The seductive appeal of poetic fluff

Written on Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008 at 4:00 pm | by benign0

Is it just me being my usual cold calculating self, or is Grace’s blog post The Magic Hour nothing more than a long-winded appeal to emotion?

We have to be careful with things like this, you know. After all, it was such a successful appeal to emotion on a massive scale following 9/11 that led the mightiest nations on the planet into the abyss of the Iraq phase of George W. Bush’s “War on Terror”.

There are several active ingredients at work in Grace’s article that are messing with people’s heads:

(1) Introduction of the concept of government-sponsored “landgrabbing” (tapping into our sub-optimally substantiated mistrust of the Government)

(2) Attribution of a causal relationship between the poverty of Mindanao and this supposed “landgrabbing” (tapping into our inherent victim mentality)

(3) Extension of accountability for this “landgrabbing” to include entities that are “from outside” as well as “foreign multinationals” (tapping into basic xenophobia)

(4) De-construction of the “Mindanao War” into a vague abstraction known as “the sound of gunfire” and “a bigger war” amont others (creating a strawman)

Then lo and behold the “ancestral domain” card is played and all of a sudden we are all thrown into the gray world of overlapping histories of sovereignity of the State as it is currently constituted by the citizens of this Republic and duly recognised by the global community and the claims of a people who had long ago lost (but have since continued fighting) this battle for control over the piece of real estate in question.

Communities that are subject to invasion will often put up a good fight — and there is pride and honour in putting up such a fight. But at some point someone will lose and someone will win. When a people are effectively conquered (I’m not quite sure myself what precisely determines when this state is achieved), and colonisation proceeds, the conquered people have a choice to assimilate or resist. A choice to assimilate or resist can arguably be analogous to a choice between:

(a) finding opportunity for one’s self in the new order being created by the conquerors (and, subsequently, colonisers);

or,

(b) not finding opportunity to thrive and instead deciding to live outside of the framework (e.g. laws and other social conventions) of the new order being built by the coloniser.

The Philippine Government has long since established, documented, and socialised among its global peers its legitimate sovereignity over all of Mindanao. It today commits military resources funded by public money as well as the lives of Filipino troops to securing this sovereignity. Grace has, on the other hand, unilaterally decided to continue setting herself and “[her] people” apart from the rest of the people of the Philippines. Yet at the same time she appeals to the government’s mandate to “protect [their] interest[s]” as victims “driven from [their] ancestral lands”.

Quite a headscratcher. Can you use the concept of “ancestral land” in the same sentence that articulates an appeal to a government that does not recognise such a concept?

Unless this “ancestral land” exists as an entity in the current Law (and if so, I hence acknowledge my error with apologies), Grace and her people may as well continue running away from the proverbial gunfire-in-the-horizon even as others choose to live by the real essence of giving peace a chance by assimilating into the framework of order (and all its imperfections) being created by those who exercise legitimate sovereign authority over these domains.

If we take the time to think and strip out the emotional fluff from Grace’s article, I believe we are left with the simple reality expressed in the above final paragraph.

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About The Author: benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.COM and has once been described as "one of the most enthusiastic hecklers of the politically-passionate" by a respected journalist.

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11 Responses to “The seductive appeal of poetic fluff”

  1. the jester-in-exile on September 3rd, 2008 4:25 pm

    … is Grace’s blog post The Magic Hour nothing more than a long-winded appeal to emotion?

    yes, it is.

  2. cvj on September 3rd, 2008 4:36 pm

    Is it just me being my usual cold calculating self, or is Grace’s blog post The Magic Hour nothing more than a long-winded appeal to emotion?

    I don’t think the ‘appeal to emotion’ applies to you, only to those who haven’t undergone a frontal lobotomy.

  3. Jon Limjap on September 3rd, 2008 4:48 pm

    I really hate that post for the way it implies that that “ancestral domain” is all Muslim. It’s not. They’ve enroached on the indigenous people’s lands themselves. And then they go pretending they represent the lumad.

    Bullcrap!

  4. Nick on September 3rd, 2008 5:50 pm

    it was a creative rendition, from interviews and research, done in a “poetic” kind of way… No doubt, it is a view held by some in Mindanao..

  5. Solid Pinoy on September 3rd, 2008 5:54 pm

    Their lack of logic and reason explains why they will always be on the losing side.

  6. Ding G. Gagelonia on September 3rd, 2008 5:56 pm

    benignO,

    You’ve dissected Grace’s piece like a surgeon wields a scalpel.

    While she indeed be over-reaching in her assertions, the emotions embodied in the piece are genuine from the viewpoint of many Mohammedan Mindanaoans.

    What is really worrisome to me is how the US Institute for Peace, which has Fil-Am senior researchers and other ‘operators’. These people played on those very emotions to peddle the First Nation concept and promote the ancestral domain bogey to push foreign interests covetous of the rich petroleum basin under Liguasan Marsh and the Malaysian retention of Sabah.

  7. Patricio Mangubat on September 4th, 2008 8:03 pm

    Well, I don’t know if they’re Mohammedan, but I sure know they’re Muslims.

    Yeah, Ding, you may be right in saying that beneath these emotional appeal lies the very reason why the US agrees to put up with the BJE–the rich petroleum beneath that marsh and Sabah. And its the fault of Gloria–for the Americans, it is easier to do business with the Bangsamoro rather than Gloria’s. Remember ZTE? Remember other deals? Gloria surely will demand for more tongpats instead of the tongpats of the Bangsamoro. That’s my guess, knowing Murad…

  8. Grace Calderon-Serrano on September 5th, 2008 3:31 pm

    benignO,

    One of the tags in this piece says ‘loser mentality.’ Internal migrants/displaced people/refugees do not have ‘loser mentality.’ They don’t need to. They’re plain losers.

    Get off the armchair, bro!

  9. Grace Calderon-Serrano on September 5th, 2008 3:35 pm

    benignO,

    One of the tags in your piece says ‘loser mentality.’ I can’t help but say this to you. Internal migrants/displaced people/refugees do not have ‘loser mentality.’ They don’t need to. They are plain losers.

    Get off the armchair, bro!

  10. Grace Calderon-Serrano on September 5th, 2008 3:50 pm

    benignO,

    One of the tags in this piece of yours says ‘loser mentality.’ I can’t help but tell you this. Internal migrants/displaced people/refugees do not have ‘loser mentality.’ They don’t need to. They’re plain losers.

    Get off the armchair, bro!

  11. pumpy on October 27th, 2008 6:31 am

    Maybe it’s part of their “spirituality.” ;-)

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