(Wrote this after "Sottogate" broke loose, and originally posted in pinoy.md)
(Disclaimer: This, in no way, represents an attack on people who are against the Reproductive Health Bill, RH Bill for short. Heck, it is within everyone’s right to have a personal say on the matter whether it be for or against or “I don’t care”. Why there is a need to be a disclaimer at the very beginning of this essay will be made clear)
Are we still in the Middle Ages? Given the fact that there is an “esteemed” senator who not only plagiarized a certain blogger but also has the balls to say “why should I acknowledge her, she’s just a blogger “(paraphrased and translated into English).
And then, his attorney made things even worse. This attorney apologized to the said blogger not through formal e-mail but through the COMMENTS section of the said blog. Mr. Attorney, I don’t know what school you came from but you seemed to have forgotten the simple rule of intellectual property rights. You have to acknowledge your sources; there is no such thing as a “follow-up” acknowledgement. If you didn’t acknowledge your source in your work (in this case a speech) then you have committed plagiarism.
You didn’t even have the nicety to personally e-mail the blogger and apologize to her there. Even when you were already caught stealing; you still have the balls to ask the blogger to join your cause. To think, you were thoroughly schooled, college and then law school.
Such a shame; I’m not even going to ask what law school you went to. The answer might just irritate me further.
So are we still in the Middle Ages? Well, idiotic people have existed back then and even up until now. What’s worse, they don’t even know they have committed something wrong; so they hide it, create more lies and fallacies. So no, it’s not this “esteemed” senator and attorney that has ruined my particular day.
To give a better picture, let me first describe how they have ruined my day:
During the Habagat rains, when the entire city was flooded; school was cancelled. Of course, being a medical student requires one to study even in the face of floods but when the flood waters have already reached your home, you evacuate.
Anyway, my residence wasn’t flooded and also my family’s residence so I’m thankful for that. While I was checking Facebook; one of my online contacts forwarded an image of a tweet to me. What I saw made my crappy day even crappier and even replaced my feeling of hopelessness into outright indignation.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the rain was God’s way of saying no to the RH-Bill (paraphrased)”.
I had to read it again so that I can be sure I was still in the 21st century. After reading it many times; I was sure of what it said. I was so indignant and so angry. The very nerve of these people! So while our fellow Filipinos are being pounded by the torrential rains, their homes and properties and even their lives endangered; you have to use these very rains to give credence to your cause. Of all the times; if it was within my capacity I would have flung these people in the middle of the floods.
If the waters don’t claim your life; I hope leptospirosis will.
And then, when I thought nothing would have added further to my indignation; I just had to receive a particular petition in my Facebook, 1 week after the Habagat rains.
That petition called for the immediate resignation of my former professors because they have committed “academic tyranny”.
So now, since my former professors have taken a stance, and they even took the precaution of including a disclaimer in their position paper that in no way does their stance reflect the Ateneo de Manila University’s stance on the RH Bill; that petition calls for them to be meted out sanctions. Even when they have painstakingly made it clear that it is their personal stance; they must be punished because it is contrary to what the Catholic Church believes.
So again, I ask, are we still in the Middle Ages?
Apparently when the Catholic Church teaches us about freedom and the dignity of the human person; it’s only valid when you blindly follow what they say. Forget about your personal dignity; you have to follow what they say or else. What is now lacking is the reinstatement of the Inquisition. I can even see Pope Alexander VI on the papal throne because of the intense hypocrisy being committed.
And now, the coup de grace to the ruining of my day and my disillusionment. This is now the root cause in which I can now say that: I AM ASHAMED OF BEING FORCIBLY BAPTIZED INTO THE ROMAN CATHOLIC DENOMINATION. Yes, I’ll repeat that: I am ashamed of being a Roman Catholic.
So the main cause of this disillusionment: certain anti-RH comments. If you read some of them; you’d think were still in the Middle Ages. Again, go against what the Church says; you are an infidel. Don’t believe me, search around; you might even find someone who has a picture of a Crusader with the tagline of “Anti-RH” juxtaposed with the said Crusader as their main profile picture.
Now people disapproving of the RH Bill are Crusaders and people for the RH Bill are infidels? Words can’t even describe the horror I felt when it finally hit me there was something wrong with using a picture of a Crusader. Does this person have any idea of what the Crusaders did during the Crusades?
Let’s refresh everyone’s memory. The Crusades was basically an invasion sanctioned by the Popes to re-take Jerusalem because of its significance to Christianity. Remember, this was where Christ was judged by Pontius Pilate and then sentenced to crucifixion. So the Popes back then, preaching piety and holiness, sanctioned thousands of Europeans to kill a lot of people a.k.a. infidels. These so-called “infidels” were already living in peace when these Europeans, spurred on by the then-Holy Fathers, killed them and invaded their lands. Don’t even use the “it was a different time, different society” argument with me. You can’t deny what they did.
We are now cast as “Crusaders” and “infidels”, what’s next, the Inquisition?
Again I go back to the petition against my former professors. One alumnus even commented that these professors can’t express their own views because they belong to a Catholic university and that critical thinking must always serve an agenda. So again, we see the hypocrisy at hand. You are only free if you follow what they say.
We’re not in the Middle Ages after all. Somehow, we are stuck in a place where two different historical periods intersect. On the one hand, it’s the time of the Crusades and on the other hand, it’s the time of Pope Alexander VI.
*notes on this essay: I know, it's an unusual break from what I usually post (anything medical school related). But it was because of the sheer disgust I felt at what some people were saying just to further their own beliefs that I felt compelled to write down my disgust. Again I reiterate, this is not an attack on those people who are against the RH Bill. Rather it is my indignation at the manner at which some of them argue. In the midst of their arguments, I'm struggling to find the Catholic concept of love.
Anyway, I think as medical professionals (even medical students) have to have stances on anything political. We are after all going to treat people and people do not just exist in the biological sense. They are affected by societal, psychological, legal and political structures. We can't treat people in a vacuum after all.
Here's the link to said petition: http://www.gopetitio...-de-manila.html
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