If A Six-Foot-Two Earthling Have Superpowers...
"If you have any superpowers, what superpowers do you want to have and why?"
I have been asked by this question a lot of times and I will always answer it with what an introvert, six-foot-two earthling like me would love to have and that is to make myself a little bit shorter and to turn invisible. I also ask my friends this question and they answer "telekinesis", or mind-reading, or super speed, super strength, to be an avatar like Aang, and even shape-shifting. If you ask kids, most probably they will answer you "to be a doctor to make the dead live again" which is the most innocent thing and you're not able to disagree with that or tell them "doctors don't do that" because you will be seen as such villainous adult. We have been dreaming to have this superpowers because they look cool on TV and movies. But I bet we never answered this question once practically because we were always hungry for that cinematic superpowers. The reality is, we never answered the question by thinking first what the world needs and what villain is the hardest to defeat.
Now, if I were to be asked again, "If you have any superpowers, what superpowers do you want to have and why?" I would most probably answer "to be able to turn back time." Why? Because I think the hardest enemy to defeat is the outcome of our journey to the present. You may not get me with this, but you will in a while.
When we were kids, we were taught a lot of things. We were taught not to talk to strangers, to obey our parents, to not do bad things to other people and to not say bad words. The usual Filipino consequence for disobeying simple rules is to get spanked by a hanger. In school, we were taught to be polite, to be honest, and to build relationship with our classmates. In high school, we were taught with a lot of things that we never asked for like "The Golden Rule" that we even question "How are we going to use this when we pay our taxes?!" College life is the turning point of most of us because somehow we are getting the sense of reality and when we graduate, we look for jobs and realize we cannot apply the formula for solving the gravity of the earth and identifying the composition of plant cells. We get the sense of reality that it is important to be good and to be kind, to be humane and to build good relationship with your fellow earthlings despite your differences. Most of us, the lucky ones, experienced this.
Now, what happened to the DDS and to their "tatay"? Were they once not kids?
Social media has been there for us for more than two decades already and it gave us a power to be virtually connected to whoever we want to connect with. But, as what Spider-man's Uncle Ben said, with great powet comes great responsibility. Unfortunately, most of us have forgotten our responsibility in social media. We have become selfish of information and at the same time, ignorant of the injustices that happen in our society. It made us uninvolved, unhonest, and inhumane.
Philippines remained in the top spot as the country with the most social media users. With more or less 74 million Facebook users, a great power was given to our country. This power is supposed to unite us as it connects the 7,107 islands of the archipelagic Philippines. But in our country, the internet divided us. It gave more power to the authorities and none to those who are deprived of factual information.
With the rise of the Duterte administration comes the rise of his minions called "DDS" or Diehard Duterte Supporters. This also paved the way for Mocha Uson and Jam Magno to redirect the Filipinos attention from standing for the truth and justice. Harry Roque have forgotten his principles as a lawyer for human rights to defend the president's unprofessional behaviors. There are also rumors that DDS trolls are paid to comment on activists' posts in social media and to force hate on the opposition (mainly on the Liberal Party). With all of these people creating a chaos in the internet, this caused a lot of people to forget the simple netiquettes they need to abide to. This caused Filipinos to be divided and to spread hate all over the social media platforms on the cyber world.
Were they once not kids? Because DDS, who we can refer as strangers, begin to infect us with hate and as a reaction, we fight back. DDS and the administration also lie to cover lies. Our constitution also abides with our religion and belief and when EJK happened, it seems like nothing to them. Hurting, or I may say, killing people, is nothing to them. The president curses and make rape jokes on national TV and is still defended. When Duterte or the DDS speaks bad about a person or threat a person's life, it seems fine. But when activists fight back, the activists are tagged as terrorists. Most of these government officials are college graduates, so we expect them to have a sense of reality. But it seems like they do their duties in a fantasy world (dolomite sand to heal mental health in the middle of a pademic?). They never built good relationships with their fellow Filipinos and get involved in the reality because they resist to receive the truth and believes their fantasies.
If I were to have a superpower, I want to be able to turn back time. I would like to bring back these people when they were kids. When they were taught not to hurt people, to do good, to be kind, be honest, be polite, to accept differences - in short we were taught to be humane. I want them to realize that these were taught to them, not by people who they fight in the internet and not by the "tatay" they praise, but by there parents who are or were also once a Filipino. These principles — to be involved, be human, be honest — are what we are told to abide to. And we have to realize that for us to be able to abide by these principles, social media is not the one who we're relying to, but our past, who we were when we were young, and our journey to the present.
A little play of imagination for you to hold:
"Imagine a Rodrigo Duterte who is kind and good because he has kept hold of what his mother told him to be..."
