American Dream wrote:American Dream wrote:
http://www.ibiblio.org/ahkitj/wscfap/ar ... ntents.htm2 THE QUESTION OF LAND OWNERSHIP Without a doubt, the most crucial issue that has motivated the Philippine peasantry to self-organization and self-activation is the question of land ownership.
Under Spanish rule, extensive land grants were given the Crown’s favorites who became the big landlords. Later, they also became the big capitalists: middlemen, moneylenders, bureaucrats, and limited industrialists. But because of the agrarian nature of the economy, land wealth is the prime source of all wealth and privilege; arid, conversely, landlessness – the basic status of the oppressed.
And so, out of sheer necessity, the Filipino peasants in different parts of the: country and at various time had to ask the basic moral question: What is just with regard to the land?
A peasant sits under the mango tree and stares blankly at the void before him. Except for his fellow peasants, not too many others realize that he is asking questions, searching for meanings. Why can he not own the land he tills and which his ancestors had tilled before him?
Mang Guimo, another peasant, is drinking lambanog (a native wine) with his neighbors. The landlord is asking for higher rentals, and some of the other peasants have to be evicted because the landlord will mechanize a portion of his lands.
Mang Guimo shares his thoughts with his drinking peers. Before Don Jose (the landlord) and I were born, the land was already there. When Don Jose and I shall die, the land will still be there. Whose is the land really?
When you and I were fighting as soldiers during the last war, Mang Guimo rambles on, we thought we were fighting for the Philippines. Now that the war is over, where is our Philippines?
For, indeed, while Don Jose can own seven hundred hectares, Mang Guimo cannot own even one square meter of land.
And what about the Church? She always tells us that she may never take sides. She may never side the poor even as they try to get their rights. She is after all, Mang Guimo continues in sarcasm, the common mother of both the rich and the poor. What does a good mother do if she sees her older boy always beating up the younger, weaker son, and taking food? Shall she say, “I am the mother of both of them, I may not take sides in their quarrels”?
3 THE EFFECTS OF LANDLORDISM In simple language, the peasants discuss how the land lords had ample income. Because of this, the latter are in a position to develop themselves physically and intellectually. They are able to send their children to the best schools.
We, landless poor, on the other hand, cannot afford to give “education” to our children. We are forced to keep them early as full-time helpers in the farm or send them to the households of the landlords – there to work as servants and maids.
But the problem does not end there, the peasants know. Because of the landlords’ education, and social and cultural prominence, they logically become the political “leaders” of the country.
We remain destitute and ignorant and count almost nothing in the political life of the nation. Then, because of the landlords’ poli tical power, the economic resources are further monopolized by them.
It is like a wheel within a wheel – a vicious circle: how do we break it? Is it just to struggle against the landlords and capitalists – or does God really will an unjust order?
4 GOD... THE PEOPLE... OWNS THE LAND Pedro Calosa of the Kolorum Movement put it succinctly in the 1930’s at the height of the peasant uprising in Northern Luzon: “God owns the land, the air, the water, sunshine – everything, and intended all these for the use of the people – all His children.
In the evening after a meager supper, peasants gathering at a baryo kapilya (village chapel) ask simple but pointed questions. We've often prayed the “Our Father,” a peasant leader starts. We do so because we are all His children. Can it be that God wills the land only for Don Jose and the landlords? "Thy will be done," we pray. Yes, what is God's will with regard to the land? My friends, it would seem correct to think that God wills the land for all of us to share. If He is our Father, then all goods must be family goods---to be shared by all.
It is wrong Kuya Terio continues, that we who till and need the land should continually be dispossessed by a few of its bounty.
Yes, an old peasant rises to speak, the land is like the air. It is just there for us to use in accordance with our need and labor. I did not ask to be born, he says, almost mad. But I was born to live – needing land, and air, and other things. The birds of the air and the animals of the field get what they need in order to live. Can anyone of us say they don’t have that right?
Why then are we denied the right to own the land we need to have a decent living? Why should only a few landlords who do not till the land own the most of it and reap the benefits of our labor? I say, we are poor, indeed, but it is an unjust situation. I can’t accept that it is in accordance with God’s will.
A silent Mang Fabio gets excited now. You re right, he says. Where is it written that God gave the land only to Don Jose and the landlords? Nowhere! Where then did the landlords get the land they now own? From their parent landlords, you'll say and these, where did they get the land? From their landlord forbears, you'll also say, who got them from their landlord ancestors. But I tell you, my friends, if we continue tracing the origin of landlord ownership, we must arrive at a time when the lands were grabbed by force from our own great-great grandparents.
It was unjust for a few Spaniards to grab the lands from us. It is even more unjust that this dispossession of the majority be made to continue up to now.
At this juncture, another peasant adds: Even granting that landlords originally invested in the land a hundred years ago, who will deny that that investment has already been recovered by now – not twice but at least a hundred times over?
The problem is that by possessing a scrap of paper called a Title to the land, they think they are the real owners of the land. They forget that even before they or we were born, the land was already there; that after they or we have passed away the land will still be there – God’s gift to all.
We, too, must not forget that not even we are absolute owners of our own selves. Only God is absolute owner of all.
And how absurd is the argument, another peasant says, of those who claim absolute ownership over the land just because they were ahead of the rest in occupying it? They are like a person who went ahead to a theatre and claimed exclusive owner ship over all the space – all the seats available – in complete disproportion to his or her seating needs. And when the rest of the people arrived trying, to get some seats, he forbade them– saying that because he had arrived earlier, he was now absolute owner of all the space.
This is why, Kuya Terio stresses. I say again that we must regard the land, the air, water, the sunshine, all of nature’s bounty as destined by the Creator for the use of all.
It gets harder and harder for me to accept, Kuya Terio goes on, that my children have no birth right. “Thou shall not steal,” we are often told. It is clearer to me that the majority are poor because a few are appropriating more then they need or work for. We cannot let a few rob us of our birth rights and systematically kill us by this act of robbery – with our children undernourished and our bodies weighed down by tuberculosis. God, rather, is the God of life who wills that we all live, and struggle to live. The land and the water that we need for life belongs to us all.
Continues: http://www.ibiblio.org/ahkitj/wscfap/ar ... ntents.htm
http://www.ibiblio.org/ahkitj/wscfap/ar ... ntents.htm13 NATURE OF THE PROBLEM OF HUNGERThe peasants’ reflection on Matthew 25 does not end with that note. In more and more barrio meetings, peasants ask themselves more questions like: we are the hungry, and we are the thirsty; what then do we do to feed ourselves and our children? If solving the problem of hunger and poverty is so essential to the Christian vision, what is our special task and role? What is the precise nature of the problem of hunger?
Mang Tibo says we can’t escape the inevitable conclusion: we need to gather courage to struggle effectively and eliminate the oppressive arrangements.
The present arrangements are such that, whatever we do, only a few get richer and the majority of us get poorer. Some of us still say, “It’s really like that; that is the course of fate.” Now, of course, we know: it need not be like that, and it should not be like that at all. We must live up to our dignity as human beings and children of God.
Consider the landlord-tenant arrangement, Mang Tibo continues. The harder we work in order to produce more, the more are the fruits of our labor taken away from us. Or consider the loan arrangements and the arbitrary behaviour of the price of our crops. We are continually in debt. The things we don’t produce and buy from others are getting more expensive. The things we do produce are always dipping in value.
We are like a fish in a polluted sea. As a fish, I like to swim and I can swim. But now, I find that no matter how hard I try, I cannot swim as fast or as properly as I should. And I dare say that this happens not because something is wrong with the sea I swim in.
It is now clear to many of us, I think, that we do live in an ocean of social arrangements. Often, we are not aware of this, just as we ordinarily take for granted the existence of air in which we breathe and live.
Too often, we just go about trying to accomplish the im possible task of living a decent human life in the midst of inhuman and unjust relationships. In fact, we do hear from time the phrase, “
Magkasosyo tayo” (we are business partners) referring to the fact of social partnership. And yet, how often are we aware that we suffer the unjust portion of such partnership?
We are often unaware, Mang Tibo's voice has lowered to a whisper and everyone in the room has to listen hard, except when a crisis strikes. Too seldom do we realize that the present problem of hunger is a
social and not merely an individual problem.
As a social problem, it affects the broad masses of the people, and not just a few individuals. It is not caused merely by accidents like fires, or by emergencies like typhoons. Don’t we see, my friends, that it is caused mainly by the social arrange ments, the concepts, the attitudes that we accept?
Of course, now that we are discussing these things, it be comes clear to all of us. Now we see more clearly, Mang Tibo’s voice is still calm and even, what we suspected all along - - - that the main causes of our problem include the unjust notion of owner ship that we often discuss; the haughty attitudes of the powerful and our own subservient assent to everything they say; the land lord-tenant arrangement that we detest so much; the usurious practices of the middlemen that we abhor; and the mysterious manipulation of price behavior that we find hard to comprehend.
Somebody in the group hands Mang Tibo a glass of water to increase what they call “Tibo’s saliva power.”
14 TWO KINDS OF THIEVES AND KILLERSNow take for instance, Mang Tibo now squats on the floor, the notion of robbery.
During the last
fiesta in this barrio, the parish priest came to say Mass. Afterwards we asked him what he thought of our desire to own the land. Now, do you remember what he answered us? He said, quoting the Bible: “Thou shall not steal!” I mean, Mang Tibo’s voice rings with sarcasm, who can quarrel with that moral admonition?
What he did not tell us, however, is even more important. You see, there are two ways of stealing: the individual way, and the social way.
For instance, if I go to the house of Mang Juan one night when he and his family are away, and there I take various things that are not mine, what am I doing? I am stealing what does not belong to me, right? This is one individual way of dealing. And if I get caught, what will happen to me? I might end up in jail.
But if I am a landlord and I have tenants and workers whom I hire and at harvest time I don’t give them the just share or a just wage; in other words, I don’t give them what is due them as human beings because in the first place, I don’t consider them human like me. If I do this – taking what is not mine – what am I doing? Obviously, or, perhaps, not too obviously, I am taking what does not belong to me. This is the social way of stealing. More often than not, it is sanctioned by law, or, at least accepted by society.
In fact, if, as a landlord, I steal in this fashion, and you ask me what will happen to me: will I end up in jail? But of course not. I will begin to accumulate so much money that I can afford to give to charity. I will end up as a philanthropist, perhaps, or certainly, an “honorable” person.
At this juncture, the laughter of the group is uncontrollable.
Oh yes, another peasant says to Mang Tibo, and at Christmas time you might give us presents. Also, if I die of tuber culosis, you might even give my family a five-peso offering for which you’ll expect them to be grateful eternally, right? Right.
The laughter of anger pervades the room while Aling Juana lights another candle. Coffee is ready, but some have in the meantime passed around a pitcher of tuba, (coconut wine) Mang Perino says, come on, drink for the “enlightenment” of your mind! (A Filipino idiom which is similar to '
in vino veritas’.)
I take the same view with regard to murder, Mang Enzo, whose children died of undernourishment, now rises to speak. Don’t we often say, there are many ways of killing a cat? Well, I’ve found out that there are a few ways of killing people.
The individual way is simple and. damnable: I get a dagger and stab you in the heart till you breathe your last. Well, some of you might remember what happened to my family last year. One after another, my two kids died. My kind landlord was very sorry. He even gave a fifth-peso offering for funeral services.
My friends and acquaintances, too, were so sorry that such a tragedy had happened to me and my sickly wife. People said, “Poor Enzo, in less than a year two of his daughters died.”
I thought, then, as I think now that it is not quite ac curate to say that my daughters died. I tell you how clearly, they were killed. You all know that I have only two hectares of land to till. My landlord owns at least a hundred and fifty and we are about 40 tenants in all under him in different parts of this province. I have to shoulder all the cost of production. At harvest time, the landlord takes fifty percent of the gross.
Then I sell whatever little is left because nowadays, unlike before, one needs money to get most of his necessities.
Before we know it, we are short of money again. One after the other, my daughters got sick and we had no money to buy medicine. I thought they had fully recovered when the next year they got sick again. Well, you know the rest of the story, Enzo says.
But tell me, Enzo is almost pleading for understanding, if my landlord were less greedy and the middlemen less like crocodiles, would not my daughters still live today? Tell me, who killed, or if you want, what really killed my daughters? Isn’t it time we acted forcefully against the social ways employed by others of murdering our children and, eventually, us too?
We care so much for the plants of the field, and the carabao which helps us. We respect their life very much. Surely, Mang Enzo emphasizes, our concern for our own human life should make us even more meticulous in determining the ever present yet hidden dangers affecting it.
15 LAZY AND RESISTANT TO CHANGEWhen we lack awareness of our own world, it is Tio Bading’s turn to talk, we are bombarded with the lies of the landlords and their spokesmen. We fail to see the truth of our own condition.
For instance, they tell us that we are poor because we are lazy. But have they ever seen us eat our breakfast? Tio Bading’s voice is now rising in anger. Because if they have seen us eat our breakfast, and they ate the same breakfast that we eat everyday, they’d be crazy if they were not lazy.
Hell, how many long, hard hours do we put in everyday at the fields – from early dawn to late sundown, under burning sun or heavy rain – all in order to survive?
In sugarlands, we know, even pregnant women have to work 10 to 12 hours a day cutting cane or hauling them – for a daily wage of less than four pesos ($ 0.55). Enough of these accusations of laziness!
They also tell us that we are poor because we are resistant to change. But what kind of changes they want us to undertake, Tio Bading asks.
Well, maybe, I can remember a few examples, he continues.
One time, this lady from the Community Development Office attended a barrio meeting. In the course of the meeting she had to answer a call of nature. So she asked Agaton where she could find the toilet.
Now, my friends, don’t laugh. This really happened. When Agaton understood her question, he was embarrassed no end because, like many of us, Agaton has no toilet. Rather he owns a one-hectare toilet!
The group bursts into laughter; Come on, tell us, what happened then? Well, Tio Bading says, a month later when the Community Development worker returned to Agaton’s place, she had a big project for him. With a bit of financial help from her office, Agaton was persuaded to construct a flush-toilet.
But, Tio Bading grins, if you go there now to Agaton’s house, you 11 find that the toilet is very clean, indeed, for the simple reason that it is used only by visitors.
Agaton, however, is not really dumb, says Tio Bading. In fact, he’s rather clever. Do you know what he told me when I visited him last time? You know, Bading, he told me, our problem is not toilets. It is not one of subtraction but one of addition.
In other words, what will you place in those toilets once you have them? That is our problem, don’t you think so?
Why then did you do as told by the CD worker if you did not really appreciate her perception of your problem, I asked Agaton. Don’t be silly, he said. I have to humor them from time to time or worse things might happen to me.
At .this point, Mang Pedring clears his throat indicating his desire to talk.
Speaking of changes they want us to undertake, Mang Pedring starts, I went with a group once to Santa Barbara town. There the landlords and the government have a model farm as they call it. They showed us around with the hope of our im itating the modern methods of production that are used there.
I tell you, my friends, I was kind of impressed with that model farm, except that I asked too many questions. I asked for the cost of the irrigation pump, fertilizers, pesticides, herb icides and what have you, I also noticed that they used what looked to me liked a mosquito net – well, a net really, which they explained was necessary to keep the birds from eating the seeds.
When my landlord visited me the week after, he asked why I was not about to adopt some of the modem methods I saw in Santa Barbara. Of course, he also took the opportunity to remind me that I am poor because I am resistant to change. The worse part, however, was when I answered him by saying: I can’t even afford to buy a mosquito net for my kids, how could I possibly afford to buy that net for the seeds? I tell you, at that point, be threatened to evict me from the land.
From that time on, says Mang Pedring, I have been thinking and thinking about this “resistance-to-change” accusation And I say it now clearly: it is the landlords and the government who arc resistant to change!
They only want us to undertake surface changes. But they refuse to accept the most, fundamental change of all which we and our ancestors have demanded for years and years now. I mean have they not done everything to fight our demand for a change in the ownership of the land?
Mang Pedring clears his throat again, and in the silence some are grinning and many heads nod in agreement.
16 DON’T YOU TOUCH IT; IT HURTSIn another barrio, peasants are reflecting on their last visit to the municipio or town hall. They had heard over the radio that the government was about to implement a program favorable to the farmers. But it turned out that, to all purposes, the credit program would be available only to landlord farmers. Peasants have no land to put up as collateral and therefore cannot get credit directly from the agency.
This is the big problem, says Mang Henio, the govern ment and the church will never touch the land question. The landlords are so strong, and the government and church officials are themselves landlords, that they just can’t afford to have “controversy,” as they call it.
And yet, every time they learn about our meetings, they cry, “Bandits are organizing again. We’ve got a big social pro blem. And again, they'll dispense “solutions” that hardly touch the core of the problem.
It’s like the case of a woman who got boils in her behind. We all know, says Mang Henio, that to have boils is no joke: it hurts. We also know that when a pretty woman has boils she not only hurts in pain but she also gets embarrassed if she thinks others know.
And so, shell never accept that she’s got boils, she’ll force herself to walk straight no matter how much it hurts in the behind. She’ll do this till the boils cause other side-effects in her body: headaches, colds, fever, etc. But still, she’s not about to acknowledge the root-cause of all these bothersome, side-effects.
One morning she wakes up with a bad headache. Finally, she acknowledges, that she is sick. She, therefore, goes to the drugstore to buy medicine. But instead of buying some medicine for her boils, she’ll only take “Medicol” or “Vick’s Vapor rub” for her headache.
Because the boil hurts so much, and it causes her embarrassment, she’ll hardly touch it. The same obtains, says Mang Henio, with the land question. It hurts and it is embarrassing to discuss. Gat Rizal (the Philippine national hero) was wise when he entitled his novel about the social question: “Touch Me Not.”
17 OF RIGHT AND MIGHTFor this reason, Mang Henio continues, we need to dis cuss more seriously the question of organization and power.
We have discussed many times what is just, what is right with regard to land and wealth. But I think we don’t suf ficiently appreciate the fact that right without might is not enough. They must go together.
If you have the right but don’t have the might, asks Mang Henio, what are you? You are only a “Boy Scout.” The powers-that-be will not take you seriously. At best you can become a “Christmas tree” or a decoration in an exploitative situation.
But if you have the right and the might, Mang Henio grins almost mischievously, what are you? You are like the Viet Cong! Before you know it, the powers-that-be will want to negotiate with you.
It is not enough to be innocent like doves, Christ told us. We must be clever and wise as serpents.
Even John the Baptist had some power, when he was languishing in jail. The Bible says Herod would not put him to death because he was afraid of the people. John apparently had “a mass base” or following, But, of course, Mang Henio is grinning again, of cause the dance of Salome was a miscalculation.
As far as we can remember, Mang Henio’s voice is emphatic, never has it happened anywhere that the landlords and the have’s were willing to give up their privileges voluntarily. The case of old Don Jose, the sugar baron, who voluntarily gave higher wages and better working conditions to his workers, is an exception that only proves the rule.
The teaching of Heaven and Hell which is handed down to us early should, perhaps, be an indication that unless we give the oppressors hell, they won’t stop oppressing us.
18 THE GOVERNMENT AS INSTRUMENTAgreeing with Mang Henio, Mang Ruben now wants to have his say. Our experience, he says, should now have clarified to us that we can no longer take the attitude of one waiting for a Messiah or Saviour other than ourselves.
Years ago, we thought President Ramon Magsaysay would be that Messiah. He died. Then President Garcia succeeded him. We thought he was no good. Then we had Macapagal. We thought he was worse. So we had Marcos – we still have him. Well, what can we say? These Presidents get worse and worse.
Christ himself, the true Messiah, has shown us that we can only depend on ourselves. This is the reason, I guess, why He left his people and “ascended into heaven,” as the Bible says.
Peter and the other disciples were so sorry to see Him off and so self-diffident. They were probably sulking over the ascension of Christ. I’d not be surprised if one of them complained: its okay for Christ to have gone away. No spear can reach Him now. But what about us? Here we are, left behind with nothing: no constitution and by-laws, and to top it all, the administration is against us.
Now we know, of course, that Christ did the only sensible thing: to have faith in the people so that the people could have faith in themselves.
If we have this faith in ourselves, we shall cease looking towards the government as Messiah or Saviour but only as an ins trument which the people can use for their own good
Now only a few rich people who are well organized can use the government as their tool. The majority of us are so isolated from each other, so disorganized that to us, the government is not a tool but a master. We have no democracy but only a “demonyokrasya” or demon-crazy.
So, the first thing we need to do, Mang Ruben’s voice taking an imperative tone, is to recognize that though we are presently inferior to the rich in political and economic power – we already have one thing in our favor: our numbers.
But our big number alone is not enough, Mang Ruben emphasizes. We need to give it quality by organization. If each peasant moves alone, he/she cannot effectively fight for his/her rights. Truth and Right might be on the peasant’s side; yet, he still needs to gather together the strength of the whole pea santry.
The situation is similar to a broom, he says. If I now give you one midrib, how easy it is for you to break it. But if many midribs are gathered together into a broom, no Muhammad Ali or Flash Elorde can have the strength to break it. It is when we overcome our isolation and achieve unity that we become strong.
This task of overcoming our isolation and achieving unity, says Mang Ruben, is precisely the task of organization. When we get organized, we will be surprised at how many hitherto im possible tasks we can accomplish together.
Take the example of a jeep, another peasant interposes. It is a wonderful piece of organization. But the driver is even more beautifully organized than the jeep. Hence the driver can bring the jeep wherever he wants. But should the driver himself be disorganized like when he is drunk or sleepy: then, of course, he could not bring the jeep; wherever he wants; rather, the jeep might bring him to the bottom of the sea.
From our experience, if would seem clear that the same situation holds true with regard to government at instrument of the people. When the peasants are not wide awake and well-organized, anything can happen to them. They will be led wherever other interests want. The peasants do not become their own drivers. In fact, they are treated as beasts of burden.
19 REST IN PEACEEvery time peasants undertake the task of organizing themselves, landlord and capitalist voices cry, “Beware.” Their two chief instruments, namely, government and the churches warn in town hall and in pulpits against disturbance of the peace.
We need all the more to strengthen ourselves, says Aling Lety. We are being bombarded again with lies and threats which some of as may be about to accept. I propose that we discuss briefly this whole question of “Peace,” she says gently.
Even the more benign landlords and the few benevolent church officials are saying that for us to organize ourselves is wrong. Organization leads to conflict and disturbance and violence.
They now say that they agree with our ends and objectives but they think, that the means we use is unchristian because it accentuates division.
So, you see, Aling Lety sums up, we are up against unity and “peace,” and “order.” By organizing ourselves, are we doing wrong again? They say that before we started organizing, all peasants were peaceful and contented. But now, wherever we hold an organizational meeting, it is followed by peasant self-assertion, strikes, court litigations, demonstrations and so many other forms of struggle. '
They know, too, Aling Lety continues, that we only seek to do what is just and right. Hence, they use the government and the churchmen to warn our fellow-peasants that what we are doing is wrong.
But I believe that as the birds have been endowed, by their Creator with the instinct of survival and love for life so that at certain times of the year they .migrate from one place to escape death from. harsh elements, so much more God-endowed is our current instinct of survival and love to live that moves us to organize ourselves.
The truth is, Aling Lety’s voice rises with excitement, that in a place where domination or exploitation-is near-absolute, peasants are quiet and “contented.” There is “peace.” It is a false, cemeterial kind of peace: rest in peace.
But genuine peace, Aling Lety continues, is the fruit of Justice, as the Bible says. And true peace is not a dead kind of peace, like the tenant’s surrender to the landlord. It is a living, dynamic one which can of ten be accompanied by struggle and conflict.
Wherever there is oppression, there are oppressors and oppressed; And when we the oppressed, are so weak that we can hardly do anything, then a false kind of peace prevails. But when we, the oppressed, begin to gather strength through organization, Aling Lety’s voice is still loud and clear, and we begin to balance somehow the power of the oppressors, then there is conflict and struggle. And should justice prevail, a genuine kind of peace comes about.
A young peasant girl, who dropped out from senior high school for financial reasons, has this to contribute: it does seem to me like genuine peace and harmony presupposes a balancing of conflicting forces. We learn that the harmony of the universe itself is based on this balance and not so much on the absence of conflict. The force of gravity that pulls a planet towards the sun is beautifully balanced by the force of velocity pulling it away from the sun. In our body and in the smallest particle of matter the same harmony holds, based not on the absence but on the balancing of conflicting forces.
But in our present .society, she continues, that balance does not exist. Injustice means precisely that: an imbalanced situation. To bring about balance and justice and true peace we, the weak, must become strong.
In that case, then, Aling Lety speaks again, if we have to increase in position of strength and share in nature’s bounty, the landlords and capitalists have to decrease accordingly which they will never do voluntarily.
And so, they are now fond of exhorting us to be positive in our approach. We are too negative and destructive, they say. My friends, how can we take a positive attitude towards injustice? Only by negating it.
It, therefore, seems that my grandfather in the Sakdal Movement was right when he kept telling us long ago that in the Bible, the negative always precedes the positive. Quoting the prophet he often reminded us that our task is, and here Aling Lety uses her fingers to count: to tear up, and to knock down, to destroy, and to overthrow; to build and to plant. Four negatives before two positives, she says.
Well, an old man concludes, next week is Holy Week. It only reminds us even more that we can’t have Easter Sunday be fore Good Friday. Our own process of salvation will be like that.
20 ORGANIZATION AND ORGANISMStill on the question of organization, the peasants often refer to the Biblical analogy of the people as a body or an organism.
Philippine society, Mang Kiko says at a meeting, can be compared to a human organism. A healthy body is a compete set of organizations, be says. You all know that if I should cut my finger, which I won’t do, I would cut at least four or five organizations: an organization of the veins, one of the nerves, another one of the muscles, stills another one of the bones, and so on – which all work to the total organism.
Those of us who had some opportunity to have a little bit of formal schooling were told that cells organize into a tissue, into a muscle, and something else I can’t very well remember.
At any rate, Mang Kiko continues, a big part of the pro blem in our society now is the fact that this social body is sick; many of its organs, feet, etc, are not organized.
Take the cells of the hand, for instance: if they are isolated from one another, in other words, if they are not organized, they could not unify the sensation of touching this plough, for instance. A cell would say, “Well, I felt something cold here,” and another cell would say, “I feel something smooth here...” The organ cannot identify and unify the sensation because the cells are not connected with one another.
It is like our own situation: before we overcame our isolation and organized ourselves, each one of us had all sorts of notions about what was bothering us.
Even the good people who approached us individually in our homes to tell us what our problems were could never get a picture of our situation that was concrete, complete, and realistic. Because, like in the body, there are certain sensations which only the cells of the hand can feel and transmit.
There are certain problems of women, Aling Tiba almost shouts, which only women can feel and express. I suppose, she continues, there are certain problems which only the landlords can feel and express.
Certainly, there are numerous problems of which only we ourselves can feel and express. But from our experience we know now that only when we organize ourselves can we realistically feel and express these problems, interests, and aspira tions.
At this point, Mang Kiko introduces .another note. He says, it is in the nature of the bird to fly and of the snake to crawl. Do we ha»e a right to tell the bird: “Don't fly, I forbid you!” “1 command you not to crawl!”? I don’t think so.
It is also in our nature, I think to need each other, to associate with each other, and to gather. Can the government, then, have the right to tell us. “You are hereby forbidden to need each other, and to associate together, you are prohibited to organize yourselves.” My friends, I say, that this urge in us to form our own associations is a right belonging to us as humans. It is a human right, and we shall exercise it.
The shouts of agreement from the whole gathering are almost deafening.
21 AWARENESSA key word throughout the long history of peasant or ganizations in the Philippines is
awakening or
awareness.
It means, first of all, waking up to one’s capacities as a human being in association with fellow humans. The prime capacity is to reflect on one’s own condition which leads to a faith in or awareness of one’s own dignity.
More often than not, this awareness comes about in the exposure of the unjust and oppressive practices of the op pressor.
A peasant asked a group at one time: how do we go about this ^process of exposure so that more peasants will achieve awareness? Do we start removing, the oppressor’s “shoes” – or that part of his unjust practices that affect us directly, and wait for others to similarly remove his pants, shirt, etc. until he is totally exposed? Or do we also actively participate in the removal of the other “parts”?
At the first stage of awareness, another peasant says, my first reaction was to my immediate environment and my immediate enemy. When I am bitten by a mosquito, my immediate reac tion is to kill the mosquito. I do not determine then and there where the mosquito comes from so as to eliminate it totally, nor do I think immediately of buying a mosquito net or a mosquito killer. Ordinarily, I wait till I can't stand mosquitoes anymore. Then I might take another form of action other than killing the mosquito or slapping myself in trying to kill it.
There are indeed many degrees of awareness or awakening, Mang Paeng says, depending on how involved we are with other peasants and their allies in trying to change the oppressed peasant condition.
The process of unifying hitherto isolated individual peasants finds a common program and a common total vision.
The total vision is the HUMAN COMMUNITY – a community where there is justice. Mang Paeng says, it is HEAVEN that starts on earth – a community where there is no exploitation; where every man, woman and child live together without fear, with love and respect for one another.
But the Word must ever become FIesh, Mang Paeng adds. This means that our vision must “be translated into immediate, concrete programs of action – or, he quips, we might all end up with a stiff neck indulgently looking up to the blue.
We are co-creators, remember? Mang Paeng continues. Our present manifold struggles are just a few among many more to create the “new” from the "old"; the new man and the new woman in a new economy, a new polity, and a new culture. Hence, our program is always provisional but not arbitrary – combining the experience of people’s participation and the ideology of people's reflections all through the years.
