A Passion for Repression

I started the day hungry. First, for food. I started on Poli Law last night, after a prayer meeting, and after I decided to do the remaining 300 pages of Azucena's vol. 1 in hourly installments for the next week or so. I'm done with volume II, by the way. At this point, I find it a more interesting read than volume 1. I finished several articles of the Constitution and started on Nachura at around three am, but 27 pages later, my stomach was growling. So, I downed a cup of Soupy Snaxx, hoping that the black hole that is sometimes my gut would be temporarily sated, at least until mid-morning. Unfortunately, my gut screamed back at me, "I want some more." Quite persistently, in fact, that I started having visions of the breakfasts my mama used to cook for me as I lay there in bed trying to capture sleep. Bacon and rice, steaming hot chocolate and iced tea, eggs sunny side up with the yolk breaking under the pressure of toasted pandesal ... Morpheus didn't want weave his spell yet, and the dawn caught me gripped in the anticipation of breaking my fast.

And in my quest to break my fast, I derived two pleasures far removed from the culinary. The first pleasure was seeing the sun rise. It may seem odd to some, particularly to those who are, for all intents and purposes, the "larks" of the human race. But for those like me who are favored by the night, or whose blood only start to quicken when darkness falls, the beauty of the sunrise is a gift rarely seen.
My second rush of pleasure came as I held my first newspaper in ages. Well, my first newspaper since my grandmother went back to the province. I can almost hear you say, "A newspaper? Come on." I would probably have mirrored your incredulity with the utmost sincerity and empathy on some other day. But not today. Oh, not today.

My second hunger was for information, the variety of which was different from the bar reviewee's compulsory fare. News. I wanted news. I hadn't seen a newscast, much less cracked open a timely issue of any newspaper in what felt like an eon. Reviewing for the bar sometimes takes away the desire to touch anything with text on it immediately after a lecture or even a personal review session. There's this faint tendril of anxiety of information overload. And then, wham! You realize that you've become so immersed in your law books and law friends and everything law that you're in the inside of a glass compartment looking out.

So, I got myself a newspaper. The Inquirer, what else? I would dearly love to read a Businessweek as well, but spending P50++ on newspapers when I'm on a budget deficit is anathema at this point. I got myself a paper and was almost instantly reminded that for every pleasure there is a corresponding pain.

The first thing that caught my attention was the full color photograph of Erwin "Pastor" Emata, left arm extended to the pale yonder of a snow-covered portion of Mt. Everest.

The headline read: "Second Filipino conquers Everest, Garduce expected to reach summit tomorrow." I hadn't even known that compatriot Leo Oracion had reached the summit 24 hours earlier. Good for them, and I hope Garduce reaches the summit safely as well, and that for each mountaineer the journey down is just as untroubled as the climb. If truth be told, however, all that media coverage was a bit off a turn off. It wasn't just the glory of spotlighting the first Filipinos on Everest that motivated all this press, I should think. One media outfit trying to scoop out the other in a never-ending networks war is what primarily comes to my mind.

"Time mag writer placed on watch list." According to the news article penned by Armand N. Nocum, "Justice Secretary Raul Gonzales yesterday said he had ordered the Bureau of Immigration to put TIme's Philippine correspondent Nelly Sindayen on the list [watch list of politicians and businessmen allegedly behind the alleged coup attempt of Feb 24 against PGMA] to compel her to shed light on the alleged plot.

Gonzales is reportedly adamant that Sindayen is a key witness to an alleged meeting between civilian and military personalities determined to withdraw support from PGMA. Sindayen and Cojuangco (one of those Gonzales pointed out as having participated in that meeting) are equally adamant that no meeting of that nature occurred.

Gonales is reported to have said that the correspondent's testimony is key to unmasking those behind the failed coup. He is quoted in the same article: "She won't be arrested, but she must cooperate. We're not asking for anything except the truth. We just want to talk to her." In addition, the article quoted Gonzales as having said: "The NBI report is not completed. We want to know why they were in that meeting. We will file charges against these individuals if I find that there's probable cause."

Okay.

When the good secretary of justice said that Sindayen wouldn't be arrested, but she must cooperate, what exactly was he saying? The directive for the journalist to cooperate is mandatorily voiced. Must cooperate. What are the consequences of a failure to satisfy the "powers that be"? A cordially extended invitation to glove the coercive hand of "justice"?

The Secretary says "we" are not asking for anything except the truth. Who comprises "we"? And would they even know the truth if it bit them one by one on the nose? Or is it that they want to put truth in a noose?

Another thing. When will the NBI report be considered complete? When all the facts are in, or when those who are demanding that report get a report that paints a picture that satisfies them? What face truth?

The witch hunt is on.

Just as disturbing is this news article, "City of Manila bans Da Vinci Code". The movie. Manila's dads have banned the movie.

For Pete's sake. Brown's Da Vinci Code is disturbing to some, though I must admit that I love the way it was written. It's a book. A work of fiction. A facet of Dan Brown's literary landscape that I inhabited for those few hours that I was immersed in it. And if it is not fiction, does it necessarily make everything else a lie?

Father James Reuter is reported to have said that "Rome, in general, has condemned it...{But) the Holy Father has not made it a sin if you watch it." I am not Rome, and Rome is not, and never will be me. And the judgment of whoever makes up "Rome, in general", is not mine to adopt blindly.

I have all the respect for the Holy Father; all the love my heart can muster for the right hand of God on earth. But if God has not spoken in the negative, and the Holy Father has not made it a sin for people to watch the movie adaptation of Brown's book, who are these politicians that they dare strangle the freedom of choice of others on the altars of their personal beliefs?

So much for going to bed after breakfast.