Punchline
Hand-to-mouth existence
By Ermin Garcia Jr.
THIS month marks the 55th year of your Sunday PUNCH.
In all modesty, I must say your PUNCH has come a long way in every sense of the word. I certainly had no illusion at anytime in the past when I took over the reins in 1968 that the PUNCH would still be around 43 years later.
I was told by my father’s friends that he had even told them at one time shortly before he was killed in 1966 that if he should die at anytime, he would want the PUNCH to end with him. I had not understood then why he even entertained such a thought when publishing the PUNCH was his life and passion.
I initially understood what he meant after the paper’s dire finances were finally known to the family after his death. Then, I finally had a clearer idea of what was in store after I had seen and experienced what he said when he addressed the members of the Pangasinan Press and Radio Club as its president in 1963.
Here are excerpts of that speech – “The Provincial Newspaperman” – that virtually told the story of the PUNCH’s beginning…and life to this day. It was his description of the realities in the life of community newspapermen that still makes us continuously doubt about your PUNCH’s future. Yet, it’s the same truism he spoke of that challenges and inspires us to go beyond our dreams.
Ermin Sr. wrote:
“…That in no other profession but journalism is it expected that a man will renounce friends, personal convenience, family, and even self in the faithful discharge of professional duties…
“…The only hero newspaperman is a dead newspaperman. Recognition comes only with death. The complete story of the savage conflict that rages inside a newsman between truth and camouflaged falsehood, between heart and mind, between conscience and popular favor, is never told and so is never appreciated—until the newspaperman is maimed or is killed, and you get an inkling of implied heroism between the lines of the obituary.
“The inner struggle that convulses a newspaperman’s being almost everyday is fiercest and is most taxing in the local or provincial press. And we do not refer to the material and physical handicaps, such as inadequate and sloppy facilities and unproportionately low financial remuneration, that would make less stout hearts and less dedicated souls quit in disgust and disillusionment.
“…Each unsavory news published about any person of consequence in the community is certain to have disgorged through a riptide within the newsman of conflicting emotions, of heart-breaking pressure from friends and even members of his family, of sleepless nights and tasteless meals, of hair-bleaching soul-searching, and sometimes unshed tears. Because of the harsh demands of objectivity, a newspaperman has to be callous, stonehearted, and cynical.
“Yet, he strives to be, if he must keep faith with his public and the lone commodity in which he deals, which is truth. But between the fact, or the event and its actual publication, there invariably had been a heart-rendering inner conflict that had subjected the moral strength and the sanity of reporter and especially editor to a grueling test.
“Members of the local press have to cope with extraneous pressure of every conceivable shape or color. Sometimes they have to make decisions on impossible solutions, in which they are damned if they do and damned if they don’t.”
“And then there are the community crusades against evil, against sin supposedly. It would be to the advantage of a newspaper or a newsman to join the mob and be a hero, but at the expense of truth and justice, at the expense of the weak and numerically inferior, at the sacrifice of his self-respect.
“…The local press wages unrelenting, but seemingly-futile, was against syndicate gamblers and vice lords who have the powerful and mighty bought and sewed up to their ranks. But it must reject witchhunts and crusades inspired by self-righteous intolerance.
“…Your local press keeps watch over the affairs of the people of its community. It expresses their hopes and their aspirations, echoes their frustrations and disappointments, and chronicles their glories and their successes, as well as their tragedies and agonies.
“A newsman cannot write of these adequately without sincerely feeling the gamut of deep emotions. Thus he dies a thousand deaths as he writes about his people’s tragedies. And in the process, his own mental attitudes waver in cynicism with the ringside view of man’s inhumanity to man.
“But all the time, he must have an instinctive urge to keep faith with himself—to be honest with himself and all the people he deals with or must write about.
“He is so wrought up sharing the tragedies of his people that he is deprived of the luxury of grieving over his personal tragedies.
“He is thus forced to seek refuge behind an armor of callousness to maintain a hardboiled fidelity to truth; yet at the same time, even as he vituperates, deep down inside him, his heart bleeds with compassion and understanding, bitter at the society and the factors that made a man that way or the things that force a helpless woman walk down the streets.
“He must, whether he relishes it or not, condemn ill-doing, without trying to sit in self-righteous judgment over the inherent worth of any individual—keeping in mind always that even an alleged prostitute or a thief has God-given rights no man or society can take away which is the right to be heard….”
* * * * *
So through the years, unknown to many, your PUNCH operated on a hand-to-mouth existence while paying off printing debts for almost two decades. We published every issue not really knowing how the printing of the last issue would be paid and whether there would be enough left in the bank to pay salaries and allowances of the staff. (Again, unknown to many, your PUNCH never owned and still does not own a printing press to this day).
Martial law aggravated our situation. Harassment after harassment came our way until I was forced to go on exile – not to be seen in Dagupan – as a condition to allow the PUNCH to continue publishing. (I had to see to the continuance of the paper for the staff’s sake since they had no other means of livelihood). I’ve had to sneak in every Friday night to do the paper for 3 years until the PUNCH’s tormentor, Col. Vicente Eduardo was reassigned.
As the staff plodded through weeks and years, the national and local advertisers appreciated the reach and popularity of the paper and began marketing their products and services through us. The ad revenues now help keep your PUNCH in the black. Then, kabaleyans overseas have also begun pitching in to support our online service that we started in 1997.
So here we are at 55…stronger as we look forward to making it to 56! But let it be known that the PUNCH is stronger today because there were men and women of sterner stuff in the past who shared our commitment and came forward to help make the PUNCH what it is today. They and their families know who they are, and I am eternally grateful. To them, I say – salamat ya balbaleg!
* * * * *
SERIOUS EFFORT. Congratulations to Dagupan’s Lim administration for its successful development and launching of the river cruise project.
The well-appointed design and construction of the river cruise’s docking area in Dawel clearly points to a serious effort on the part of the Lim administration to keep the rivers clean and clear for a long time. The river may not turn out to be a cash cow for the city but it certainly boosts the city’s image as a major tourist destination.
It would serve the project well if barangay river patrols are visibly and regularly fishing out trash and any debris floating on the cleared waterways.
P.S. How much did the construction cost the city? I pray there are no padded costs this time.
Share your Comments or Reactions
Powered by Facebook Comments
