays-their-hopes-and-fear.)
What’s my deal? Why do I think it is unfair to keep attentions on Syria?
It’s no one else’s primary fault but the government and the media that we do not have enough knowledge nor coverage of the lumad killings right now. The leaders were killed only September 1, 2015. But this driving out of the natives has been going on for years and has only been brought to attention now. Take note that they aren’t even in the forefront of local news, just special mentions and little drops of names here and there. It only becomes our responsibility, our fault, when we know what is going on and yet choose to not care and not help cure or alleviate the situation.
Remember as well that the current egghead of a president we have, Noynoy Aquino, started a counter-insurgency operation called Oplan Bayanihan that pretty much did the exact opposite of what it was supposed to do. Examples, you say? Mamasapano. SAF44. A rise of military operations and alongside it, human rights violations. If you need the numbers and more, click this link: http://www.karapatan.org/resources/statistics.
And of course, it’s not difficult to suppose that his family has had the media by their throats for a long while now. I’m going to just say one name: Kris Aquino. One of the most influential (yes, do not deny) celebrities in the country.
Syria and what’s happening there is highly covered in so many countries and media networks around the world. As it should be: an entire country’s descent to the most human hell must be stopped, children and families and innocent lives must be saved by all forces possible.
But here’s the thing: we Filipinos know so much more about Syria than we do our kababayans. Within our own fucking lands, we have chaos and terrorism and military bullshittery happening. Mga kadugo natin. Mga kapatid. (Our brothers.) What’s the fucking deal with us, na ang hilig nating pumansin agad sa muta ng iba gayong sarili nating muta ay hindi natin malinis? (Why do we so love to point out other people’s mistakes when we cannot even fix our own mistakes?)
We all should care for Syria, yes. The children there are suffering and deeply traumatized. No kid should ever have to go through that which they go through now. See this video here, and this one, too. But that does not mean we should be ignorant and blind and uncaring about our own fucking issues. There are children traumatized and involved here, too. #StopLumadKillings is a good way to bring about awareness and attention to what’s happening to Surigao, but the number of people who know are still so small, and the number of people who know and care, so much less. I’m not even going to try and bring up those who know and care and do something about it.
We have to bring the plight of our lumad brothers and sisters to the forefront, headlines and sirens and red lights all over. We have to make the government active and accountable for what is happening to them, to us. We have to get involved and get dirty because this is our land, our country, our home. If these lumad people are supposed to be protected by laws like this and this and yet are so transgressed, then how the fuck do we expect to be safe from the same fucking operations the government is letting through now?
And why do I have to put this in a perspective that will let you understand how shitty the situation is, when we can just understand it in the language of compassion and humanity?
turnnoffyourmind
yousharknotpass
dededos
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