In defense of so-called historical revisionists
By Herdy La. Yumul
IT
staff
It is sad when self-aggrandizing freedom fighters cry foul whenever
anything good is said about Ferdinand E. Marcos. To them, he is pure evil
and that the youth must be constantly reminded about alleged misdeeds during
his presidency. Students such as the Ateneans who joyfully had selfies with
Imelda are criticized for having poor historical knowledge while artists like
Chito Miranda who perform in Marcos-related activities are chided for
glorifying the “dark side.”
These
“freedom fighters” consider Filipinos who recount positive personal experiences
during the Marcos era as ignorant or stupid. Meanwhile, writers whose accounts
of history diverge from what anti-Marcos folks believe to be Gospel
truth are branded as revisionists and propagandists.
These
are foul.
For
how could you blame farmers who enjoyed strong government support in the 1970s
for loving Marcos?
How
could you blame mothers whose children enjoyed quality education, and who had
more food on their tables then for remembering the president well?
How
could you blame artists whose respective crafts blossomed under Imelda’s
patronage for dreaming for the same support?
How
could you refrain people from wishing we have today a more stable power supply,
a saner traffic situation, and an efficient transport system the way they were
when Marcos was president and Imelda was Metro Manila governor?
How
could you look down at our countrymen who wish we have today the same
level of respect we enjoyed in the international community when Marcos was
president?
And, how
could you prevent Filipinos from feeling hungry for reform, and from rooting
for the new society Marcos envisioned or something to that effect?
These
“how could you’s” go ad infinitum. Point is, a growing majority of our
countrymen now realize that as our social ills have remained—and by all
indicators have even worsened—in our post-1986 national life, Marcos is not the
real enemy. If people feel they lived more decent lives during the Martial Law
years, no historian or scholar or political analyst could contest that without
insulting those who own that experience.
I
concede that some dissidents may have suffered during that time, but did rebels
and communists seriously believe they would be handled with kids’ gloves by the
very government they wished to overthrow and the social order they wanted to
overturn? I concede that the media may have been less free and independent or
that movement may have been more restricted, but these are freedoms that can be
negotiated in view of a higher end.
Think
of Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew and Malaysia’s Mahathir Mohamad, strong leaders who
ushered their nations to development. Think of Park Chung Hee, the
developmental dictator who is credited for the most remarkable economic
turnaround in modern history—that of South Korea’s transformation from one of
the world’s poorest nations to the socioeconomic superpower that it is today.
And then think of Marcos, or maybe rethink of him sans the flimsy concept of
democracy Uncle Sam shoveled down our throats or the now-outdated ideology
Chairman Mao brainwashed leftist activists with. Thinking or rethinking is not
revisionism. Regretting EDSA is not revisionism.
Let
me make this clear: I am not anti-Aquino. Today as before, I appreciate the
government’s reform programs even as I speak my mind over its follies. I am
happy that my world is not blindly divided between red and yellow, and I look
down at no one in a kaleidoscope of colors.
I
agree that in dealing with history, we should stick to facts. But the divide
between cold fact and personal interpretation will always be a blur. No one’s
interpretation—not even those of self-aggrandizing freedom fighters—is always
right. And if we are to be truly democratic, we should learn to accept
that in a real and mature democracy, people have as much right to love
Marcos as to abhor him. Otherwise, we would fall into the trap, not of
revisionism, but of historical authoritarianism by a noisy few. That ‘freedom
fighters’ dictate what our collective narrative should be is the height of
irony and hypocrisy. That a dwindling band of activists shout “Never forget!
Never again!” while bullying people for what they truthfully remember is plain
and simple bigotry.
In
the end, the people’s account of history—not the vilification by textbooks, the
Inquirer, or ABS-CBN—will judge Marcos and define his place in our memory. As I
see now, the verdict is getting kinder. And it is not because the people are
ignorant or that they have a short-term memory or that historical revisionists
are succeeding. It is simply that decades after the first EDSA, a growing
number of Filipinos realize that they have been fooled, swindled, and betrayed,
and not by Marcos.
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