THE WORK CONTINUES

Who is that white person in the back?  A lady teacher of English nursery rhymes?

Who are those Filipino soldiers in nice uniforms and hats, each well armed?

Philippine Scouts?

Faceless and nameless, at any rate.

The KKK did not take pictures.

They didn't have cameras.

Neither did the Spanish army.

They were too pissed off to have to die for nothing.

The U.S. Army took most of the pictures we see on Internet.

They were eagerly documenting their new island possession and the natives 

occupying their real estate.

The U.S. Army were not allowed by the elites to enter their mansions and haciendas.

So all we see are pictures of lots of poor-looking barrios and inhabitants.

So take this into consideration.

The pictures ARE NOT THE WHOLE STORY.

They were the argument for the folks back home that the yanks had a whole lotta redemption goin on.

 STATEMENT OF PURPOSE:

      My interest is to unearth the deep-sixed historical and cultural protagonists of a period of Filipino history that has been woefully excised from the transmission of the past to already five generations of Filipinos born after those events. This is all.

The Americans stayed out of this picture.

Only one is identifiable.  They wore dark blue long-sleeved shirts. 

Over to the right from the center of the photo.

Native Filipinos were also called "indígenas" and "naturales".

By the time of Rizal, "Filipino" was already applied to the ilustrados in Spain,

who were natives, Spanish and Chinese mestizos, but all were Filipinos.

The reason why only the insulares (Spanish born in Filipinas) were called "Filipinos" 

is very logical:  they were visible.

They traveled, they wrote newspaper articles and books and letters.

To the Spanish monarch, the administrators of the colony, they were their valid interlocutors.

The Filipino representatives to the Cortes were not Spaniards, they could have been Spanish-Chinese-Malay mestizos.  They were known as Filipinos.

As time went on, the non-creole Filipinos gained visibility. Then the term "Filipino" no longer was exclusively applied to insulares, or creoles.

Resentment is a non sequitur if you really want to understand your history.  Leave emotions out of it.

Spain did not purport to establish a modern democratic republic named Filipinas.

Spain evangelized, converted to Catholicism, created a colony that was part constitutional monarchy, and mostly monastery.

Spain did not lie.

The U.S. purported to do it. The U.S. said she was teaching Filipinos democracy.

The U.S. lied.

What is our country today?

A Free Republic, perhaps?

No, Sir.

A U.S. satellite.

Filipinos are all for sale today.

Tell me:  how exactly have we profited from our erased memory,

our falsified identity?

When are our OFWs going to come home and raise their own children?

In the 19th century, Rizal could not live peacefully in Filipinas.

In the 21st century, 100 million Filipinos live in precariousness.  Wherever they may be.

Their ignorance keeps them enslaved.

They changed tyrants. 

Now, instead of kissing a pries's ring, they sell their vote to pulitikeros, to earn some money.

But hey, today we are all Filipinos. Aren't we?  We can hang the sign around our necks now.

Isn't that progress!

Now, even scientific commissions traveling across borders have problems 

if any members carry Filipino passports.

Today we are all Filipinos!  Wonderful!

But nobody respects us.

Not even ourselves.

We speak lousy English.

Just like we spoke lousy Spanish.

You gotta laugh.

Hay que reírse.

Porque es mejor que llorar.

Because it's better than weeping.

(Paraphrasing Rizal, yet again.)

Have a nice day in the plantation.

Hopefully, you are an overseer, or your husband is one.

But no, you will never see this blog.

You're too busy vlogging yourself, or your nose is glued to your phone laughing at Instagram jokes.