Bashing the President

BASHING THE PRESIDENT

by Antonio C. Antonio

February 8, 2015

This is just an afterthought to a blog I wrote last December 9, 2014 under the title “Asking the Right Questions” but published on my blogsite only yesterday.  (http://antonantonio.blogspot.com/2015/02/asking-right-questions.html)

I was in high school when Martial Law was proclaimed by then President Ferdinand E. Marcos.  For more than a decade, presidential criticism was non-existent and a very unhealthy thing to do… fear gripped the whole nation.  If there was nothing nice to say about public governance, “zipping it” was the more prudent thing to do.  Bashing (meaning: severe criticism) the President then was a workable solution to landing in jail, forced disappearance or ending your life.

“The EDSA Revolution of 1986 brought back our basic freedoms… including freedom of speech.  This ushered in a post-Marcos era where some people took special pleasure in bashing the President --- from Corazon C. Aquino to Fidel V. Ramos to Joseph E. Estrada to Gloria M. Arroyo and Benigno S. Aquino III.  I agree, however, that some of these presidents deserve to be bashed but some simply don’t.  Curiously, some of these bashers were praising alleluias to the President during the Martial Law years.”  (Antonio, 2014).

Social media and other communications platforms opened the floodgates for people to be hypocritical (meaning: behaving in a way that suggests one has higher standards or more noble beliefs than others).  All too suddenly, we regained our freedom to liberally speak our minds.  The mainstream media and, most of all, netizens are having a field day criticizing everything and everyone.  Every gesture our president makes could be the subject of condemnation from some… especially those who did not vote for him.  Often, his demeanor (meaning: outward behaviour or bearing) is interpreted to favour whatever political ends his dislikers have.  The Philippines is fast becoming the primary example on how democratic freedoms can easily be abused and misused.

Social media has become so powerful that even terrorist organizations use social media to advertise and spread their hate ends and purposes.  But, on second thought, under Martial Rule, the State could always find ways to regulate and curtail social media.

“I am just wondering… could the present-day presidential bashers do the same under Martial Law; when it was not too fashionable and utterly dangerous to speak out against the President? Probably not…” (Antonio, 2014)  Under Martial Law, Presidential follies are never a justification for bashing the President.

Just my little thoughts…

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