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appleflavoredkitkats · 11 months

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don't support here lies love the musical as it comes to bway

my post on here lies love is getting rounds and while i still stand by everything i said on that post, my grievances with the musical has Grown in the last couple of weeks of me researching about it. granted, i still need to do more— i want to do an essay on it in the future because i would hate for it to run on broadway for long, but because that takes time, i thought, at least, i would need to make a post detailing what i find wrong about this musical. even if it's not the most comprehensive, i want more people to be informed about it as soon as possible.

so, have this. ramblings at 5am. i'll try my best to gather sources, but information i have regarding the marcoses comes from a lot of non-digital resources like classes, museums, and physical books. in this case, i recommend the following resources to learn more about who the marcos family is and what they did:

"the kingmaker" by lauren greenfield. native filipinos can watch this free on youtube, but if you aren't from the ph i recommend using a vpn to access it or find a pirated version somewhere else

online martial law museum

if you can buy it, "some are smarter than others" by ricardo manapat, a book detailing marcos' crony capitalism and all his faults

i'd also like to preface: i am not a saint. i am not a historian nor the smartest person who can detail everything marcos did when he was born. i'm trying to do my best with what i know, and i am down to learn more if others want to chime in.

lastly, here's a fresher on the names of people involved, because it can be confusing:

ferdinand marcos — i will try my best calling him ferdinand but most people, including myself, often call him just "marcos" despite the fact that they technically all are marcoses. he was the president from 1965-1986

imelda marcos — i will refer to her as imelda. wife to ferdinand and contributed a lot to his reign of terror. she is still alive today.

bong bong marcos — son of ferdinand and imelda. his name is often shorted to bbm, which i will use. he is currently the present of the philippines

ninoy aquino — marcos' main rival who he indirectly murdered. not a perfect guy tho, just the lesser evil. i will just call him ninoy

now, onto the real deal:

thesis statement, so this can be easy to follow: despite the intentions of the musical being anti-marcos, much of how it is written and presented will inevitably become propaganda to brighten the image of the marcoses. by putting imelda in the forefront, making her entire character do what she does supposedly out of love, audiences will come out of the theatre sympathizing with her and her family. not only is this politically dangerous, but it is incredibly insensitive to native filipinos who have not only gone through the struggle of martial law, but also is suffering through bbm's presidency today.

[rest of the post under the cut]

despite what a lot of criticisms claim, the intentions of the musical is not to be pro-marcos. this is stated in their instagram post:

david bryne also stated these in an article from the guardian:

"The mindset of the Marcos regime and the mindset of disco music to me doesn’t seem all that distant. The hedonistic, escapist feeling of losing yourself and being transported to another world, like you feel on the dance floor and like you feel in a dance club, that’s a means to divorce yourself from the rest of the world, just as Imelda did.

When you’re dancing, you’re in this psychological and sonic bubble, in the same way that powerful people create a bubble around themselves. So I wanted to give an audience a taste of that feeling.

In the first half, when the play is dealing with her childhood, her upbringing and her meeting with Ferdinand Marcos, it’s meant to get the audience to empathise with her and understand what’s driving her and then they’ll understand how that manifests later on."

so, it seems promising: an anti-marcos musical that will make audiences dislike empathizing with her. initially, i really liked the concept of audiences being lost with the music similar to how the marcoses were able to play a lot of their supporters.

but, and a big but, 1.) there's a lot to pick apart from these statements, and 2.) i fucking despise how they presented imelda in the musical.

let's discuss the first point: the instagram post details that the intent of the musical is to dispel disinformation created about the marcoses. first thing's first, if this truly was a musical that aims to educate, then broadway is probably the worst way to do it. while the west and native filipinos could share the award of most misinformed about the marcoses, native filipinos are the ones most affected by it. we just suffered a terrible election last year with constant speculation and reports of vote buying. i've heard accounts from people from the province that bbm would send representatives to bribe those in poverty to ensure a vote. we are suffering in the worst education crisis, with the most corrupt politicians you can think of.

so, if this musical aims to educate, the fact that you can only access it by viewing it live on broadway is incredibly... backwards. how are you opting to dispel information when those most affected can't even access it?

what's worse is the statement that says that modern history of the philippines cannot be told without the usa. it is such a patronizing, surface-level statement that gets my blood boiling. it is true that our histories and present-day contexts are intertwined, especially since the filipino diaspora in the usa is incredibly huge, but that's because this is all a product of american colonization + imperialism. stating like the philippines owes the usa to retell our native stories mirrors much of the savior complex-esque sentiments the usa had when they colonized us.

now, onto bryne's statement. the main problem i have with it is him insinuating that imelda is a victim of circumstance. he wants us the audience "empathize" with her and understand her downfall. this is common rhetoric uninformed people, even filipinos, used to excuse imelda's contributions. that she was supposedly "poor", that marcos put her through hell. but genuinely, and i cannot emphasize this enough, imelda was an absolute ass on her own accord.

no, she did not grow up poor. her wikipedia even states that she grew up in a wealthy family, born into the romualdez political dynasty. my history professor even claimed that she attempted bribing the mayor when she lost one of her beauty pageants. despite the repetitive "i'm doing this for love!" bullshit the musical regurgitates, imelda did not even marry marcos out of love. in ricardo manapat's book, he details how marcos attempted to swoon imelda by showing her his vault of money (of course, possibly stolen). she was enraptured by marcos the moment she saw his WEALTH.

i want to emphasize: imelda is not fucking stupid. much of what marcos did to the philippines was thanks to her. i would recommend watching the kingmaker documentary for all the details, but just know she is still alive and incredibly wealthy. she is well-known for her absolute gaudiness and all of that comes from her money-centric mindset. she does not give a shit about love.

here's some accounts by ricardo manapat from his book. on imelda falling in love with marcos (btw, she had a fiance at the time and didn't tell him she was marrying marcos until said fiance found out on the damn newspaper):

imelda being aware of the wealth she accumulates in politics:

on this note, i'd love to discuss how historically inaccurate the musical is. i'd like to preface that i've only listened to the only available version of the musical which is the 2013 version on spotify. this could have changed, but either way, the general tone of the narrative already reads to me as extremely incorrect, anyway. i'd also love to detail every discrepancy of each song, but again, i'll save that for a future essay.

in general, the musical's plotline follows imelda, a "humble and poor" girl from leyte who grows up and marries ferdinand. she repeatedly expresses she's doing this all out of love. thus, the musical insinuates that imelda is merely a victim of circumstance, and that she didn't become evil on her own accord. and yet, from what i've presented so far, she was very much aware! she was not passive. you have to understand, SHE was the reason both men and women had equal opportunities to become corrupt in our government.

what marcos did was also imelda's fault. the genocide and displacement of indigenous people, the mass torture and murder of journalists and politicians, the stealing of companies and mass wealth, the mass delivery of non-native animals to the philippines. she condoned all that. yes, marcos cheated on her, but she also used that as a means to manipulate him into doing whatever she wanted. they are both horrible people.

speaking of, marcos' song in the musical was also really bad. he could be written as lying for all we know, but his "fear" of japanese soldiers invading the philippines is also up for debate. there is speculation of the marcoses collaborating with japanese troops, which also led to the murder of marcos' father's political rival.

and while i don't know if there's actual dialogue outside of the songs, i don't think this musical actually informs us much of the marcos' faults. the songs, which will be the most accessible thing to native filipinos, express nothing but generic descriptions of what characters feel about certain situations. it's hard to understand or know what these people are actually doing because it's just so vague and ambiguous. how are you supposed to inform when none of the music details, well, anything? the information given is so minimal that i pray, at least, the musical would have more explicit scenes about marcos' atrocities.

and that's my main problem with the musical. with how much they spend sympathizing with imelda in the first act, i don't think everything the marcoses have done can be encapsulated in the second. of course, i'm not asking to give me a detailed rundown of everything they did, but let's be honest, this musical was never about dispelling disinformation. if it was, then they wouldn't spend an entire act and a half sucking imelda's dick. it's not about educating audiences about martial law. it's about humanizing imelda, with martial law and the marcoses' atrocities as a second priority. it makes me sick to my stomach seeing how pure imelda is presented when travelling to meet other world leaders, or how she's seen as the person who insisted that ninoy move away from the philippines.

it was never about education or re-information. in the end, these were such pretentious and performative statements to defend a historically inaccurate musical.

and tbh, that's just the tip of the iceberg of why i hate this musical. another thing is that, holy shit is it obvious that it's written by two white people. they mispronounce "tacloban" (should be tacLOban not tacloBAN). these characters are also just... not distinctly filipino? they're so white in mannerisms. i need more insulting humor, more grit. in fairness, the richer you are in the philippines the more connected you are to western culture, but i would have loved to see that disaparity more in the songwriting. they really peaked (/s) when they wrote these lyrics:

this is... awful, in a cringey what the hell manner. i hope they changed it for the bway production, because this was blatant evidence that the songwriters barely took the time to understand our culture before writing.

if you don't understand what it says, "titi mo" (the correct spelling is tite but i digress) means "your dick". i think imelda is trying to call marcos a dick, but they literally translated dick in tagalog. but tite isn't an insult, it literally refers to a penis. "mo" is the equivalent of "your" which also makes ZERO sense. the lyric literally goes "how can a your penis run the country?", like WHAT.

so you know, maybe there's a reason why many filipinos fucking despise this show on twitter. we are insulted for good reason. they are sensationalizing and glamorizing our suffering for their own gain. we native filipinos and other filipino diaspora who can't access the show have nothing to gain. here lies love is profiting from our struggles that we are still recovering from and experiencing today. imagine if you made a musical about hitler explaining he is a victim of circumstance to disco music. insensitive, isn't it? i'd love to ask the cast of here lies love if they'd ever show the musical to living survivors and families of victims of martial law.

and what's worse, because of course it gets worse, misinformation like this is what boosts the reputation of corrupt politicians in the first place. manapat quotes what leonard saffir wrote about how marcos built his reputation in new york via a biography filled with disinformation. the excerpt is too long but it's quoted from this article by the new york times. and now we are living in an era of another musical based on imelda being shown in new york — time is a flat fucking circle.

what sickens me is that this musical is possibly a lot of americans' first exposure to the marcoses, and what will they think? imelda is just a poor girl, imelda is just a victim, imelda is blah blah blah. that will be stamped in their head. even if some filipinos have come out of this musical dreadful that they sympathized with imelda, not everyone is gonna have the same experience.

^ this an excerpt from one of theatermania's articles. dictators have feelings too, i guess!

objectively, there is nuance when it comes to anyone. but the problem is, we cannot afford to consider nuance in politics. we cannot sympathize with imelda right now when people are dying of poverty under the marcoses' hand. the marcoses are very much alive, very much in power, and very much willing to lend their offspring to other positions of power. they turned the entirety of ilocos into a bunch of marcos dicksuckers, and i'm afraid that this musical can make a ton of their audiences be oblivious to the true extents of the marcos' atrocities. i'm already seeing people on tiktok say that there's nothing wrong about this musical, or that this can exist when miss saigon and evita exist (which in on itself are problematic beliefs, because they are glamorizing other country's sufferings too).

i am privileged enough to be educated about marcos, and while there is much to be done in terms of disability and lgbtqia+ rights, i am lucky to be less impacted by the marcoses compared to other people. but there are hundreds of thousands of filipinos severely affected by marcos. what's worse, is that there are plenty extremely uneducated that they are unaware that marcos is directly contributing to their suffering. my history professor told us that other countries are using the philippines as their model for successful disinformation campaigns. in this era of disinformation, we cannot afford to disinform even more. as sad as it is, the usa has a lot of power and control over the philippines (and the world, tbh), so one wrong step into the wrong direction and we're fucked. this musical fails the message it attempts to preach and i cannot imagine how much more people are going to spread misinformation about the philippines like they did during the 2022 elections.

to end off, i'd like to mention to everyone that imelda marcos has actually listened to the musical. in this new york times article, she says, "i'm flattered, i can't believe it!". i don't know what to tell you— if imelda herself says she likes the musical you claim to be anti-marcos, then what does that say about the musical?

i guess i'll end with, i am willing to change opinions once i see how the musical is being executed. if they emphasize the atrocities done by marcos and give proper information about the timeline of events, then i can be more lenient. but if i still see any attempts woobifying imelda, then i stand by what i say. this musical is insensitive, disrespectful, and just fucking hurtful.

#here lies love #imelda marcos #ferdinand marcos #bongbong marcos

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aphroditesknife · 8 months

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Current president of the Philippines, Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr., watching F1 races while the country is in multiple crises

Current vice president of the Philippines, Sara Duterte, refusing to tell the public why she needs SO MUCH MONEY as Confidential Funds for "Education"

calling it a "shitshow" is an understatement

#philippines #philippine politics #ph #ph politics #bbm #bongbong marcos #marcos #duterte #sara duterte

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gael-garcia · 6 months

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Netanyahu, Marcos Jr and Genocide Joe

Philippine Pro-Palestine protest at the US Embassy, 14 November 2023

#art #!!#free palestine #benjamin netanyahu #ew am i really tagging them #bongbong marcos #joe biden #genocide joe #philippines #post #israel shall fall in this lifetime #and the US empire with it #so cvnt like

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themagical1sa · 2 years

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The state of the Philippines after the May 9, 2022 National Elections (Part 2)

continuing from here

"why are there so many tweets?" I NEED YOU TO UNDERSTAND THE GRAVITY OF OUR SITUATION, ESPECIALLY FROM THE FILIPINOS' PERSPECTIVE. this might as well be the only time I get to tell about it too especially given that we have a history of being silenced and shot down by our political abusers. read my messages. then try to understand. then read them all again. I need you to understand and know this well. almost begging, even, because we are in a state of turmoil and we may have to fight for our rights — we might have fight for our lives and if anyone asks what happened, and if anyone so dares to tell you that we were all fools- i hope by then you will have known the deep struggle we had to go through just to fight for ourselves and the very president we wanted to have Filipino resilience should not be celebrated. Accountability must be demanded.

[referring to the Commission on Elections] You are rich in funds. Even if- all we want is ONE reliable VCM (Vote Counting Machine). That's it. That's all we want. Voting should not last beyond 10 minutes, but how many hours have we been in line here? The resiliency of Filipinos is not an honorary badge. We should not be used to being sweaty, tired, and hungry.

— from ABS-CBN News Official Twitter

With this in mind, there have been some speculation that PayPal might pull out from the Philippines like they pulled out from Ukraine due to the Ukraine/Russia conflicts.

A freelance illustrator had to personally reach out to PayPal to clarify this.

I would like to end this with an archive of documents, news articles, and resources comprehensively detailing the Marcos era, especially during the Martial Law. He has committed heinous crimes against the Filipino people as well as robbed us of ₱203B which should have long been paid in their estate taxes.

Please help me spread awareness. I cannot trust the international media and news outlets to properly tell our experiences without dubbing us collectively as fools or idiots who let a dictator's son have power. I cannot trust them to tell how we fought so hard and accumulated too many supporters only to be let down by manipulation and exploitation.

That will be all, and thank you for reading.

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fuckyeahmarxismleninism · 9 months

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By Stephen Millies

A worker at Jollibee — a Filipino-owned fast food chain — described how when he suffered second-degree burns as a cook, he had to keep working to avoid being fired. Workers at the Jollibee restaurant in Journal Square, Jersey City, have been fired for organizing against low-paid, dangerous working conditions.

It’s these sweatshop owners and big landlords that are the biggest supporters of the Marcos-Duterte regime.

As a speaker from the New York Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines pointed out, it’s the Pentagon that’s the real power in the country. The U.S. is now at nine military bases in the supposedly sovereign Philippines.

#Philippines #protest #Bayan #bongbong marcos #Jollibee #workers #class struggle #imperialism #Pentagon #antiwar #NYCHRP #duterte #NYC #Struggle la Lucha

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lapeacenasumusulat · 2 years

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May 9, 2022, Pilipinas

I am a public school elementary teacher and one of my students' parent joked on our group chat:

"Ma'am, hindi ko na lang paaralin si ***** kasi yung susunod nga na presidente, hindi nakatapos pero successful naman."

I knew it was a joke and patutsada sa ibang mga magulang na bumoto ng tax evader at anak ng diktador. Still, it was humiliating.

As I type these words, I can't help but cry while remembering all the hardships I had to go through para lang makapagtapos—para lang matawag na isang Licensed Professional teacher. It was very personal for me, and just like many of my colleagues, feeling namin failure kami.

A lot of filipinos may not feel it but despite the education system's flaws and the lack of the government's support, we, the teachers, are all giving our very best.

Ilagay niyo kami sa face to face class, maga-adjust kami.

Ilagay niyo kami sa online class, gagawan pa rin namin ng paraan.

Ilagay niyo kami sa hybrid setup, gagawan pa rin namin yan ng paraan.

Patungan niyo man kami ng napakaraming administrative work, hindi rin namin yan pababayaan.

Saan ba kami nagkulang?

It still blows my mind that a lot of other supporters took it as a competition between Leni and BBM. Hindi po kasi ganon. Kakampinks were aggressive kasi uhaw kami sa good governance while other supporters are aggressive kasi they want to prove us wrong.

Kung "kabutihan" ang basehan ng nakararami at nakikita yun kay Bongbong Marcos, siguro masamang tao talaga ako.

Gusto kong radikal na magmahal pero patuloy na ginagawang puta ng nakararami ang Pilipinas.

#philippines #pilipinas #ph politics #leni robredo #kiko pangilinan #hindi pa ako tapos tumindig #bongbong marcos #national elections 2022

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misspeppermint2003 · 2 months

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Picrew Animated Portraits of World Politicians 1

I made the first part of Picrew anime portraits of world politicians with this image maker. It was consisting of 12 politicians from different countries.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (left), French President Emmanuel Macron (middle) & Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić (right)

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak (left), Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte (middle) & Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (right)

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim (left), Filipino President Bongbong Marcos (middle) & Indonesian President Joko Widodo (right)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (left), Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad (middle) & Russian President Vladimir Putin (right)

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15

#world leaders #justin trudeau #emmanuel macron #volodymyr zelensky #mark rutte #rishi sunak #aleksandar vučić #anwar ibrahim #bongbong marcos #joko widodo #vladimir putin #benjamin netanyahu #politicians #politics #lolitics #picrew #illustration

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southeastasianists · 2 years

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By Adrian De Leon, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Some 36 years after the People Power Revolution restored democracy to the Philippines, a member of perhaps the most brutal and corrupt political dynasties in the nation’s memory is set to return to the Philippine presidency.

Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., the son of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., has won the presidential election, according to preliminary results. It will return him to the Malacañang Palace where he lived as a child and from which his parents fled in 1986. His running mate, Sara Duterte, the daughter of current President Rodrigo Duterte, is also set to win the vice presidency by a landslide.

Both candidates hail from political dynasties with long histories of abuses of power. The human rights offenses of the first Marcos regime, from 1965 to 1986, are well documented, involving an estimated 3,257 deaths and over 50,000 victims who were tortured and detained during the martial law period alone. Also well documented is the estimated US$10 billion Marcos plundered.

Meanwhile, the outgoing Duterte administration is notorious for its so-called “war on drugs,” during which his infamous death squads killed more than 6,200 as of 2022.

The election has been mired in tax scandals, bureaucratic corruption and voter suppression.

But despite these scandals both past and present, dynastic families remain in full force in the Southeast Asian archipelago.

As a scholar of Philippine history, I know this “rule by dynasty” dates from the days of American colonial rule. But it has been enhanced by a more modern curse: media manipulation and disinformation.

The political economy of dynasties

The tenacity of political dynasties of all political orientations to outlast the Philippines’ halted revolutions – both in 1986 and a later uprising in 2001 – shows that popular mobilization did not lead to a more democratic government.

The late political scientist Benedict Anderson famously called the Philippines a “cacique democracy” – a fusion of popular electoral power and feudal, dynastic rule.

While landowning elites existed during the 19th century, this “cacique democracy” – cacique referring to local political bosses in Latin American countries – developed during the American colonial rule of the Philippines between 1898 and 1942. The aim was to cultivate an Indigenous leadership that could collaborate with American colonial rule.

To establish loyal allies among the local population, the U.S. expropriated 400,000 acres owned by the Catholic Church between 1898 and 1941 and auctioned it to landowners and economic elites. These same leaders, bolstered by their consolidated agricultural economic base, formed a new political class in Manila, as they participated in the new legislature of the colony.

With their wealth and political influence strengthened under American occupation, these ruling families held disproportionate sway over the development of the fledgling nation following independence in 1946.

These “caciques,” or native feudal lords, went on to become the ruling class of today. The Marcos family is descended from regional landowners in Ilocos Norte, in the north of Luzon, the Philippines’ most populous island. But unlike his forebears, Ferdinand Marcos Sr. rose from regional leader to national prominence, first as the president of the Philippine Senate in 1959, then as national president in 1965. Through his own charisma – and the popularity of his wife, Imelda Romualdez Marcos – the family consolidated their political base.

At the opposite end of the political spectrum are the Aquino family, hailing from a clan of elite landowners in Central Luzon, whose patriarch was one of the original members of the republican government formed after the 1896 Philippine Revolution. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr., a senator and outspoken Marcos critic, was assassinated in 1983. His wife, Corazon Aquino, was elected on the back of the mass fervor of the 1986 Revolution, and later their son reached the presidency.

Dynasties have long dominated Philippines politics. But the fact that the Marcos name not only survived the overthrow of its patriarch but managed to become rehabilitated in the following decades hints at the tenacity of dynastic politics in the Philippines.

Media and disinformation

Despotic power cannot be shored up by birthright claims alone. So it is no coincidence that the return of the Marcos family has coincided with large-scale attacks against journalism, waged by the national executive and its allies.

In 2022, the Philippines was ranked by Reporters Without Borders 147th out of 180 countries for press freedom. This is a stark contrast to the period before the election of Ferdinand Marcos Sr. in 1965, when the country’s press was considered the most free in Asia.

During the six years of Duterte’s rule since 2016, the president developed a reputation as someone who used social media disinformation – especially via Facebook – to cultivate support for his brutal “war on drugs.” At the same time he frequently attacked the work of journalists and critics of his regime.

Duterte made a deliberate attempt to undermine the free press. In December 2020, after months of systematic targeting by President Duterte, the Philippine Congress voted to shut down ABS-CBN – the country’s largest broadcasting network.

The Philippines remains one of the most dangerous places for reporters. As recently as December 2021, journalist Jesus Malabanan was shot by gunmen in his own home. Malabanan, a well-respected reporter who worked on Reuters’ coverage of the Philippine drug war, was the 22nd journalist murdered during the Duterte regime.

The weakening and intimidation of independent journalism and media paved the way for disinformation to flourish.

Bongbong Marcos’ presidential run has been widely criticized for media manipulation. And disinformation has been central to the shift in public opinion toward the family.

In 2019, Rappler, the independent news website founded by Nobel Peace Prize recipient Maria Ressa, ran a three-part investigation that revealed the extent to which Marcos deployed digital propaganda to propel himself into public favor through the use of disinformation spread on other social media platforms, and through various fan pages and other viral content. The first Marcos regime was recast in misleading propaganda that portrayed the era as a time of progress while denying its human rights abuses.

And in 2020, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Barbara Kaiser alleged that Marcos had reached out to the firm – known for its harvesting of Facebook users’ data for political campaigns – in an effort to further bolster his family’s image. The Marcos campaign denies this connection.

Never again?

The election of Bongbong Marcos comes close to 50 years after his father declared martial law, on Sept. 23, 1972.

That original Marcos era – with its extrajudicial killings and rampant corruption – has been subjected to revisionism, with many Filipinos looking back at the Marcos years as a time of stability and growth while ignoring the abuses. The $10 billion plundered by the Marcoses – which once dominated headlines – gets talked about less. Imelda Marcos, herself a notorious kleptocrat, has been transformed into an object of fascination.

Meanwhile the voices of survivors of the martial law era and the activists who oppose authoritarian rule have grown less effective in the face of President Duterte’s popularity. Their message of “never again” failed to disrupt the Marcos family return to power.

In 2018, on the 35th anniversary of the assassination of Ninoy Aquino, Imee Marcos – Bongbong’s sister – stated that “the millennials have moved on [from Ferdinand Marcos’ history], and I think people at my age should move on as well.”

The electoral victory of her brother seems to have have proved Imee Marcos correct.

#Southeast Asia #Philippines #Bongbong Marcos #History #Cacique Democracy

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randomshenaniganery · 1 year

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Xenophobia, homophobia, and government fear mongering in the Philippines

My mother was telling me to not go to this specific college because a lot of Muslims started to go to school there for engineering and it is her firm belief that they are all applying for engineering because they’re going to make more bombs.

Me and my aunt told her she was being racist she said not it’s true. I asked her where did she get this from and she replied with “homeland security” which is a fucking AMERICAN TV SHOW I slapped my forehead so hard my aunt looked like she lost all hope.

we’re not even American we live in the Philippines and she’s being affected by the stupid propaganda and refuses to listen to reason because she’s catholic and therefore anyone with literally any religion besides her must be either stupid and ignorant or very evil.

I tried to explain to her that terrorists and Muslims were not the same thing and she just won’t fucking listen.

This is the same shit as her telling me not to go to a different college because they force people to go naked and wear paper bags on their heads during freedom day or else they’ll get failed by their professors. Turns out that this was the result of propaganda against activism and since that specific college encourages students to exercise their right to have rallies they are a lot of dipshits spreading lies or contorting things to make it look wrong.

By the way the school is the University of the Philippines in Cebu if you hear wacky rumors about this place regarding the naked people with paper bags and very anti-activism remarks don’t fall for it, they’re most likely lies and made specifically for people to not go there because they don’t want people to disagree with them on political agendas.

Very recently during my ROTC for our National Service Training Program. The ROTC director said that she was against activism because of the New People’s Army. Now firstly the new people’s army are not activists they are terrorists those are two different things.

But because she used activism instead of terrorism she’s immediately attaching a bad rep to it and since this is a government funded college that has free tuition a lot of the students are not that well versed in English to know what activism actually means. And because they don’t know what activism means they’ll just immediately attach activism to a group of terrorists who have killed people and they’ll think that being an activist is a bad thing.

This is how they do it, in college they indoctrinate you with misinformation and heavily biased views without showing the whole picture so that you get tunnel vision and you do exactly as they say.

They do not want leaders that want people who will do what they want and think they way they want them to.

I do not have the ability as of the moment to do a very in depth explanation of everything since they do not talk about this to me. I am surrounded by die hard catholics, my family is very involved in the church, they are not the kind of people i’d want to tell who i voted for because when i did my aunt immediately made fun of it.

A lot of my family has very unfortunately voted for Marcos I loathe my aunt for that and also my uncle. He voted for Marcos because he didn’t want Leni to make gay rights and abortion legal. My aunt is a fucking piece of shit of course she would vote for Marcos she had no problem beating me in school in her office its not a far cry for her to vote the son of a dictator who’s showering is thieving mother with presents as if she fucking deserves it. My grandfather had voted for duterte because he’s sexist, an idiot who claims not to be an idiot, and duterte’s marketing was very heavy to people like him.

Once while we were in a mall we passed by a stall where a muslim woman was selling clothes. My grandmother said “that’s what she gets for being Muslim” and it shocked me so hard and it was just so baffling because my grandmother also owned a small store that sold miscellaneous items. I didn’t say anything because I did not expect that from my grandmother, my mom? sure she’s stupid like yeah you can solve algebra and you’re quick at maths but you lack the ability to comprehend that just because there are bad people in a religion doesn’t mean EVERYONE with that religion is bad.

A lot of why people especially those that come from the provinces are like this is because they don’t have a lot of access to unbiased news or an outside view of our country. I used to be like them until the moment I was allowed more freedom to the internet and I could see just how bad everything actually is now that no one is holding my hand and closing my eyes.

People are straight up denying what happened during the Martial Law because of how Marcos has started to represent himself online. The Martial Law wasn’t that long ago so many people are still fucking alive from that time and just a few years ago before Duterte and the entirety of his fuckery came we all knew that the martial law was a bad time and it hurt and killed so many Filipinos.

By the heavens do not let people forget the past and ruin our future. Stop voting people who come from political families and control the country to benefit them.

13 million idiots voted for Marcos and I’m not going to forgive or forget this.

Also for Duterte and all of his stupid wars

FUCK YOU

There’s more by the way. This shit doesn’t end.

Regarding the abortion rights and reproductive health. Its no surprise that the Philippines is a backwards country. They really hammer down the why would you kill a baby it’s a gift from god thing really hard.

They prefer abstinence over actually teaching the students how to not get pregnant, how to not get STDS and how their body works. Just because it’s called sex education doesn’t mean the teacher is going to only talk about how to do sex and why you should do it.

Just because abortion would be turned legal doesn’t mean EVERYONE is going to abort the baby. There is a stupid amount of teenage pregnancy because you refuse to teach them how to have sex safely and because you have no problem with ruining the lives of everyone concerned with the young teenager but you have a big problem with getting rid of a pack of cells.

I’ve heard so many stories of how many women have had their lives ruined because they were forced to raise a child that young. There is a very tiny generational gap between the mothers and their children. They do not have the emotional maturity to be in charge of a baby of raising an entire person. A lot of them will lose their identity, their dreams and their opportunities because you’re so far up your ass you can’t even consider their choice on the matter. Never force someone to carry a baby because pregnancy is not all fun times and rainbows and neither are babies.

I love kids but i understand how stressful it is to live with barely any sleep because of the crying, the feeding, and the cleaning. This doesn’t happen to rich people this always is a problem with those without the money to support themselves.

The same thing with gay people we did not have homophobia before the Spaniards came in. In fact in the Filipino language there is no he/she/him/her there is literally only they/them/you the only time you find out someone’s gender is when it’s explicitly said so. According to a spaniard’s diary documenting their interactions with the Filipinos of that time there was a person who didn’t like women, dressed in woman’s clothes and did women’s tasks but lived alone and explicitly avoided physical contact and the guy was just like ‘HUH I wonder why that man was so weird.’ (this is from a translated book that we do not own I only get to see pictures of it from someone I see in twitter the only public copy near me is one in Sydney Australia).

They use the sodom and gammorah bit of the bible so hard hell it worked on me until I started to realize that this was all horseshit and I’m an asshole.

One time I had to listen to a priest say that “oh loving a man is fine biologically but Spiritually that’s wrong don’t be gay because its not right god doesn’t want you to be gay” this is the same priest who says “There are so many condominiums are around why are there still homeless people?” and also every time in every fucking homily he mentions how “wives should never leave their husband no matter how hard they beat you because God put you in that marriage”

I hate that priest with all my fucking body his name is Father Ciano Ubod he has a Youtube channel most of the people who watch him are all women and the fact that he’s telling women to not leave their abusive husbands instead of saying HEY maybe you shouldn’t beat your spouse? Because you know hurting people is WRONG he tells them to suck it up and love them.

You may be a priest but your views drag you to hell.

Now this priest isn’t all bad because the only thing I agree with him is that you shouldn’t beat your children but also its ironic hurting kids is wrong but leaving your husband who’s hurting you is also wrong. Fuck you father ciano I hope you choke on a sausage and realize god doesn’t give a shit about you.

In Summary: people raise children to have tunnel vision and use fear tactics to control how they see anyone who opposes their agenda, the church is a carcass that attracts flies and maggots to powerful positions and affect the daily lives of everyone who has the misfortune of listening to them, Marcos is someone who pretends like his father and mother didn’t steal Billions of money from the Philippine government while abusing the country and then escaping, anyone who voted for him are ignorant and mislead or are pieces of shit on fire.

#church #catholicism #christianity #is rife with corruption #Philippines #Filipino #bongbong marcos #is a piece of shit #ferdiand marcos #i think in Philippine history ferdinands are just always on the bad side I can't recall anyone good with that name in our history #I blame ferdinand magellan for finding us #xenophobia #im sorry muslims for having to deal with the bullshit of christians #pls reblog in case you have filipino followers who aren't aware #homophobia #so much more fun in the Philippines #no its fucking not #i haven't even mentioned how so many businesses are owned by chinese people and how china's fucking around with our sea #and how duterte bends over so xi jing ping can fuck him in the ass #metaphorically but with how much he dick rides china i wouldn't be surprised if it was true

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motziedapul · 2 years

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"Why do you hate the Marcoses" I don't hate them lol, saying facts about them being criminals isn't hatred. A good judge doesn't hate every single criminal they convict, you don't have to hate someone to know they're criminals.

I don't have to hate Imelda to say she's a convicted criminal dodging jail time, or that her ego caused one of the most infamous avoidable tragedies in Philippine history (The Manila Film Centre Tragedy). I don't have to hate Bongbong to say he and his mom owe 300 million USD and counting, which is why they're legally not allowed in the USA until they pay that.

I don't have to hate them to cite their laundry list of charges, convictions, and all the money they still owe.

I don't have to hate Ferdinand Marcos to call him a dictator. I don't have to hate the Marcos family to say they were kleptocrats. I don't have to hate them to point out their human rights violations, the torture and murder and rape that happened under their regime. The Jabidah Massacre. The rise in communist and Muslim insurgency in the Philippines as a direct result of their fascism and lies, and conflict in the Philippines due to the dictatorship's aggression.

These are all such ingrained truths that they're part of the Encyclopedia Britannica, or reported in official court documents, or multiple news sources all over the world.

Do you hate everyone that owes you money? Imagine if someone owed you millions of dollars and they deflected paying you back by claiming you "hate" them.

Silly. Justice is only seen as hatred by the unjust.

#marcos #ferdinand marcos #imelda marcos #bongbong marcos #dictatorship

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hiraya-rawr · 2 years

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06 tw: PH Politics

One last political post before the day! I know that a handful of my followers aren't eligible voters, so please do share to your family and friends that will vote.

Here are my senatorial bets for this election! :) Let's not hyper focus on the president and vice president alone.

Specifically, I'm especially for Hontiveros, Diokno, Colmenares, Baguilat, and De Lima!

#hira politics #philippines #filipino #kulayrosasangbukas #lenikiko2022 #leni kiko 2022 #ipanalona10to #politics #bongbong marcos #tw politics

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aphroditesknife · 7 months

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Today marks the 51st anniversary of the enactment of US-backed Martial Law in the Philippines by the late president/dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. One of the darkest days in the history of the country and spanning for about a decade, many human rights violations, killings, tortures, enforced disappearances, military and police abuse of power, economic downfall, environmental damages, famine, media blackout (except for those approved of the regime), and overall corruption. All for the so called "fight against communist insurgency." The Marcos family and their allies basically lived like royalites while the Filipino people suffered.

Ferdinand Emmanuel Edralin Marcos Sr. served as the 10th president of the Philippines for 20 years from 1965 to 1986. He ruled under martial law for nine years from 1972 until 1981 but kept most of his martial law powers until he was deposed in 1986. Under his regime, violence was used to enforce civil control over the citizens of the Philippines, resulting in thousands of documented cases of human rights violations.

But many people to this day continue to refer to this time as the "Golden Age" of the country, that life was good for "law abiding citizens." Here are some numbers that debunks this popular myth.

Data from the image:

Sept. 21, 1972: Date of Proclamation No. 1081 placing the Philippines under martial law.

49: Persons from the Greater Manila Area immediately arrested on Sept. 22, 1972, by the military, among them three senators, three congressmen, two provincial governors, four delegates to the Constitutional Convention and eight newsmen. First on the list was opposition senator and main political rival Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr.

Sept. 23, 1972: Press Secretary Francisco Tatad announces the imposition of martial law and reads the Marcos proclamation in a nationwide televised broadcast. Marcos himself went on air at 7 p.m. to formally announce the proclamation

12-4 a.m. – Curfew was put in place

Jan. 17, 1981: Marcos signs Proclamation No. 2045 lifting the implementation of martial law ahead of the first papal visit of Pope John Paul II in February.

107,240: Primary victims of human rights violations during martial law

70,000 people arrested, mostly arbitrarily without warrants of arrests*

34,000 people tortured*

3,240 killed by the military and the police*

*Amnesty International

464: Closed media outlets after declaration of martial law

$683 million: Worth of Marcos assets in various Swiss banks declared as ill-gotten based on a July 2003 the Supreme Court ruling

$5-10 billion: Estimated alleged ill-gotten wealth plundered by the Marcoses during two decades in Malacañang

6,281: Number of Marcos laws from September 1972 to February 1986

2,036 presidential decrees

61 general orders

1,093 executive orders

1,409 proclamations and other issuances

1,525 letters of instructions

157 letters of implementation

Info from image:

Military Power

By the time martial law was in effect, the Philippine Army had an estimated strength of 17,600; the Philippine Navy with 8,000; Philippine Air Force with 9,000; and the Philippine Constabulary with 25,500.

Info from images:

Poverty

Poverty worsened over the course of the Marcos era. Whereas about 4 out of 10 families were poor before Marcos took office, 6 out of 10 families were poor by the end of his rule.

Moreover, as the graph on the left shows, this is a consistent trend across the different regions of the nation, with some regions reaching as high a rate as 7 out of 10 families below the poverty line. Only two regions saw a marginal decrease in the number of poor families: the Ilocos Region and Cagayan Valley.

Daily wages of Filipino agricultural workers declined by about 30%, such that if a farmer earned Php 42 per day in 1972, he would only be earning about Php 30 in 1986. The wages of farmers even went as low as nearly half of the pre-Marcos values in 1974, right after the declaration of Martial Law (middle graph).

On the other hand, for skilled and unskilled workers in urban areas, the graph on the right shows the change in their wages from pre-Marcos to EDSA values. Skilled workers are workers with some special knowledge or skill, often having gone to college or technical school; unskilled workers are workers without this level of training.

Info for images:

Deforestation

In addition to factors relating to the domestic economy, another way of assessing the Marcos regime is through its impacts on the nation’s natural resources and the environment. The graph specifically gives us an idea about how Marcos’s policies affected the country’s forest cover over the course of about 20 years.

Supposedly, about 90% of the Philippines’ 18.7 million hectares of uplands, including more than 11 million hectares officially classified as timberlands, is publicly owned. In practice, fewer than 200 individuals controlled a large fraction of the country’s forests.

In pursuit of economic gains, Marcos and his cronies’ uncontrolled exportation of timber led to a drastic reduction in forest cover. This cascades into dire environmental impacts including flooding, landslides, and even the worldwide phenomenon of global warming.

I could add more to this post, but that would be way too long.

To this day, the Marcos family, their allies, and supporters, paid or not, continue to deny these facts and claim that the Marcos family were good for the Filipino people and the country.

We must continue to remind the people of this dark time in the history, to not let history be erased and be replaced with lies, to remember the sacrifices made by the victims of Martial Law and their families, and to not let history repeat itself.

Never Forget!

Never Again!

sources:

https://philstarlife.com/news-and-views/649814-martial-law-by-the-numbers?page=6

https://martiallawmuseum.ph/magaral/martial-law-in-data/

https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1167808/fast-facts-the-marcos-martial-law-regime

The Martial Law Museum and the Bantayog ng mga Bayani sites are good places to start reading more about this.

#Feel free to add more to this post bc i know theres way more #martial law #martial law anniversary #marcos #ferdinand marcos sr #philippines #philippine politics #bbm #bongbong marcos #ph politics #ph #ph history #history #politics #human rights #environment #historical revisionism #revisionism

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themagical1sa · 2 years

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The state of the Philippines after the May 9, 2022 National Elections (Part 1)

as of May 11, 2022, 8:57 PM

The following post was initially written in Discord as a long string of messages for my overseas/international/foreign internet friends.

The original messages have been kept intact with some grammatical corrections as well as formatting modifications and minor additions for better emphasis.

Indented texts are the ones which were originally Discord messages while non-indented texts are new additions.

With that aside, the content remains the same as it was initially sent to my friends.

Now, without further ado, let me begin.

hi it has been two days since May 9 it has been two days since my country's national elections right now we're in massive chaos because the son (Bongbong Marcos) of a past dictator (Ferdinand E. Marcos) is threatening to become our next president // as well as the daughter (Sara Duterte) of our last president (Rodrigo Duterte) becoming vice president policital dynasties, yall. fucking hell anyway you might be wondering, "is Isa ok? how is she faring?" I'm still fairly okay, but with the way I've been vocal about the bullshit going on I might not be able to be online any longer this country has a history of its own people being silenced by those in power international media will tell you that we voted the dictator's son into presidency and that we are fools. do not let them convince you. we fought so hard. we fought so hard for the only woman running for presidency and we accumulated so many supporters and yet we failed. wait, no. we were cheated. how? because of the shit we call corruption and greed corruption and greed and power and MANIPULATION OUR MASSES WERE MANIPULATED INTO VOTING THE DICTATOR'S SON. lucky are the ones who are born in the middle class, and yet luckier are those who were born rich. unfortunate are those who were born so poor that their main priority is living day by day. votes were bought. machines were rigged. servers were hacked. just for the dictator's son to be called president. just to enable a new abuser and give him power. please do not let the media convince you that we were fools. we fought so hard for the right presidential candidate not to be thought like this.

compilation thread of election inconveniences, offenses, and violations

thread of movies and documentaries about the Marcoses and the era of Martial Law under Ferdinand E. Marcos

watch The Kingmaker for free [available Philippines only as per Lauren Greenfield's intentions]

The post continues here due to Tumblr's 10-photo limit.

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lapeacenasumusulat · 2 years

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HINDI KAMI IN-DENIAL

BBM supporters now call for "respect for the vote of majority" as if they had given the same to VP Leni for the past 6 years. They cry to respect democracy yet frontrunner Bongbong Marcos called for a recount for the 2016 elections. He did it 3 times. He lost 3 times. Until the end of the campaign period for the 2022 elections, he still claims that he lost because someone cheated.

For 6 years, his supporters never respected VP Leni. Now they ask the same from us as if Bongbong is not guilty of maligning the vice president's name. I can and I will respect BBM as much as I could but I will not pretend that everything is alright. Most people from his team never even addresses VP Leni as vice president. I often hear BBM's spokesperson address VP Leni as Mrs. Robredo.

They say it was a clean election free of irregularities yet they fail to address how there are cases of electoral board staffs shading ballots in some precincts; they claim that it's the smoothest election in history yet ironically declare failure of elections in 14 barangays in Lanao del Sur; eight members from the Marcos clan was elected. As the May 9 elections ensue, multiple people all at different parts of the Philippines would claim that they voted for BBM but the receipt would have Leni's name—this conditions the mind of gullible Filipino voters that VP Leni was cheating. There are multiple videos of vote buying (most of these videos were already taken down on the internet).

Imee Marcos, eldest sister of Bongbong, is the chairperson of the senate committee on electoral reforms.

As the election was undergoing, BBM supporters would continue to mock us, shame us, and invalidate all our claims.

Their camp refuses to address how BBM would face US district court's contempt order.

People call for accountability from their family but they were silent.

They say there is no ill-gotten wealth. His words were "I cannot give what I do not have," but the missing Picasso painting glares at us when him, his mother Imelda, and his son Sandro was recently interviewed.

Left picture shows Imelda in their house during an interview for The Kingmaker documentary. On the right, the paintings were replaced because the PCGG tried to recover the paintings from the Marcoses. Imelda refused to admit that the painting was in their house to begin with even though earlier recording for The Kingmaker tells us otherwise.

This is their recent interview (May 12, 2022). The Picasso painting is back!

Right now, Bongbong is already portraying himself as a generous leader and I fear that someday, more of my fellow countrymen forget how this family refuse to be accountable.

I have said this again but I will say it again: the morale of the education sector is low. There are teachers who are ironically Marcos apologists but there are more of us who are frustrated. A lot of students are losing their motivation to continue. They see no point in putting efforts to their education saying that if the highest governing body lied about receiving a college degree (he didn't) yet still end up successful, then truly, this is a country that never cared for its civilians to be properly educated.

He plans to appoint frontrunner vice president Sara Duterte as next secretary for the department of education. The same woman who punched a sheriff years ago. The same woman who wishes for mandatory ROTC because she only see students as avid critiques of the government. They tell us that the youth has too much freedom and lacks discipline and it will break my heart if they weaponize the ROTC program against our students.

Miriam Defensor-Santiago was right. Stupid is really forever.

I will never thank BBM even if he does a great job. It is his job and responsibility, after all. His actions will forever be the bare minimum until he finally had the guts to acknowledge the atrocities of their family.

#philippines #bongbong marcos #ph politics #pilipinas #politics #halalan2022

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