A Kabaleyan’s Thoughts…
‘Reject the Lie’
By Dr. Minguita Padilla
“Pareho lang silang lahat” (“They are all the same”). This, to my mind, is one of the most unenlightened, defeatist, and downright destructive statements I hear nowadays. No blog, no gathering, is without its self-styled pundits who preach their faulty beliefs as they continue to look at everything through the murky veil of cynicism. “They” (“sila“), of course, refers to our public servants seeking election come 2010, particularly the highest office of the land.
More than simply being untrue and dangerous, this statement is also the biggest lie that many of us; like conditioned drones, are buying; unaware that this is exactly what the corrupt, decadent, and amoral forces who appear to have dominated the governance of our land, want us to believe. We buy this lie, and we give up believing that we deserve better. We fall for this deception, and we run the risk of not recognizing good, sincere, and competent leaders, even if the evidence is already staring us in the face. We buy the lie, and we lose hope. We lose hope and evil wins.
Our situation today reminds me of the story of two little boys I met when I was a fourth year medical student. Benjie and Jun Jun were both 7 years old when they were brought into the emergency room of the Philippine General Hospital by good Samaritans who chanced upon their badly bruised and beaten bodies along a Manila street one evening. The boys were malnourished and weak; their bodies bearing the unmistakable signs of physical abuse. They were street children, “wards” of a syndicate that used them to beg and steal; and make a fast buck in whatever way possible; sexual favors included; in return for a roof over their heads; the guaranty of at least one meal a day; and a perverse sense of belonging. We never got to know how their beating occurred, or who was responsible for it. Our main concern then was saving what we could of their humanity; knowing as we did that helping them physically would be the easiest part of our task.
Like typical battered individuals, they resisted the care and affection we showed them; choosing instead to watch us with the eyes of cornered animals, half expecting us to hurt them, unable to shake off the suspicion that we were too good to be true and that there had to be a “catch” in all the kindness we were showing them. Such is the case with battered children. They had never known real love. Those who purported to care for them simply used them for selfish and perverse ends. They were conditioned to accept the abuse of the adults in their lives and they believed in their misguided hearts that everyone was the same; that this was life and they could not hope for anything better. This was how we found them. But this is where the similarity between the two ended.
An orphanage took them in; and they were cared for and loved in the best way the good nuns and benefactors of the orphanage could. It took a while to penetrate their hardened shells, but eventually Jun Jun chose to open himself up to this love and in time he metamorphosed into a loving, talented, and intelligent boy. Benjie on the other hand, chose to remain trapped in his cell of mistrust; and one day he escaped from the orphanage. He tried to take Jun Jun with him, but the latter refused. Benjie went back to the streets, where he was more accustomed to the “rules” as governed by the code of thieves and thugs. The two boys lost touch until a few years ago when Jun Jun, already an IT professional, heard that his childhood buddy had gone to jail for theft.
Like these two boys, we are a battered people. The broken promises of EDSA I and II shattered the hopes of many. The impunity and corruption we have been witnessing the past several years among those who were sworn to uphold our welfare, have inflicted painful and festering wounds on our country’s collective soul. We are tired. We are cynical. And many of us have chosen to tune out and not believe in anything better than the system we have to live and survive in; if only to spare us from more pain and to preserve our sanity. Fortunately though, there remain those who have resisted this path.
WE are on the precipice of dramatic change. One need not be a psychic to feel this and to know this. Call it a natural response to the unprecedented level of corruption that is choking our very life as a nation; but there is today a palpable thirst for true reform just beneath the surface of our collective consciousness. Some of this force has already manifested itself in many events during the last year. Just look at how the COA has been exposing more and more evidence of wrong doing; at how many employees of various government agencies have started to band together to try to curb the horrible decay corruption has brought to our institutions; how various citizens groups are being more vigilant and vocal about their disgust at the status quo, how our righteous soldiers and law enforcers are starting to speak up and stand up for what is right. Even the international financial crisis is a wake- up call that has forced many to re-examine and change the ways that brought about the crisis in the first place; namely unabated greed and deception.
The evidence of this rising tide of positive change is there; but we must help set it free so that it can become a raging tide that will carry us to where we should go as a nation, as a people. In order to do this we must reject the lies being peddled by the crocodiles and political dinosaurs who want us to believe that all politicians are the same, and that any new group of leaders will just be as corrupt as they are. We must break the chains of this deception. We must pray for enlightenment and for the faith of children, so that the fog may be lifted from our eyes and we may finally recognize and fearlessly support those leaders who suffer with us and share our aspirations, who have taken the difficult and lonely path of resisting the trappings of corrupt politics, who lead by example, who are willing to sacrifice for the common good and who put country above self. We must reject the lie so that we may finally reach the heights we were destined to climb as a people. We just reject the lie, lest we end up in a dark prison of our own choosing, where we will continue to curse the status quo and desperately dream of the best leaders our country never had.
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Dr. Ma. Dominga “Minguita” Padilla is the President of the Eye Bank Foundation of the Philippines and the Drug Abuse Research Foundation. She is the daughter of the late Supreme Court Justice Teodoro Padilla of Lingayen.
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