On the afternoon of January 12 the Taal Volcano began spewing ash and smoke from its ancient caldera. Within hours a massive evacuation effort was launched to get people out of harm’s way. A comrade was among the people fleeing the scene. Government offices and schools were understandably closed due to the disaster, but BPO centers around the areas most affected by the ensuing ashfall had the gall to call their workers back to work.

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Attorney Oli Reyes mentioned in a viral tweet how foreign youtubers were taking advantage of the Filipino need for global validation to garner more views — and therefore, ad revenue. But what is going on here? What does that mean for us as people? Does anyone care?

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On social media, I usually see people moan over how we’re “Destroying Nature”, and that “Mother Nature is dying.” No, my sweet summer child. Mother Nature ain’t dying. Mother Nature is just grabbing the slippers she’s gon’ use to spank our collective asses with. Natural processes that lead to life are going to remain well after we are gone. We just won’t be in it.

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When I was an undergrad, I had to fight so many people to allow my voice and opinions to be heard. The central point of my struggle as a young activist then was to get formally organized activists to realize that speaking up is a form of action, too; that not being part of any organization or not being as physically and publicly active in political struggles as they were didn’t mean you weren’t one; that just because someone isn’t doing activism and radicalism the exact same way the established Left does, doesn’t mean they aren’t activists or radicals.

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So anarchy’s all about doing whatever the hell we want, right?

Before answering that, let me go on a bulky tangent about why group projects suck.

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Let us not mince our words. The EDSA Revolution has failed.

If you look around at the state of society in our archipelago, you can see clear parallels to the horrors of 1972. A dictator, with the military and police in the palm of his hand, supported by sycophants blindly loyal to his person and by local and foreign capitalist interests, brutally murdering and terrorizing the poor, and the dissidents who fight for them.

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How much of our negative self-talk is based on false ideals foisted upon us by Capitalism? Last night I caught a friend (who shall remain anonymous) using negative statements about themselves based on not having the “right” job, or living situation, or socioeconomic status. My friend is sort of an anarchist chaote type and regularly posts anti-capitalist stuff. But their self-talk was full of capitalist ideas of personal worth. It saddened me and I tried to do my best to snap them out of that kind of thinking.

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