keep the good fight raging
“Aling pag-ibig pa ang hihigit kaya
sa pagkadalisay at pagkadakila
gaya ng pag-ibig sa tinubuang lupa?
Aling pag-ibig pa? Wala na nga, wala.”
Which translates to:
‘What love can surpass purity or greatness like love of country? None.’
The poem Pag-ibig sa Tinubuang Lupa (Love for One’s Homeland) was written by Philippine hero and martyr Andres Bonifacio. He was no martyr but was sacrificed and murdered by his political rivals. Executed in broad daylight on the 10th day of May, 1897 — their graves unknown to this day.
This is how we feel in the wake of our 2022 presidential elections on May 9 — sold out and hang to dry. The term election stress disorder (ESD) is used to describe the pressure build up due to this event. With so much riding on the outcome, many are stretched to the extreme.
What exactly is ESD or PESD (post election stress disorder), and is it a legitimate medical diagnosis?
The term was first publicly coined in 2016 by Steven Stosny, PhD, a psychologist who has written several books on compassion, anger, and relationships. Stosny used the term in an article for The Washington Post, where he wrote that he had been “overwhelmed” with “distress calls” from patients during the 2016 election cycle.
Others have picked up the term since then and it’s now applied regularly — especially when the 2020 US election was really ramping up and now in the Philippines — with the 2022 election of its former dictator’s son and the current presidential goon’s daughter claiming victory ahead of the official count.
Even with an uncontested victory by the Leni/Kiko 2022 party the country would have been hard pressed to recover from decades of rape and pillage by its greedy and corrupt politicians and oligarchs. Still we would have had a chance to crawl out of the deep dark hole we are in.
Now we have to heal our wounds and put out raging fires while constantly being alert and vigilant — the sad and sorry PTSD outcome of our doomed nation. May our spirits rise to the challenge once again, even as our hopes have been so brutally crushed once again.
So much for never again, never forget, always remember.
May the beacon of light that blinked on during this campaign season never leave us alone in the dark again. Keep up the good fight — tuloy and laban!
Originally published at http://changewarrior.blogspot.com.
