#cover k-t-kontrapolitiko-theses-on-halalan-2022-en-1.jpg
#title Theses on Halalan 2022
#author KonTRAPOlitiko
#SORTtopics anti-politics, electoralism
#date March 2022
#lang en
#pubdate 2022-03-22T05:23:57
*** Editorial note from *Bandilang Itim*
This is an edited anthology of collected notes from comrades critical of
Halanan 2022, the 2022 Philippine General Elections. “KonTRAPOlitiko” is
not an organization, nor is it our collective name. Rather,
KonTRAPOlitiko is the name we give to our anger: “Kontra” meaning
“against,” “TRAPO” meaning “traditional politician,” and “politiko”
meaning politician. Thus “kontra-politiko” could be translated as
“anti-politician.” We the authors are not all anarchists, but we are
united in our anger and contempt of the politicians. Because this is an
anthology of sorts, certain themes in some theses are repeated in
others, but on a whole we have tried to curb repitition and arrange
these in a thematic way.
*** Thesis 1: Halanan 2022 is a game of musical chairs for the elite.
Trip to Jerusalem is the general Philippine term for a game of musical
chairs. For those unaware, the rules are simple: if there are thirteen
people playing, there are only twelve seats readily arranged in a
circle. Players go around the seats dancing to a tune, and when the tune
stops playing, everyone has to find a seat for themselves. Whoever does
not have a seat loses. A seat and a person gets eliminated until only
one remains. The game ranges from fair to outright dastardly depending
on who’s playing. Some people can dance too close to the chairs, maybe
mess up their rhythm so that they can line up perfectly to a seat. Of
course, you have seen or heard about people who straight up yank seats
out so they could get their own, much to the chagrin of the person
behind them. It is all in harmless fun and games though.
But then you realize that party game you played at birthday parties
years ago is a perfect metaphor for the elections we have been dreading.
Many candidates enter the field to get a shot at the mercy seat of
Malacañang,[1] each representing their own tribe of Philippine politics.
Yet, the chances at the seat grow slimmer and slimmer every month as
someone falls back because of some godforsaken backroom dealing, or
perhaps just lost their chance because they are staggering in the polls.
At the end, when the music stops playing and the bread stops flowing,
there remains only one to rule them all. The game of parties stop and so
does all the competitiveness. Now, everyone is buddy-buddy and
cooperating, doing their best to further their own interest, until
another game plays again.
With the filing of candidacies and the inevitable early campaigning, it
looks like we have started our Trip to Jerusalem. Let’s meet the
players, shall we?
*** Thesis 2: While standing for nothing, the Marcos-Duterte tandem presents a very real threat.
Partisan politics is particularly volatile and high-stakes, but many
politicians are not playing with chips on a table; rather, it’s the
lives of over a hundred million people amidst a continuing health
crisis, and the social ecology of a whole archipelago. And who else to
join the fray than the son of a dictator who took a bit from the fruit
of the forbidden tree of lust and greed?
On October 6th, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. (BBM) filed his
candidacy for President only replying matter-of-factly like it was
obvious a thief wanted to grace Malacañang again. He was officially
endorsed by the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan,[2] the political party of
Martial Law.[3] “Bagong Lipunan” was the dictator’s “New Society,” and
this “Movement for the New Society” delightfully takes a page from every
nostalgic and ultranationalist strongman by calling for a Philippines
“made great again.” And his run echoes much of the same sentiment, if
not just general lack of clarity about anything. No slate, no policies,
nothing.
Yet, at Sofitel, where the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) decided to
set-up, an emergency text alert system (normally used for the national
disaster management agency) was hijacked ostensibly showing a support
for BBM, president-in-waiting. Audacious as it may be, it is an
indication that his camp has the resources, the mobility, and of course,
the manpower to mount a campaign as brazen as this. You can just check
Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok too. Now BBM has allied with the Sara
Duterte, the daugther of the fascist-in-chief Rodrigo Duterte. The
so-called Marcos-Duterte “axis of evil” presents a very real threat to
Filipinos.
*** Thesis 3: The people who campaign for Duterte and Marcos are not misguided: they are authoritarian without apology.
People say the ableist things about Duterte supporters and Marcos
apologists, but these supporters of Duterte and Marcos are not “stupid.”
We recall that a certain valedictorian who shall not be named is
actively a Marcos apologist, a historical revisionist, and a Sulu
monarchist to boot. This valedictorian is emblematic of who we are
fighting against. These people are not “stupid,” they are intelligent,
wealthy, and actively malicious in their authoritarian intent.
*** Thesis 4: Marcos’ no-negative campaign is an illusion of professionalism.
Bongbong Marcos knows exactly what he is doing. Not only does he know
his supporters well but also the social and political climate of the
Philippines. He is not underestimating his enemies and the Filipinos,
which is why he is doing a no-negative political campaign. It goes along
with his strategy of being selective on which interviews or
debate-forums to attend. He already knows the consequences of his
strategies, which among them is his enemies calling him a “coward” and
“incompetent.”
Naturally, most Fipinos—successfully groomed to be pro-government in the
heart and mind—find activists, protestors, and rallyists annoying and
noisy. Anyone who fights an authority, especially an authority that
aligns with pro-government Filipinos, are seen as an eyesore because
they are also taught to see anger as “unattractive”, “uncool”,
“ungrateful”, or “unprofessional”. To them, anger is anger, justified or
not. It is for this reason why Marcos has garnered popularity despite
the mountains of factual evidences gathered against him and his family.
With Marcos only attending favorable interviews or popularly known as
the “Babackout Muli” strategy, his image remains squeaky clean in the
minds of his supporters. They don’t have to think about the issues
against him because he is also not talking about it. He only talks about
his platform, his plans for the Philippines if he wins the presidential
elections.
By appearing to be the presidential candidate who gets attacked from
almost all sides, Marcos gains their sympathy and absolute willingness
to ignore attacks against him and to listen to him and only him instead.
*** Thesis 5: The so-called “opposition” is more Dutertismo in new guises.
On the other end of the bourgeois political spectrum, there is a motley
of oppositionists ranging from opportunists who would otherwise be
massively loyal to Duterte to the vanguards of liberal and “progressive”
politics; the inheritors of the *Daang Matuwid*.[4] It would be easy to
lump in the other candidates together as they fall in the same category:
former Duterte enablers. These include Ping Lacson, Isko Moreno, and
Manny Pacquiao. Pacquiao is the *worst offender* of them all. As before
2021, he was firmly a PDP-Laban partisan and an erstwhile fierce
supporter of the President. Isko and Lacson are much of the same. In
favor of the administration’s policies, providing votes and fresh faces
for rotten politics, they only change their tune when the opportunity
presents itself for greater power for themselves. No amount of
window-dressing can hide the homophobia, militarism, or populist
pandering and posturing. They are the Duterte administration’s alternate
candidates whether they admit it or not.
Then of course, there is Leni Robredo. There is no denying, her message
and her programme can restore a pre-Duterte liberal idea with respect
for the “rule of law” and “democratic processes.” At the very least, it
would outwardly seem like the tension that has nearly cracked the
archipelago into many pieces feels like easing. However, her campaign is
the continuation of the pseudo-progressive, neoliberal status quo we
have that has not resolved *any* of the deep-seated political, economic,
or social issues that has faced this country since People Power,[5] or
indeed, since the *beginning* of the Republic. It is still insufficient
to actually addressing military overreach, the War on Drugs, class war
by capital on labor, and the ever-increasing attacks of civil and human
rights and their defenders. Not to mention, her senate slate consists of
many more traditional politicians, outnumbering the otherwise
progressive candidates and not containing any representatives from the
labor sector. No wonder the National Democratic union Kilusan Mayo Uno
were partial to Pacquiao. It only took a whole year for them to finally
to bet their chances on Leni. Even then, they’re not officially included
in her slate!
In the end, none of the candidates answered the root cause of political
alienation and social struggle: the domination of institutions over
individuals. The State over citizens; the late-capitalist system over
workers; the social status quo over women, Indigenous Peoples, queer
folk, the disabled, etc.
*** Thesis 6: “Let Leni Lead” empowers no-one but herself, her sponsors and the patriarchal system.
The presidential candidate and current Vice President Leni Robredo
abusively invokes feminism and the LGBTQIA+ community for her political
campaign. She has been specifically wrongly using “women empowerment”,
wherein she declares that she can help Filipino women in their struggles
by giving them jobs without any mention of increasing the salaries of
all, except that of the teachers. Women are paid lower than men for the
same job. Is it really about helping women or is it about serving
herself and her sponsors? If she really is for women empowerment, why is
she not for legalizing divorce and abortion? As a human rights lawyer
herself, she has admitted in witnessing these struggles of women in her
career. Are their struggles not enough reason?
Leni has been promising LGBTQIA+ communities empowerment and a country
free of discrimination, all while only “supporting” same-sex unions,
which is not a definitive position at all. Her campaign is all about
giving good “empty” promises to communities and minorities while leaving
half of the people in the country to remain miserable.
With the Philippines being a heavily religious country, the elections
being a popularity game, and neoliberal economics being taught in
schools and universities, it’s clear that Leni is only serving and
empowering the current status quo. The status quo that has only brought
misery and poverty to all.
Leni is not aiming to bring about change. She’s aiming to continue the
reign of patriarchy and of the elites in the Philippines, which has been
made clear in her stand on divorce and abortion, most especially the War
on Drugs and NTF-ELCAC. Instead of putting an end to it, she wants to
add her tweaks of more enforcement and closer surveillance, which does
not make it any less immoral.
She tries to fish for sympathy and gather votes by using the fact that
she’s a woman running for a political position that has been long
dominated by men. She, along with her supporters, has been miscontruing
Feminism for a movement in which women should be the one to dominate or
do things because they think it’s the men that has been doing it all
wrong; without even considering for a moment that being a woman does not
automatically make them a feminist, and that it’s something to do with
the system itself. They think that maybe, *just maybe*, if a woman runs
the country, things *will* change.
It does not matter if it is a man, a woman, or a queer that runs the
Philippine government, the system remains the same and the maddening
cycle goes on repeat.
*** Thesis 7: National Democracy offers no solutions.
In the 2016 elections, Duterte bribed the National Democratic left with
empty platitudes. For this the National Democratic left blinded
themselves to Duterte’s naked fascism and abandoned their original
candidate Grace Poe. Duterte rewarded them with positions in government
and peace talks, but what can be given by the State can be taken away.
Suddenly out of favor with Duterte, the left repeated their tired
refrain: “US—[insert president here] Regime.” It is now clear they have
been used. In desperation, the National Democratic left now hitches
their wagon to any and all bourgeois allies as long as they are
anti-Duterte.
In their blind opposition to the fascist-in-chief Duterte, National
Democracy now backs the *haciendera* landowner who has become the *de
facto* leader of the liberal opposition: Leni Robredo. Their goal is
clear: to gain “ascendancy” over the opposition’s campaign—to cite one
of their internal strategic documents—to catapult yet another bourgeois
faction into power. Robredo gives no concessions to the National
Democratic Left because it is clear that the she has their unconditional
support. Where once they sold out the working class to fascists for
unhonored concessions, now they sell out the working class to liberals
for nothing.
*** Thesis 8: While the campaign of *Manggagawa Naman* may be good for expanding the political imagination of Filipinos, it will be limited by structures of domination.
“*Manggagawa Naman*”[6] and the campaign of Ka Leody de Guzman has been
groundbreaking in many ways. This is the first time a labor leader
gunned for the highest office of the Republic. Ka Leody de Guzman is the
former President of the socialist trade federation Bukluran ng
Manggagawang Pilipino, who was active during and after Martial Law, and
has been a perennial workers’ rights candidate under Partido Lakas ng
Masa, one of the descendants of the Rejectionist left after the early
nineties. Those familiar with the Philippine left and anti-authoritarian
field would listen to him and identify his labor activist roots. The
language he uses is ideological and direct, as you would expect from any
unionist, and his critique is well-established: removing Duterte is not
enough, we need to change the elite-dominated capitalist system.
Leni stalwarts and centrists in general scoff at the campaign, saying it
will divide the field. Even in good faith, many question the winnability
of a candidate that lost the senatorial race in 2019. Usually in bad
faith, certain activists grounded on National Democracy question a
socialist candidacy as being “out of touch” with the material conditions
of the working class. Yet, there exists a certain clamor, especially
among younger progressives, for this campaign, perhaps similar to the
Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn crusades that signalled a new brand of
leftism worldwide.
Surely, one can question their agenda, the economics of the wealth tax,
the ability of curtailing the army and police (or at least
NTF-ELCAC[7]), or the sincerity of participatory budgeting, workplace
democracy, and universal healthcare. It is true: a De Guzman presidency
will still preside over a Philippine Republic, and will always run the
risk of a reactionary whiplash even within an erstwhile socialist
government. Domination can and will always exist with dominating
structures. But his critiques of elite democracy, the blinding lights of
personality politics, and the cyclical nature of politics are
refreshing, and perhaps, an indication that more and more people are
recognizing that the Republic is not a thing of the people as we were
told it was.
*** Thesis 9: Entering the State makes one bourgeois.
Did not Rosa Luxemburg say a century ago, to the effect, that the “entry
of a socialist into a bourgeois government is not a partial conquest of
the bourgeois state by the socialists, but a partial conquest of the
socialist party by the bourgeois state”?[8] Ironically, Mikhail Bakunin
would very much agree: “The new worker deputies, transplanted into a
bourgeois environment, living and soaking up all the bourgeois ideas and
acquiring their habits, will cease being workers and statesmen and
become converted into bourgeois, even more bourgeois-like than the
bourgeois themselves.”[9]
Indeed, it has been proven true time and again. So-called progressives
in Congress and Senate have time and again voted against workers and
against ecology. Witness the darling social democrat Risa Hontiveros
voting for the approval of the Bulacan Aerotropolis—a bourgeois project
that has actively destroyed marine habitats and bird sanctuaries.
Now the Laban ng Masa left attempts a presidential campaign with Ka
Leody that has no chance of winning the elections. They are very much
aware of this and these particular leftists understand that their goal
is propaganda, not winning. Yet what these leftists do not understand
that all leftists who capture State power become State socialists. In
doing so they cease to develop the capacities for the working class to
build power and instead develop the capacities of the State to carry out
its functions. Whereever the left wins State power, social movements
become subordinated to State power and lose their agency.
The State is the graveyard of social movements. We saw this in Bolivia,
Venezuela, Brazil, and Nepal. Evo Morales built a highway destroying
indigenous land funded by a “worker’s” administration in Brazil, the
same indigenous bases that brought Morales to his presidency. Venezuelan
communes are constantly at the mercy of Bolivarian bureaucrats who
restrict their agency. The Worker’s Party of Brazil killed their social
movement bases by subordinating them to the State. Nepali Maoists moved
into masions and actively suppressed strikes after winning power. The
same will happen in the Philippines if any left faction wins.
*** Thesis 10: The party games of the elite have real consequences.
Many of these politicians taking a stab at elected office are making a
party game out of something that will define our standards and quality
of life for the next three to six years. But the stage at Sofitel was
not only the playground for the rich and wealthy. If politics can be
used as spectacle for the ruling class, chances are the dispossessed
will use that spectacle as well to raise their concerns. We have had
candidates that used the filing as protests against the War on Drugs,
the mismanagement of the pandemic, and the general lack of
representation of marginalized sectors. Tarpaulins, pictures, mystical
names, and simple statements; that is their manifestation of the power
of the people. Individual it might seem outwardly, but no less powerful,
and more representative than the tens of trapos who ran subsequently to
better press.
And like clockwork COMELEC declared many of these candidates nuisances,
even if many of them had noble aspirations and platforms. That there is
a group that can dictate who can and cannot represent the voting
constitutency shows just how much of a sham the democracy we have
actually is.
If you feel alienated, apathetic, or even hopeless about the coming
elections, you are not alone. There is a good enough reason for you to
skip going to the polls for every reason you should vote in May. If
you’re under the belief that your choice will not matter and the game of
politics plays out in backrooms and highrises, or that organizing
campaigns can translate to organizing long-lasting efforts towards
progressive and sustainable change, then do what you will. Agitate,
educate, and organize as much as you please.
Whatever your actions will be, one thing is clear: It is not just
political power that is on the line, it is the whole interconnected
system of institutions that force us to act against our own interests,
to the benefit of political and economic elite on top. Human domination
will continue; rich over poor, politician over citizen, straight over
queer, man over woman, Manilenyo over the indigenous, etc. It is easy to
focus on the game of musical chairs, but the music will stop eventually,
and the reality will come out to look like not much has changed at all.
The common adage is that the only way to win is not to play. Though in
this case, we could be better off finding other ways to disrupt the
game, or make it useless.
Regardless, it is safe to say that the party games have begun. Let us
hope the players remember that the fate of the archipelago is not a game
for them to mess around with, or they might just find the seat they have
been eyeing yanked from beneath them.
*** Thesis 11: If elections ever changed anything, they would make it illegal. The promises of politicians are lies, pure and plain.
Yet another set of storm clouds cover the clear skies of the Philippines
once again. Pouring waves upon waves of lies and deceit on the millions
of Filipinos thirsting for change. Drowning their desperate screams and
cries with united thunderous voices all roaring empty promises. A
dramatic scenery that has been going on for decades.
Without being given a chance to enjoy the clear skies, we have learned
to live in darkness; where our well-being, hopes, and dreams diminish.
Where generations of old and new have been made incapable of love and
freedom; but have been made capable of misery and violence, of repeating
the same maddening cycle of replacing the rotten with another—the
Philippine electoral politics.
The elections is a critical part of the Republic—Presidential system of
government that we have here in the Philippines. Like all types of
government, it is founded on grand lies, millions of corpses, and public
deception. It is rotten to its core. It has been creating poverty and
diseases since its establishment. It has been making us subservient,
unemployed, sexually impotent, impulsive, self-hating, distrustful, and
over-all miserable; which begs the question: How ever can elections
solve the issues we are facing today?
It cannot and that is exactly why it still remains today. If voting can
bring about the change we need, it will be made illegal. Anything that
can bring systematic change is illegal or hindered by having to ask a
permit from the Philippine Government. It is never about us having a
better life, no. It is about the government staying in power. It is
about protecting and enabling the oligarchs, elites, and political
dynasties on enslaving the majority of us to satisfy their greed. It is
about giving us false hope and the illusion of choice and change;
letting the majority vote anyone from the new set of their puppets every
3–6 years.
From our childhood to the present day, we have been trained to be good
Filipino Citizens in our homes and schools. We have been exposed to
cultures, traditions, politics and economics that heavily favors the
government. Just so when we get sincere and passionate enough to bring
about change, all we could think of is the following:
- to vote for a politician;
- to become a politican;
- to become a lawyer or eventually, a judge;
- to join the police or army.
We hardly hear about the alternatives of the reality we have been
contained in. But when we do, we hear it from the so-called terrorists,
the enemies of the government. And being groomed to be pro-government,
young and naive as we were, we shut them out like the good Filipino
citizens we are and never for once think of the possibility that the
government—that we have loved and defended so much—is the real
terrorist.
We get so confident in our education to the point that we think could
make a difference if we participate or become part of the government. Or
we get so confident in Politicians having degrees and experiences under
their belt that we put our lives into their hands. All while not taking
into account that it is the government that also decides what we should
learn in schools and universities. With that said, none of us are
apolitical; and most of us are victims being doomed to propagate false
beliefs.
So when we hear a Politician declaring that they can help lift us out of
poverty, out of unemployment, know that it is a blatant lie. Again, it
is the government that created poverty and unemployment in the first
place. What the politician means to say is that they can give us jobs
because they are connected and sponsored by the rich and elites who run
the businesses. Or they themselves owns businesses. Yes, we can get a
job, be employed and try to get out of poverty; but there is no
guarantee when our wages/salaries remain the same. There is also the
abundance of unemployed people ready to be plucked from to replace us by
the time we are slowing down. The only way to get rid of poverty is by
abolishing the government. And it all goes the same for the political,
economical, and social issues we face today.
*** Thesis 12: Elections are tools of authority for facilitating obedience.
Ah elections, seen by many as a tool to enact change by voting for other
people, — flesh and blood—to represent them, to make decisions for them,
to rule over them.
For decades, in the Philippines, people have been doing this over and
over again, in the hopes of changing their lives or the lives of the
people around them for the better or for the worse. But the Philippine
elections are not designed to give power to “the people,” no no it was
not made for this. Elections, what they really are, is simple. Elections
were made for those who claim to have authority and want to claim
authority. It is a tool to fool people to fall in line and to be
complicit to bowing down to rulers, obeying whatever comes from above,
whatever comes from the elected officials.
Obedience is the goal of elections, it wants you to respect whoever wins
the election and then wait for the next elections, to give you hope that
if you just voted for “the right person” then things will be alright,
that your neighbor struggling in poverty will be saved, or that people
who are addicted to harmful drugs will be saved, or that people who
struggle with their mental health will be saved, or that your life will
be better.
Will you just keep on voting and hoping that “the right person” will
come until you grow old and die? Or will you cherish what little time
you have left on Earth to live your life the way you want it to be, to
live out your dreams?
Why not stop relying on elections or waiting on the government to pass a
bill when you can take matters into your own hands and make changes
happen? Possibly with help from other willing people around you if you
want. Let us do away with elections, and with government systems
altogether, and once again assert ourselves as owners of our lives and
that no one has the right to rule, not even democratically elected
officials.
*** Thesis 13: Elections are the domain of the already-wealthy and powerful.
One of the problems with the Philippine electoral system is that in
practice, in order to run for office, one would need to have power and
resources behind them. Instead of representation of a certain sector,
experience in governance, organizing or something similar, or even just
a platform, what seems to matter more when it comes to elections is how
much backing and support, particularly financially, a candidate has.
The electoral system we have allows people with plunder and corruption
charges to run, because they have the machinery to do so. In the
meantime, when a person from the working class expresses their intention
to run, while some see it as inspiring, many others see it as a nuisance
or question how that person will be able to campaign. It makes you
wonder: can the elections really proclaim to be “democratic” if the
barrier of entry is so high?
*** Thesis 14: To be excited for a politician is to deny our own agency.
Instead of being excited for yet another politician, it would be
preferable to see people excited for the prospects of their own power
and agency, rather than the images of power forwarded by mediators and
their ballot boxes.
The hashtag #LabanLeni2022 (Leni Fight 2022) is
particuarly pathetic. Where once activsts shouted “Makibaka, wag
matakot!” (Struggle, be not afraid!), this was recuperated to become the
liberal cry “Maki-Leni, wag matakot!” (Be for Leni, be not afraid!). A
cry to struggle has been recuperated for *magkapersonalan*—mere
personality politics.
Filipinos have learned nothing from the Joe Biden campaign in the United
States. To vote for Biden supposedly was a vote for harm reduction, but
there is no real difference between Biden and Trump. Both Biden and
Trump are rapists, run concentration camps, ignore the student debt
crisis, and fund policing. Just in the same, Leni’s campaign is all the
same. Just look at her position on the War on Drugs: she wants a War on
Drugs “with tweaks.” Her positions are no different from Duterte’s, only
that she “tweaks” it with her pink colors.
*** Thesis 15: Politicians can never represent the fullness of you.
Let it be said that no president after the 1987 Philippine Constitution
has ever won at least 50% of the vote. “Winnability” in the Philippines
is the victory of the largest minority vote. “Democracy” as the rule of
the majority has always meant minority rule for it is always the
representatives and not the electorate who rules.
Politicians only represent and serve themselves and their platforms;
democracy here means you get to choose which personalities seem to align
with yourself. No politician can ever hope to represent you and the
fullness of your needs and desires. *But they can lie to you*.
If we are to wait for leaders to do the right thing, we shall wait
forever. You need no-one’s permission to act now, and to do what is
right.
*** Thesis 16: The problem is not the voter but the concentration of power.
The upcoming elections is shaping up to be the largest voter turnout in
Philippine history. All candidates from reactionary to liberal repeat
tired refrains: “register to vote” and “vote wisely.” If BBM, the son of
the dead dictator wins, he would win with unprecedented legitimacy.
Everyone wants to fund more and more voter’s education campaigns, yet
are not not tired of “vote wisely”? The problem is not “vote wisely,”
it’s that concentrated power such as a presidency should not even exist
to begin with, and that we are not given real choices over the power
over our own lives. If BBM wins with that legitimacy, we must then
question the legitimacy of voting.
Why is it that we have to concentrate so much power into a presidency?
It is not enough to think about our ballot, we must question why is it
that we give so much power to institutions that are essentially
unrecallable and are dictatorial in practice.
*** Thesis 17: Apathy towards electoral democracy and its institutions is not apathy towards all of politics. The apathetic and the Other are not enemies, but people with real, valid grievances against formal institutions who are not given space or voice by the system, preyed on by politicians who use discontent for their own ends.
In the first place, if we want to pin the blame of the great masses’
rejection of and refusal to at least support the “lesser evils” of the
elections and at most participate in our organizations and movements, we
must necessarily look at the very supporters and campaigners of these
candidates, the very organizers of our spaces. We must pin the blame on
*ourselves* for being unable to become allies and friends and comrades
to the great many whose valid complaints, struggles, and hardships have
never been articulated or given voice to by our efforts and movements.
In our belief in our own intellectual—and thus moral—ascendancy, we are
unable to recognize that we spit the same vitriolic, harmful, divisive,
or backhanded comments as those we hate (but who might, in fact, be the
very people we need to bring into our spaces and movements).
For example, the supporters of Leni Robredo, previously known as
*dilawans*[10] but now rebranded as *kakampinks*,[11] like to hold their
educational attainments, institutional affiliations, and thus voting
patterns above their enemies (be they the Duterte Diehard
Supporters,[12] the Marcos supporters, the Leody supporters, or
basically literally anyone else who does not support Leni and her
slate), equating their level of education and supported candidates to
the morality they possess, and this abstract morality to the kind of
human being they are in actuality. That is to say, *kakampinks* think
that their being educated (as they are typically college graduates) and
Leni Robredo supporters mean that they are actually kind, respectful,
understanding human beings in real life precisely because they are
highly educated and voting for the lesser evil, when in fact their
conduct and interactions with those who differ in stance and opinion
from them will show that, at least in the context of electoral
discussions, they are anything but.
It is actually this vehemence in moral supremacy and antagonism of the
Other that further cements the unpopularity of and low support for the
chosen lesser evil candidate among the people. After all, who would want
to vote for someone supported by the most obnoxious, inconsiderate,
condescending person you have ever talked to? More than that, who would
want to vote for a candidate supported by someone that you hate
*precisely* because how they interact with you makes you hate them?
Supporters and campaigners for “lesser evil” candidates neglect that the
most important and effective way to gain support for one’s cause is to
build bridges, not to shit or piss on or burn them. Relationships are
not only personal, after all; they are political, and have great
political effects. The Invisible Committee did once write, “Those with
shitty relationships can only have a shitty politics.”
The way the diehard supporters of the liberal democratic—as opposed to
authoritarian democratic, at least—candidates engage with their
perceived Others, in our observation, can be broadly categorized into
the poles of conversion and antagonism, and between these extremes is a
whole spectrum of possible combinations. Three subtypes in this spectrum
tend to be most observable: benevolent conversion, where supporters take
a Catholic approach and act as missionaries spreading the good word of
their savior-styled candidate; *parinig*,[13] a soft kind of antagonism
that relies on loudly hinting criticisms and insults at a perceived
Other; and blatant antagonism, which is “stooping to the level” of the
perceived Other by throwing them insults and other harmful acts and
comments. Despite these differences, they have in common the view that
the Other occupies a lower position morally, intellectually, and
politically due to the Other’s support of enemy candidates or the
Other’s “apathy.”
This perceived apathy of the Other, however, remains unproblematized and
shallowly understood by liberal-electoral democratics. Or rather, it is
seen solely as an illness that requires treatment and fixing, rather
than an invitation to understanding a reality outside our (perhaps
electoral) own. Interventions such as voter’s education initiatives and
efforts towards political information bombarding rely on this assumption
that the people are passive, maleducated, misinformed, and unable to
discern right from wrong. However, these assumptions also rest on a more
fundamental view: that politics and the political solely concern the
formal institutions above our everyday experiences, and thus begin with
voting rights and end with reaching out to representatives in the hopes
that our outrage are at least acknowledged and at most heard. The effect
of this view is immensely disempowering, perpetuated and ensured by the
way its implications and assumptions are acted out by those who
originated and believe them.
In treating not only apathy but even support of other, perhaps more
evil, candidates as an invitation to understanding, then, we are asked
to listen to the stories, opinions, experiences, and realities of those
who do not see, experience, and do politics the way we do. We will then
confront a truth that we often neglect and even reject: that people
typically focus and act on the things that personally concern them—not
because they are selfish and misanthropic, but beacuse it is only in
their own affairs that they can feel and act on their power. What is
most immediate and accessible to people has more direct, tangible
consequences on their lives. An excerpt from an interview highlighted in
Maureen Baker’s *Motherhood, employment and the
“child penalty”[14] reads: “My children come first. I’m not accountable
to any government. I’m accountable to my children.” Derek Schilling, in
his chapter on the French sociologies of the quotidian, writes that
Michel Maffesoli would “[argue] that the masses, quite to the contrary,
prove their wisdom whenever they turn a deaf ear to the politicians:
aware from experience of how empty most campaign promises are, they will
not invest themselves in a cause that will likely produce few tangible
rewards before it is replaced by another, no less transient cause. … For
even as they appear to subscribe to official values, the masses keep
their distance, viewing as suspect all top-down attempts to unify the
social whole around an ideal.”[15] In sum, apathy and opposition to our
view and brand of politics should not be taken as the people’s
stupidity, egotism, nor being inherently evil; they are products of the
systemic and structural failures of the state in making the people feel
like they have power, and that they have a stake and say in the way we
run things.
Even more important to our cause as anarchists and abolitionists, these
should be taken as signs that the views and experiences of the people
are closer to our ideals than we anticipated—that the people do not only
already disregard and find superfluous (if not downright obstructive)
our formal institutions, but also find ways to function and live despite
them.
*** Thesis 18: You cannot vote away capitalism and the State and Dutertismo is here to stay.
People are already declaring their vote for Pacquiao, Isko, or Leni.
Vote for whoever you like, but the result remains the same: wage-labor,
rule of capital, and the violence of policing, all of which we cannot
vote away. You cannot vote for a free society.
Duterte might leave come 2022, but Dutertismo is unfortunately here to
stay. The police and military have already been consolidated, police
powers have already expanded. Even with a return to liberalism, its
power will not be dismantled by a vote. You cannot vote out the police.
*** Thesis 19: We need not a “unified opposition,” we need autonomous struggle.
If we are being perfectly honest here, it is not the lack of a “unified
opposition” so much as a need for progressive movements to assert
distributed loci of resistance against capital and the state.
Decentralization is not a fundamentally “good” thing, in that it’s a
structural trait, and not a moral position. But one needs to understand
that there are clear mechanical benefits to acephaly that insulate
radical currents from the suppression or co-option of singular leaders
or groups.
A clear commitment towards the lateralization of power into autonomous
affinity groups (among other units) would do more for the struggle than
laughably marginal concessions within liberal (representative)
democracy.
For one, it generalizes a threat to state power. Repression of activism
will still be present, but this sidesteps the scapegoating of legal
organizations and activist groups—forcing broader authoritarian measures
in its stead.
Accelerating these conditions may seem counter-intuitive, but it also
lays out the state’s antagonism in ways that become increasingly
untenable. Resisting the “communism” of the haunted “Communist Party” is
a clear message. Resisting a vague, ambiguous other is not.
People could only go so far before realizing that the state’s actions
are against their personal, and collective, self interest. Assuming
minimum viability, this draws the public’s subjectivity past prior lines
of pseudospeciation—affording some degree of headroom for meaningful
solidarity.
You do not have to be a communist, anarchist, or name brand radical to
stand for yourself—you just have to stand. At the cost of necessitating
greater volitional understanding of autonomous struggle across affinity
groups, more paths open up for the public to act upon its discontent.
[1] The presidential palace.
[2] Movement for the New Society.
[3] Martial Law is the period of dictaorship under Ferdinand Marcos Sr.
[4] “Righteous path,” the policy of the previous liberal administration
under President Noynoy Aquino.
[5] The “People Power Revolution” is the liberal revolution that ousted
the dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr.
[6] “Workers now.”
[7] “National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict,” the
anti-communist agency.
[8] Rosa Luxemburg. 1899. “The Dreyfus Affair and the Millerand Case.”
[9] Mikhail Bakunin. 1869. “On the Policy of the International
Workingmen’s Association.”
[10] “Yellows.”
[11] A word that combines “ally” with “pink,” the color of her campaign
[12] “DDS” is also the acronym for Duterte’s assassins, the Davao Death
Squad.
[13] “Hinting at.”
[14] Page 222. Maureen Baker. 2010. “Motherhood, employment and the
‘child penalty’.” Women’s Studies International Forum
33(3):215–224. doi:10.1016/j.wsif.2010.01.004
[15] Pages 205–206. Derek Schilling. 2009. “French Sociologies of the
Quotidian: From Dialectical Marxism to the Anthropology of Everyday
Practice.” Pp.187–210 in Encountering the Everyday: An Introduction
to the Sociologies of the Unnoticed, edited by Michael Hviid
Jacobsen. Hampshire and New York: Palgrave MacMillan.