Category: UP diliman

59th U.P National Writers’ Workshop on ZOOM

i didn’t catch all of Likhaan: the 59th UP National Writers Workshop but what i did catch (some 6 or 7 of 12 sessions) i thoroughly enjoyed.  how great that it was open to the facebook public, requiring no registration or hassle of any kind   i’ve never been part of a writers workshop kasi, i’m not sure why, haha, but i’ve heard stories, of course.  and after the first sessions that i caught, i found myself remembering Sesame, a seven-month gig where i learned to face and deal with criticism without batting an eyelash, parang workshop na rin.  the ability to face criticism is good, worth cultivating, if one is to grow as a writer in whatever genre.  but wait, on second thought, there’s a huge difference between my gig-as-workshop and Likhaan.  other than CTW producer tippy fortune who sat me down in several one-on-one sessions through the different stages of rewrite, my regular critics were mostly the production team — executive producer, director, head researcher, art director — who were just as nangangapa as i was.  in contrast, Likhaan’s panelist critics are seasoned writers, most of whom i’ve read at one time or another but never really seen / heard perform other than on the printed page.  and so it was a blast watching / hearing them strut their stuff, so to speak.  jimmy abad, butch dalisay, neil garcia, charlson ong, bomen guillermo, cristina pantoja hidalgo, roland tolentino, and luna sicat cleto, in particular.  comments were focused and forceful, drawn from personal and professional wisdom, affirming and encouraging, questioning and challenging, pointing out the “infinite possibilities of the imagination” from “marvelous realism” to “science vs, magic”, even of an “alternative value system”, why not indeed, along with questions like, to what end?  saan papunta?  sustainable ba?  “sana matamis hanggang dulo, parang tubó” — ang ganda, ang dulas, ng tagalog ni luna sicat cleto, puwede talaga (i should stop with the taglish, LOL)!  but the top take-away for this fag hag, i mean, LGBTQIA+ ally, was all that juicy stuff (from such credible sources!) about kabaklaan being bawal in the communist movement in the ’70s through the ’90s and yet someone very close to joma was gay?!?  (da who!?!)  i sure could have used some of that for the ishmael bernal anti-bio!

The tale of an online mob #NachoDomingo

Katrina S.S.

I happened upon the case of Nacho Domingo too late. It was Sunday, September 29. I asked a friend who had posted about social media responsibility and online mobs what he was talking about, and he told me to do a Twitter search for his name.

It yielded little, though the few tweets that came up were ones of mourning and condolences, a lot of regret. By later in the day more and more tweets surfaced that were turning defensive: this is about frat culture, they said. The system is to blame for his death, many others said.

The blame game on Twitter seeped through the rest of the week, with some accounts coming out with names of “people who killed Nacho,” which just continued the cycle of blaming and shaming, bullying and mob rule that brought upon us this death to begin with.

READ ON…

NACHO, 22

sharing here katrina’s facebook posts on ignacio “nacho” domingo.  we didn’t know him personally, had not heard of him (yet–what a waste), this UP scholar and student leader, apparently a most promising and gifted young man, whose untimely and tragic death so crushed us that we haven’t been able to get it, him, out of our minds, needing to figure out what it was all about, wanting to understand why and how and who and when events escalated so quickly, to a point of no return.  this is neither to sensationalize the loss nor to intrude on the family’s privacy, rather, to shed light on, the better to grasp, what went wrong, and to beg that we all guard against it happening ever again.  then nacho would not have died in vain.

Katrina Stuart Santiago

2 October at 12:43

Those screencaps were released ANONYMOUSLY by a new (now deleted) Twitter account, and dated from two years ago. It was released Sept 25 (11:00AM) by an account called @rhosigrambles. By the afternoon UP ALYANSA (4:31PM) and KALikha: Kasama Ka sa Paglikha ng Arte at Literatura Para sa Bayan (7:49PM) released statements of condemnation.

By early morning of Sept 26 (1:08AM) the UP College of Mass Communication Student Council released a condemnation, promising accountability for any form of “impunity.” By the afternoon, STAND UP (4:20PM) called out the “offenders” for “bastardizing principles.” Students’ Rights and Welfare Philippines (9:35PM) followed suit talking about the “safety of our educational institutions” and stating “UP Sigma Rho Fraternity, particularly its members <name 1>, <name 2>, and <name 3>, who were PROVEN VIA SCREENSHOTS and testimonies to be involved in hazing, as well as sexual and derogatory remarks made on and regarding certain women, to reassess its reasons for existence, present themselves in investigations, hold itself accountable, and thus face the consequences of their actions.” (all caps mine)

By Sept 27 (4:34PM), the University of the Philippines Administration had announced that they were “investigating allegations” and have placed “suspects on preventive suspension” and “will file formal charges where there is evidence to support such a move.” The UP Diliman University Student Council (5:58PM) followed suit with its own statement talking about disciplinary action.

These official statements are all based on screencaps of a conversation from TWO YEARS AGO, released anonymously. A conversation that involved students who were being called “suspects,” and already penalized by the university with preventive suspension, with not enough evidence to file formal charges.

This was NOT just about social media lynch mobs. This was about institutions quickly and swiftly and thoughtlessly making decisions given those mobs. No one’s hands are clean. Certainly NOT the University’s, and NOT its organizations.

October 3

I have 122 screencaps as we speak, mining whatever is still left of tweets that were posted from Wednesday, Sept 25, to Sept 28 when he died, to the post-narratives since. I have gone back to all the statements that were posted. I’m told that before his death, the Mass Comm Student Council FB comments sections were terrible, but I missed that completely.

In fact, I missed this whole thing as it was happening — my Twitter network is obviously removed from it. But there was still enough to go back to, and while it takes time to find the right key words, once you find it, it’s a very depressing blackhole that proves why and how we have come to this point.

I have no time as of yet to write about this at length. But here’s a thought: the noise of groups and the social media mob, demanding quick action and condemnation, there is a downside to that. There is a massive problem with that, especially when we’re talking about private individuals, about REAL PEOPLE. Not everyone is Duterte. Not everyone is just operating with impunity and is a product of the macho-fascist rule. I don’t know why we even have to remind ourselves that.

A question: Where was hunos-dili in this case? When even the institutions did not practice restraint, did not spend some time to put things in perspective, did not even ask questions about whether or not responses are commensurate, or did not wonder about the possibility that these kids don’t even believe what they believed 2 years ago. When institutions are at the mercy of mob rule — who then is in control? Whose responsibility is it to make sure the kids are okay?

#StateU #SocialMediaCrisis #SocialMediaPH 
#LynchMobs #MobRule #CallOutCulture

faculty center fire

ninotchka rosca posted this on facebook in reply to a query regarding the fire that razed UP’s FC building early this morning.

I did think about that — how coincidental that the UP Faculty Center burns down after UP history professors denounce Marcos historical revisionism and Raissa Robles’s book is scheduled to be launched there. What say you?

sana naman ay nagkataon lang.  dahil kung hindi, ibig sabihin ay sinadya ng masasamang loob ang UP faculty mismo, at lalo pa itong nakakaiyak.