Filipinos tend to have a proclivity to forget past events and issues, especially those that do not affect them personally or directly.
They always believe in moving on, rather on dwelling in the past which could mean getting stuck in whatever miserable experiences one has had. “Just move on!” is what people say to those who tend to dwell in the past.
Time and again, this trait among Filipinos can either be helpful — for moving on easily means less baggage — or harmful, as it will most likely lead to others, especially people in places of power, capitalizing on it.
Looking back in history, it seems that Filipinos in general are not only forgetful individuals but also quite forgiving.
When we look back at the arrival of the Spaniards, and their subsequent colonization of the archipelago for more than 300 years, it seems that the Filipinos during that time were either just oblivious to Spanish subjugation and discrimination that transpired in those 300 years, or just unreasonably forgiving as they continued to venerate Spanish priests and obey, if not fear, Spanish colonial officials and military.
This continued until the coming of the Americans — knowing that they waged one of their costliest wars in history, the Philippine-American War, murdering thousands of Filipinos just to succeed in colonizing the Philippines through what they called as the benevolent assimilation policy.
This policy was still a form of colonization but done in a “good way”, so to speak; colonialism with a heart, as one historian would put it.
Even with the thousands of Filipinos murdered, even with all the ravages of wars felt, the Filipinos still welcomed the Americans with open arms, and eventually, just forgot about what the Americans had done before they benevolently assimilated us, and made us their little-brown brothers.
Of course, there were some who did not forget and forgive — the likes of Gen. Artemio Ricarte, an officer in the Revolutionary Army of Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo, who was inevitably sent to exile in Japan because he never pledged allegiance to the Americans. He later returned to the Philippines, along with the Japanese during World War II.
The rest who easily forgot and moved on opted to collaborate with the Americans. Most, if not all, of them were known as ilustrados or the educated Filipino class.
Thinking that it was more pragmatic to collaborate than to resist against the Americans, these ilustrados then acquiesced to the benevolent assimilation policy of the Americans, and collaborated with them to ascertain not only their own personal, political, and business interests but also the political and economic intentions of America in the Philippines.
The collaboration of these ilustrados evinces the type of politicians we had during the American period, which is not unlike the politicians we have today — mostly turncoats who do not seem to have any moral compass.
To some, they might have showed their political adroitness by accepting reality that they would not be able to win against the Americans; but to others, they would invariably be seen as traitors who sugarcoated their collaboration as something done out of practicality, but which, in reality, was done to maintain their status in society, and for financial gains.
The predilection of the ilustrados to collaborate continued during the Japanese Occupation — which had a historical precedent, and thus, something that was not surprising, to say the least.
Many of those who had collaborated tried to exculpate themselves by saying that they were simply ordered by then President Manuel Quezon to work with the Japanese imperial forces but not pledge allegiance to them.
Some, like Sen. Claro M. Recto, asseverated that they were only doing what was “good” for the Filipino people, and questioned why they were being discriminated when they were only doing more or less the same things as what the ilustrados did when they collaborated with the Americans at the outset of American Occupation.
In retrospect, the collaborators during the Japanese Occupation had varying reasons why they perforce conspired. Most did it to survive, others did it to take advantage of their new-found power and influence. But there were a few good “collaborators” who did it to mitigate the suffering of the Filipino people.
In the case of Dumaguete during the Japanese Occupation, one collaborator (whose name I don’t need to mention) was quite notorious. In the various diary entries and military reports I have perused in my research, his name would always be mentioned on the role he actively played then.
Moreover, when I recently had a deep conversation with my 94-year-old grandmother about the Japanese Occupation in Negros Oriental, she demonstrated to me how she has not forgotten that name, mentioning it many times, and saying: “Kana siya, espiya gud na siya sa mga Hapon!” [That person was truly a spy for the Japanese!]
Archival sources would corroborate that that person was indeed a spy. He was in charge of the Public Opinion Office, otherwise known as the Japanese Spy Corps [an office assigned to pinpoint guerrilla members, agents, and sympathizers] in Dumaguete.
The guerrilla units under the 75th Infantry Regiment of Lt. Col. Placido Ausejo, based in Southern Negros, despised that person, and showed it by trying to ambush him many times, but only managed to injure him.
After the war, this person was arrested, and made to face a surfeit of charges on his role as a collaborator during the Japanese Occupation. However, the charges were dropped as President Manuel A. Roxas gave the political collaborators amnesty, and absolved them of all their crimes.
It seems, however, that the Oriental Negrenses — especially the local populace of his town of origin — have moved on from the atrocities that this collaborator had committed during the war. I say we seem to have moved on because the person was eventually elected mayor of his hometown in the 1950s. His victory alone is a testament that the people have forgotten about his role during the war, or they may have readily forgiven him.
The proclivity of the Filipinos to forget seems ineradicable. It is still happening now with the election victory of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Although true that the sins of the father indeed are not the sins of the son, it is worrisome that some Filipinos are quick to say “move on” from the abuses and atrocities committed during the Martial Law period.
What is worse is when people deny the human rights abuses, plunder, and killings, or refuse to remember and acknowledge that they actually transpired during the Marcos dictatorship.
They have now forgotten about those things mainly because they were not directly affected by it or maybe (and this is also one of the main reasons) they egregiously deny these things happened as a result of their political bias — a black and white mentality — against the Aquino family.
Most of the supporters of Marcos Jr. fit into the mold of the latter as they time and again demonstrate a simplistic view of history. To them, it’s like heroes versus villains, good versus bad, always pointing out that Marcos Sr. has always been the good guy, the glorious hero who became a “victim” of Filipino oligarchs and leftist elements, the hero who was “kidnapped” by the Americans, or evicted to Hawaii “on orders from Cory Aquino”, and barred from returning to his motherland.
These stories, however, are pure balderdash — only fatuous nincompoops would believe in these made-up tales.
Nonetheless, these stories undeniably appeal to the senses of the unknowing and gullible Filipinos — and because of this, they tend to forget the truth; because of their credulousness, flagitious political families or dynasties remain in power. The Filipino people, therefore, have a historical precedent of forgetting their past.
Our National Hero Jose Rizal is not like most of the Filipinos though when he told Marcelo Del Pilar he had already forgiven him [after their squabble within the Propaganda Movement] but that he can never forget what he did.
‘Never forgetting’ is not like holding a grudge; ‘never forgetting’ only means we are continuously aware of the misdeeds of some individuals so that next time, we are more careful and maybe less trusting.
‘Never forgetting’ also means we have learned from the past, and that we strive not to repeat the mistakes of other people before us.
Most of the Filipino people, unfortunately, tend to forget their history, and thus, repeat the mistakes they have done in the past.
This is the reason why there is a deleterious cycle of corruption in government, and why political elites continue to dominate Philippine politics — because we keep on forgetting about what they had done in our country’s past.
A testament to the Filipino people’s proclivity to forget is when they forget to choose competent candidates in local and national elections. Only time will tell when we will finally wake up from this nightmare, and remember that we, the people, can chart our own destiny by remembering, let alone learning from, our history.
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Author’s email: JJAbulado@norsu.edu.ph
