DDS opinionators are peddling the notion that their social media vloggers (video bloggers) are today’s mosquito press, and even more powerful than the original because of the much wider reach of the internet’s platforms for disseminating info and opinions. The message to DDS vloggers and followers being, let’s not stop, we’re on the right track, people are watching and liking and sharing our posts, let’s engage and organize and hold rallies, and if we keep it up, we can oust the son just like we did the father.
But Joe Burgos’s mosquito press of martial law times that, after Ninoy’s assassination, was boosted and amplified by Eggie Apostol’s and other anti-Marcos publications, was also purely anti-Marcos, totally focused on the struggle to end the dictatorship. And that’s what made it a powerful force in support of the widow Cory’s campaign to unseat Marcos.
Contrarily, the social media platforms — Facebook, Twitter, Tiktok, and YouTube — where anti-Marcos DDS vloggers proliferate, abound, too, with vloggers of different persuasions and politics, i.e., pro-Marcos anti-DDS as well as anti-Marcos and anti-DDS vloggers, many of whom are pro-Leni pro-Risa pro-Bam pro-Kiko pro-Leila, even pro- and anti-Tulfos.
Sa madaling salita, social media is a marketplace of ideas, even, a megamall of tsismis, everybody welcome, kanya-kanyang agenda, walang isang adbokasya o mensahe na bumebenta sa nakararami, except perhaps freedom of expression, and fake news.
Besides, in Feb 1986 the mosquito press was just a part of the Cory-led multi-sectoral opposition immersed in a 10-day Marcos crony boycott that saw banks running and the economy reeling. And VP Sara is certainly nothing like Cory.