Bullets, violence
Media
Part of Panorama
- Title
- Bullets, violence
- Creator
- [Roces, Alfredo R.]
- Language
- English
- Source
- Volume XX (Issue No. 4) April 1968
- Year
- 1968
- Subject
- Violence
- Crime prevention
- Shootings (Crime)
- Legislators -- Crimes against
- Political violence
- Peace
- Peacebuilding
- Rights
-
- Fulltext
- BULLETS, VIOLENCE The gunning down of Con gressman Amante (on March 26, 1968) is a continuing re minder that peace and order is now the fundamental na tional problem. It will be im possible for the nation to sur vive if the situation continues to deteriorate. Despite a w e 11-publicized ant i-crime campaign following the pub lishers’ pool editorial lament ing the sad state of peace and order this country, criminal elements think nothing of shooting a congressman in public. We do not know the facts behind this recent as sassination attempt, but it fits into the same pattern of kill ings in that it shows our so ciety is becoming more and more prone to violence and scornful of the law. Today one can be anywhere, driv ing a car as in the case of the radio commentator Yabut, or dining in a restaurant as in the case of Speaker Laurel, or waiting for an ele vator in the lobby of a gov ernment building, or receiv ing communion in church, and a hired killer will come and shoot you down. Human life is that cheap. And this attitude seeps down on the entire nation, whether one refers to farmer-Huks killed, or religious fanatics like the Lapiang Malaya slaughtered, or the more re cent reports of Special Forces trainees being “massacred.” This situation prevails not only in our gangsterinfluenced cities because kill ings are even more rampant in the rural areas, whether one is talking about bandits, pirates, Huks, or armed goons in Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Pampanga, Cavite, Ilocos, or the Southern provinces. The rea sons for killings are diverse, from personal family feuds to politics, to plain criminal avarice. Our image abroad is already such that most visitors who come here, al ways state that they had come despite the warnings and cries of alarm of travel agents, transport personnel, and friends. Pursuant to this, a bill was proposed in Con gress requiring that local crime news reports can be 16 Panorama published in Pilipino so they may escape the tourist’s eye. Alas, it is more than our image abroad that is in grave peril, it is our very lives as citizens of this republic, and the life of this nation as civil ized society. According to someone, who has been to Jolo, recently, the PC enforcement groups there are outgunned and alienated from the people, all of whom carry the latest automatic weapons. Those in the hinterlands are flocking to town for protection. When a farmer plows his field he needs his brother to stand by cradling an Armalite. We need more than a mailed fist policy against criminal violence. We need a positive voice speaking out for law and order and civilized hu man decency. — Alfredo R. Roces, Manila Times, March 27, 1968. April 1968 17
- pages
- 16-17