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Secretary
Pagdanganan's "joke", and I would tend to believe he
wanted to be funny (admittedly tastelessly), was deplorable. For my Visayan readership,
I had to add in the first part of this essay the disgusting Bulakeno
regard upon colored (not white) ceilings as pejoratively a Bisaya
architectural quirk (Pagdanganan hails from Bulacan, as does my non-racist
wife). But I was not about to rally my fellow Visayans to stone
Pagdanganan and so veered away from sheer condemnation to the
examination of a more deplorable farming of racisms within society. And I
believe Ms. Yuchengco, the Chinese-Filipino magazine editor who walked out
of the hall, would also acknowledge the reality of business and consumer
and labor crimes committed by wealthy Chinese-Filipino businessmen that go
unpunished. The racism against Chinoys that results from this reality is
unfair, of course, since Malay Filipino and even Western companies also
commit the crimes. It just so happens, however, that jobseekers see more
Chinoy bosses than not in their daily circulation of the job route. Add to
that, the popular impression is that such elements as Henry Sy, Lucio Tan,
etc. have been the prime lobbyists for the retention of certain
questionable labor law loopholes that no one in Congress would dare touch
(a supposedly pro-labor senator even sat in the board of a networking
group that exploits money-seekers and consumers). But
this is not to say that in the Philippine context, less than elsewhere,
Pagdanganan didn't say something wrong. What he said was deplorable, to
say it again. We have seen, for example, how movies about homophobia
demonstrate the potent combination of jokes and impending violence. And by
Jonathan Swift's self-critique, that comedy is a produce of prejudice.
However, especially perhaps in the Philippine majorial context, comedy
does not always guarantee violence. This is the country, after all, where
I saw so many of my comrades talk violently against Marcos in the "kanto
bar" but reneged from their support of a demonstration at
the last minute. The
dangerous racism I've felt, nay heard, here have been from those
who weren't laughing or joking around. But,
on the other hand, the first part of my essay must not be read as an
apologia for these grim-faced personas' positions. In the same
way that talking about what sows the seeds of terrorism should not
translate to a rally for terrorism, though perhaps it might be used by the
terrorists for their propaganda e-zines. I believe that when racism comes
from below, the search for a resolution (other than class-cleansing those
below) must come from those above. WHY SHOULD
I write about this at all? Well, because I'm afraid. Although many say
that this is the country that suffered Marcos for twenty years and then
proclaimed a revolution in the streets when it was almost guaranteed safe,
everybody calling themselves heroes for “being there” and not being
anywhere while the martyrs were being captured or shot. No way what
happened to Chinese-Indonesians in Indonesia a decade back is going to
happen here, they say. This is the country of Christians with kind hearts,
they add. Well, perhaps in that case I shouldn't allow myself to write
grim warnings, then. I should simply join the rest in thinking nothing
wrong is going on, pretend the workers are happy, and hope racism here will
not go beyond the heckle. But
supposing a racist figure as popular as Joseph Estrada (different from the
kind of Erap that coddled big Chinoy corporate interests) is to blossom
from within an Edsa 6? What now? What if the racist figure lecturing
people to abhor the current economics and its perceived sponsors happens
to actually be a team of pseudo-nationalist generals? Product of
imagination, perhaps, but still reason to be afraid some. Racism
is no more harmful in rioting Germany or Britain or the United States than
in the jokes-filled islands. It pains me to be, as a Bisaya, the constant
butt of Manila jokes. It pains me to see "coños" asking the
traffic cop to give their Harley gang priority, the total disrespect
the higher class race has for the lower classes. It pains me to hear a gay
man declare "heterosexuals can't be more creative than us" just
as it pains me to witness gay-baiting almost every minute everywhere in
this nation of cowardly males who can't stand up to change our
damaged culture. It pains me to see Christian fundamentalism in secular
government, processions in national highways they wouldn't allow Moslems
to have. It pains me to see racist (and relatives) crimes in the
tabloids as the broadsheets tackle "more serious" matters. But
instead of standing up to bash heads, I can only do what I must. Join the
rally for change. It just so happens that -- in the same way that it would
be best to mail a letter to Pagdanganan than rally an angry audience
to stone his house and soul -- I seek change from above, not below,
criticizing the shortcomings of the former and what dangers they may be
manufacturing. Of course I might come out like a doomsayer, but
it's better to be safe than sorry, right? Sure,
Palestinians must change in the post-Arafat era. But there's more change
to be expected from above than from below, that I believe. Certainly some
Moslems must do away with terrorism to air their grievances, but should we
always find the Bush "clean 'em up" way as the best way from
above? Will it work? For how long? Perhaps when it comes to this issue I'd be more of a Fascist than a democrat or Maoist in the sense that I don't think that the fight against racism can be effected by those below. Mussolini believed change must derive from the intelligentsia or power elite class. The difference between Mussolini and me is not only that I'd rather kill the disease than the perceived disease-carrier, but that I would tend to recognize any social disease as actually mothered by an anomaly above (whether a religious, ethnic, or intelligentsia elite, or all of these three). Racism breed racism, and it will not suffice to denounce one and not denounce the other.
PAGDANGANAN
delivered his speech (with the ignorant and racist passage) in the United
States to an audience of Fil-Am writers trying to promote Philippine and
Philippine-American literature. But aside from the fact that to most
Americans all Asians look the same, the Chinese (and Asians) in the USA
are the minority (people below); in the Philippines, though they
would be a minority in numbers, Chinese-Filipinos are perceived to be the
"financial elite" (people above). The Chinoys in the Philippines would,
therefore, be our equivalent to the Republican-backing
corporate world of America. They are perceived to have brokered the
candidacy of politicians and have been regarded by the masses as the
virtual government running the laws of this country. I challenge any group
to do their own formal survey/poll of the masses in regards these
attitudes. One can begin by looking for racial stereotypes in major
Philippine literature and cinema; they can tell me if what they see
is not telling of a rampant “racist” view from the
intelligentsia. Do
I, by focusing on those above, become racist towards them by necessity?
This is how I would answer that query. Were I a communist and wise, I wouldn't
campaign for the candidate who would make this country a better place. Wouldn't
I just love to watch the land go in shambles under a
powerful despot or plutocracy?
LET ME NOW give you a backgrounder on Pagdanganan. Roberto Pagdanganan has been projecting an image of himself
in the Philippine political arena as a poor boy that made it into the
corporate world and its high echelons. I wonder if this experience
broadened a racist perspective that he had against the Chinoys, in the
same corridors he paced, dining with them, dealing with them, laughing
with them, or whether it erased it after having befriended so many of
them. But one thing is certain. He prides himself as more of a
“Tagalista” than an “Inglesero” type of corporate, and later
government, man; prides himself for having the personality that propelled
him to the governorship of Bulacan, the Magsaysay personality that can
talk to a farmer in Bulacan Tagalog. His vice-governor and now
second-term governor, Josie de la Cruz, emulated this personality. I suspect that politics is at play here. Farmers have a
disdain for Chinoy traders who seem to earn more from farmers’ produce
and months of sweat. Perhaps from a feeling of triumph at having found his
political base, Pagdanganan may have pandered to the farmer with the
latter’s views and jokes, assimilating this culture and perspective
further into his speeches (developmental communications-fashion) to in
turn deliver his developmental views and mission. After all, he has been
credited for the widespread establishment of cooperatives in the Bulacan
region, now being extended by his protégé, Governor de la Cruz, to the
small-scale food processing industry of the province. This system or
mission has also been adapted by the Department of Agriculture under
Secretary Arthur Yap, a Chinoy, in seeking to eliminate middlemen and
create a farmer-to-market situation wherein farmers become their own
traders, keeping more of the mark-up profit to themselves while lowering
the cost of the produce to the consumer. It is against this background that Pagdanganan might have
seen himself as a great achiever in having uplifted, nay empowered, the
“farmer Pinoy”. It is against this background that Pagdanganan might
still carry with him the belief that he can propagate the same zeal and
attitude in any indio anywhere to be able to erase the hatred for the
Chinoy trader by becoming successful himself. In this sense, he might in
the long run be in the mission to eliminate racism by eliminating the
envy. And against this background of achievement, acknowledged even by
Chinoy technocrats like Arthur Yap as commendable, he might have seen his
triumphs as a missionary to be universal in context. Alas, he was
mistaken. For in the final analysis, though his end achievements of farmer
empowerment in Bulacan may be said to have justified his speech
means, yet we all know that it will always be the means that will be
examined and judged. For while Pagdanganan may in his contribution have
weaned the farmer Pinoy from the latter’s unimaginativeness that
hampered the farmer sight from alternatives to the usual,
Pagdanganan may have likewise reinforced the racism among the folk. And what is this folk racism? It is not merely culled from
envy, it is also rooted in what the novelist Bino Realuyo calls the
“politics of the face”. So the landlord’s fair-skinned mestizo son
might be “bakla” who can’t handle a sickle, in the same sense that
in campuses pretty faces aren’t expected to be intelligent. As in rock
music the demand is that the pretty-faced should be marketed as the
greater rockers. I agree, the politics of the face is everywhere, from
Mexico, Pampanga to Acapulco, Mexico and back in the hiring offices of
Makati. And it is everywhere in Manila these days. It’s in the
laughing bunch of tambays at a billiard saloon heckling a young Chinoy
couple at the taxi stop, it’s in the laughing trio of Chinoy or Tisoy
execs at Starbucks laughing loudly at a young low-wage yuppie girl with
her waiter-boyfriend with the hollow cheeks passing by. But the politics
of the face can also be a politics of pride. It’s in the anger of a
red-faced industrial partner of a web design studio who scratches his
Chinoy boss’s car and proudly beats his own brown chest, congratulating
himself for the rage. It’s in the anger of the fat Chinoy at the mall
door asking the malnourished guard trying to inspect his bag, “di
mo ba alam kung sino ako?” (“don’t you know who I am?”) Pagdanganan’s racial slurs are no less inappropriate here
than in the U.S. To say so will underestimate the gravity of the
Philippine situation, the situation that I in this column attempted to
paint. Fil-Am as well as Filipino writers must fight in the great
war against racism, though it be quite a tall order. We must fight it in
all the hills of battle, and it will be fine to see everyone ranting and
wanting to fight it in their respective hills of focus. It will be quite a
reassurance if, though we derive from different tribes or political
leanings or class or skin color, and come armed with the materiel of
different experiences past and current, we can agree on the need to fight
it. There’s the bright picture we can begin to paint.
Posted at the Bananacue
Republic website 11/16/04. Send
your comment to [email protected]
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