Sisihan 101, when the whole world goes WTF

This morning before I left the house, I managed to catch some bits of the morning show debate. In that segment, they pitted two old dudes against each other and guess what? They played the game we all have played as children, the Did-Too-Did-Not or the sisihan game. On one hand, the KBP is saying that the media *cough* circus *cough* coverage was just journalists and newscasters doing what they are paid to do: report events (I can’t really say “news” because there is a thin line between news and sensationalist crap and I feel our journalists at some point started to not see this line.). The other side was for “responsible journalism,” urging that since there was no media blackout during Monday’s unfortunate series of events, the media should have used their own discretion as to what and what not to report.

Needless to say, the segment boiled down to pointing fingers. Everybody’s fingers are pointed at somebody else at the moment. I don’t have nearly enough fingers (and toes) to point at who I think is to blame, especially when I think everybody is to blame. Yep, that means you, you, you, me, and that other you at the back, we’re all to blame for this. I am to blame because I don’t nearly pay enough attention to the news, and because I and other normal Juan dela Cruzes like me have encouraged news outfits to give me half-baked news reports, or worse, sensationalist news. At some point, I realized that the big networks and broadsheets have ceased to give me interesting and compelling news, that at some point they started creating news straight from their asses. (Really, who gives a flying fuck if PNot doesn’t quit smoking? I’d cared more about why the DepEd secretary has a Brother in his name.) I am to blame because I know there are problems with budget and training, and a plethora of other things in this country but maybe I don’t speak about it often enough to be heard. I and everybody else is to blame because we cultivate the sense of morbid fascination, a culture of usiseros and usiseras that couldn’t be stopped from entering a danger zone just for the satisfaction of having been there. It’s everybody’s fault, and I’m afraid only a few people will realize that and own up to it.

In the end, it really isn’t a matter about whose fault it was; this is the two-days-after folks. We’re all reeling from the damage: the people of China are furious with us in general (the fact that they are in possession of bigger missiles and outnumber us 100 to one seem to have escaped some people); our president’s PNot; our media just televised our police force shitting in front of an international audience live; trust in the police force is at an all time low; our overseas workers won’t be so popular with their employers; and we as a nation are feeling the polar opposite of national pride at the moment.

Hopefully, all of us learns… Wait, no. I’m not even finishing that sentence.