Oscars and Edsa

Iwas supposed to follow the news and analysis on the 33rd anniversary of EDSA, but instead I was tracking who was winning the Oscar Awards.

Perhaps, I needed entertainment, as politics here is turning bad with traditional elections and impunity, so watching the Oscars was good distraction.

But something hit me about the winners of this Oscars. Spike Lee winning a long overdue Oscar for his film about racism. Best foreign film Roma depicting the violence in Mexico. A superhero movie winning because it tells the story of an African king and a fierce progressive African kingdom. The Best Picture Green Book talking about racism.

The Oscars celebrated and recognized diversity, color, pride on history. Meanwhile, this side of the country seems to mechanically divide people into colors: yellow (dilawan), red communists, and politicians who change political colors. If Green Book was about how Black people used a green book to travel safely in America circa 1950s, here we have a police putting a Red October hit list of activists.

We have history being revised. Like EDSA is now described as a power grab by the Aquinos over the Marcoses. That EDSA was a failed dream that buried Marcos “golden years” and pushed us further to poverty. Where did these stories come from? It comes from the most popular book the Filipinos read: the Facebook. And add You Tube too.

But I did read some analyses on what went wrong with EDSA at age 33. Professor Randy David correctly called this an EDSA Regime, where one side of the elite group took over to rule and broke the promises of change and democracy. Electing Erap, and now Duterte, are signs that people lost hope on the image of EDSA.

Going back to Oscars, I see that movies, books and art can connect us to our past or to the bigger struggle for change. But somehow, even with good movies like Liway, or books about surviving Martial Law, we lost our sense of history, and even our sense of democracy.

Perhaps we are ruined by the culture of Eat Bulaga and Vice Ganda, or the commercial values of WattPad books and young adult books that occupy our young generation’s minds.

Perhaps we blame corporate media, for sensationalizing issues and conflict without context. We can blame the system, which brought us EDSA, and even Erap and now a Duterte. What comes next?

David puts it right. We equate democracy as simply voting, and hoping that strongman and saviors can lift us up.

But I would rather have movies or books to lift up my spirits. And in due time, learn what Spike Lee said in the Oscars about the coming elections, let’s “do the right thing”.