It is easy for us contented Filipinos, here and abroad, to simplify and/or imply that the arguments and presentations of our homeland’s history and current events by our nationalists as a blame game, i.e. use of “argument by victimhood” against America, the supporter (of our forefathers’ revolt against Spain) turned interventionist, new occupier and colonial master for 50 years.
To the thinking Filipino, he knows that among equals, to use the “argument of victimhood” is disgustingly moronic, irresponsible or immature.
But between the strong and the weak, the intelligent and the ignorant, victimhood is reality.
It is as real as the Jewish Holocaust, or the forced displacement of Palestinians from Palestine (now mainly Israel) or the genocide of Armenians by Turks or the more recent ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia, etc. All their decades-old, if not centuries-old, ongoing conflicts borne out of real victimization.
As I wrote on my blog:
“Suffice it to say that the failure to solve our people’s poverty is not strictly the fault of America or of foreign institutions (America has the strongest control and influence in them), and it is also not completely the fault of the so-called leaders of our homeland. It takes two to tango, to screw for so long and continually the country and our fellow countrymen.”
It urgently behooves the Filipino nationalists to educate the weak and the ignorant among us, that is, the impoverished majority and the miseducated in the homeland (many of us so-called educated), about the unknown hidden truths and the known untruths in our history; and to appreciate and see these recorded past as guides to internal and external factors which heavily and continually contribute and lead to our present, ever-worsening, national socio-economic and political predicament.
Only by educating and thus raising the national consciousness of the majority can a united, nationalistic citizenry be attained; who then will decisively work for the radical transformation of our homeland for the common good.
Bert maintains a blog called The Filipino Mind at http://thefilipinomind.blogspot.com/.