The Pro-Marcos is a Person
There is nothing radical when I say that pro-Marcos are human beings.
As an anti-Marcos, I admit to sometimes — no, oftentimes — calling the pro-Marcos keyboard warriors crude Filipino names. Some of them loosely translate to “mentally challenged” or “wench.” And it is not very difficult to get swayed by your emotions when you see many of them call Martial Law victims “bayaran” or dismissing statistics in favor of unreliable sources.
Most of the things I call the pro-Marcos I keep to myself. Still, what we think usually translates to the things we say, and what we say can never be taken back — especially on social media.
One can only observe how the anti-Marcos have started to engage the pro-Marcos in the very incarcerating rhetoric the movement has been criticizing. Words like “dilawan” or “Marcos pa rin” get responses like “p*****ina” or “t***a.” For every unfounded Mocha Uson post shared by the anti-Marcos as “stupid,” there are millions of other Filipinos feeling like they, too, are being called stupid. For every false infographic we caption with “Only idiots will believe this,” thousands of other feel like they are assaulted intellectually. Are the anti-Marcos then spared from blame?
Many people fail to realize that behind every pro-Marcos keyboard warrior is a human being with his own experiences. The pro-Marcos is an ordinary family man frightened for his children’s security in the streets. The pro-Marcos is probably someone whose family had to move out of their hometown after post-Marcos administrations neglected their communities and opened all their industries for privatization. The pro-Marcos is probably an overtaxed government worker who, upon hearing of alleged progressive Marcosian economics, longs for the day he won’t have his salary reduced by 30%.
The pro-Marcos keyboard warrior has reasons we can never invalidate. Really, there is something more divisive than politics — and that is alienating the pro-Marcos as an “other,” boxing their identity into “t***a”. The anti-Marcos is at fault for considering the pro-Marcos as somehow less human and even “unreal.”
Engaging the pro-Marcos begins with this simple affirmation: The pro-Marcos is a person.
