A few nights ago as I was talking on the phone with Jeanie I heard my father raise his voice at someone. Alarmed I rushed out to see what all that was about.
To my surprise, it was the local night watchman, that was deputized by our community's elitist homeowners' association, telling them a 'bote diyaryo' not to pass on our street. You may be asking why is that so?
Nothing really its just how people who regard themselves as rich think that there's always some poor folk who's there waiting to rob them. And I am against this line of thinking. Why again you ask?
For starters it was just plain and simple bigotry. Majority of people living in so-called 'villages' and 'subdivisions' tend to regard themselves so highly that they security from the 'dregs' of society a high priority for them. This explains the gates on national roads; the guards; the 'no sticker no entry' policy and those perimeter fences that sometimes has those ala-DMZ (when I say DMZ its the demilitarized zone like the one in between the borders of North & South Korea) like that of the one in Corinthian Gardens.
This is a sham policy for one, because it breaks the law. Roads are a property of the people, when I mean people it is the country's citizens who in turn make up the government. Not just some chosen few who just so happened to have enough money to own a house and lot in some posh location in the metropolis.
Another is that it is one of the causes of traffic hams, why you ask? Because cars that don't have sanctioned stickers can't pass through those subdivisions because they're blocked only for the use of those who live there. On that thought, that's one of the reasons why I am not a fan of MMDA's Bayani Fernando, because he treats public utility vehicles, pedestrians and vendors to almost fascist lengths by implementing cruel street cleaning operations and irrational odd even schemes, and pink cages but on the other hand he is so relaxed on getting those roads on Corinthian, Arcadia, Wack-wack (the village of wackos like erap and jinggoy), and Valle Verde 1 to whatever part Once Upon a Time in China ended.
The way I see it, and I know that a lot of you folks reading this would be angry with what I'm about to say is that one revolutionary solution to traffic congestion is to issue a strict rule on having private vehicles especially cars that at least less than half of its passenger capacity on the roads, especially on major roads. Imagine a buss that is more or less as long as two or three cars can carry at least 100 passengers shares the road with thousands of cars that carry only one passenger in it. Now isn't that a waste of precious space?
Back to the issue of subdivisions...
It is very unfair to put such high security sanctions as a unanimous decision that's implemented by weak decision making bodies as the barangay or the home owners association, of some place. Because it implies that it is only those who own a house that has the right to protect themselves, but what of those who don't own a house? I mean if those on the slums who'd implement such a rule on their community, we'd consider it as something wrong. Nor do we see any similarity with this rule on subdivisions with lets say a squatters community defending themselves from demolition, now don't they deserve the same chance at security as that of those in subdivisions.
That type of thinking is no different from state-sponsored terrorism like that of the USA's homeland security protocols that are implemented after 911 or like that of being vigilante's wherein we operate outside the law and get away with it just because we're rich. It's no wonder that communism is still an attractive alternative to the present political system. Because the picture of an ever-existing class war is so vividly painted and so blatantly exhibited in society.
So going back to the story I ended up trying to halt my father from pouring his anger at the watchman, as he charged towards him. And as it turned out it would be me who'll also be screaming at the guard because such a system sickens me and I regret having to scream at the poor guy but what's happening here is so unfair.
And that's the whole point that sucks about it. The guards are working class folks (if I still remember my Marx and Amado Guererro readings) that are being put against fellow working class people and those belonging to the lumpen. Ultimately turning them into pawns of those who own homes.
Now doesn't that remind you of that scene in Geogre Romero's Land of the Dead where there is still that system wherein the rich still get the best out of society in the midst of a zombie infested earth and they still get to mess around with the poor, But in the end the class structure in that place in the movie was broken down when the zombies were able to breach the rich peoples perimeter security.
And that's a persisting wish that I so desperately want... that the walls be finally be torn down, and equality be a reality.
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