Heartless assault
President Duterte need not have dignified with an explanation the criticisms made about a pre-debut photo shoot in Malacañang of his granddaughter Isabelle. What happened required no explanation. Malacañang is the official residence of the president. And Isabelle is family to the president. What can be more natural than taking pictures inside one's home?
The gripe of the critics absolutely had no legal leg to stand on, although they tried to scrounge around for anything they can pass off as a valid excuse to question and criticize. But it was dead from the beginning. That no one took up the call or provoked a tumult only underscores the limpness with which people regarded the unfortunate assault.
What the critics did not realize was that, in their desire to hit the president, they only succeeded in making a young innocent girl, who was about to enter a new phase in her life, feel utterly miserable. Isabelle may be the granddaughter of the president. But she has nothing to do with the politics of her grandfather. It is absolutely cruel to make her suffer just because of the blood that runs in her veins.
Those who saw nothing wrong in what they have done cannot be simple ordinary folk. Simple ordinary folk find cheer and joy in life's little big moments -a birth, a baptism, a birthday, a debut, a wedding. These are moments that even we, as outsiders, can share in all honesty and sincerity. Because these are moments of life, moments that never fail to inspire hope in humanity, and the desire to go on living.
The insensitivity of the criticisms suggests a stark professionalism by which they were carried out. There was a heartless doggedness by which they were relentlessly pursued. If only it is possible to imagine a big mean machine as behind the operation. But of course there is none and it is pointless to kid ourselves because we know just exactly who could be behind this caper.
What a sad commentary then were the criticisms on the depths to which some people would willingly plunge just to pursue their own interests. If these people want a go at Duterte, I am pretty sure he is man enough to square off with them one by one. But they had to go at him through a young girl who was not the enemy, someone they did not even know before then, and probably will never meet again in their lifetimes.
I wonder how the critics would feel if, in the political skirmishes they obviously relish engaging in, their own flesh and blood get needlessly and innocently drawn into the line of fire. If that happens, I am pretty sure they would come begging on bended knees pleading to have their sons and daughters spared the nasty fate of becoming casualties of a selfish war.
But then again, why wonder? What the critics have done, and the willingness with which they did it without compunction, betrays a mindset bent on achieving a mission regardless of who stands in the way and who gets hurt. The big disappointment in this case is that whoever might be their principal isn't any better. In fact, by refusing to draw the line or laying down rules of engagement, the principal is even worse than his minions.
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