LET’S START with a bit of foreplay to set the mood.
“Red-tagging” is a phrase conjured out of thin air by pseudo-communists and used by cowards to manipulate morons. “KORNBIP,” on the other hand, is a playful Filipino slang term used online mainly to mock the usual suspects — leftists, pseudo-communists, and “useful idiots.” It is simply a clever way to condescend.
Condiments, of course, are meant to spice up a narrative and make it more interesting.
“Red-tagging” has since become a catch-all defense whenever government security forces identify someone as a militant subversive allegedly plotting to overthrow the state through armed conflict. In other words, it has become their version of the “victim card.”
Ironically, the very people who popularized the term “red-tagging” are often the first to accuse others of engaging in it. What is laughable is that being a communist in the Philippines is not even illegal, yet those who dread being called one are often the loudest in announcing that they are being labeled as such.
Consider these organizations, all of which have claimed to be victims of what they call “red-tagging”:
• Kabataang Makabayan (KM) – Kabataan Party-list
• Malayang Kilusan ng Bagong Kababaihan (MAKIBAKA) – GABRIELA Women’s Party-list
• Revolutionary Council of Trade Unions (RCTU) – Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU)
• Pambansang Katipunan ng mga Magbubukid (PKM) – Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP)
• Kalipunan ng mga Gurong Makabayan (KAGUMA) – Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) Party-list
The party-list groups mentioned above, which are represented in Congress, collectively refer to themselves as the Makabayan bloc.
Then there is Karapatan Alliance Philippines, better known as Karapatan, a left-wing non-government organization and human rights alliance that conducts research, advocacy, monitoring, and documentation of alleged human rights violations in the Philippines. Its work is largely focused on issues arising from the government’s campaign against the communist insurgency and the peace negotiations between the Philippine government and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.
By the way, “human rights” is a Western invention — an abstract ideal shaped by people living in relatively comfortable societies who may have little exposure to how people in less developed or more troubled societies actually think, feel, and behave.
To say that these pseudo-communists have weaponized “human rights” is an understatement. For them, it has become a weapon of choice — a means of using government resources and institutions to undermine the government itself.
Speaking of “useful idiots,” they are at it again. Recently, government security forces conducted the Inter-Agency Territorial Defense Operations Exercise in the towns of Miag-ao and San Joaquin, Iloilo Province, as part of the government’s obligation to defend its territory and sovereignty.
Of course, the exercise was purely defensive in nature and was never intended to provoke war, contrary to the shrill rhetoric and obsolete slogans shouted by these “useful idiots” during their rally in front of the Provincial Capitol last week.
But when it comes to grooming and recruitment in schools, their silence is deafening.
One of the primary sources of recruits for the CPP-NPA-NDF insurgency movement is the country’s colleges and universities. There, under the guise of “student activism,” impressionable young people are groomed and encouraged to join leftist organizations such as the League of Filipino Students (LFS), the College Editors Guild, and similar groups.
Those believed to have the potential to become armed fighters are eventually brought to training camps in remote areas for immersion and indoctrination before becoming full-fledged members of the armed movement. Many end up as cannon fodder, killed in their first encounters with highly trained government forces. Those who do not make the cut often become the noisy “useful idiots” commonly seen in rallies and protest actions.
The usual excuse offered by these colleges and universities, particularly the University of the Philippines, is that they are teaching “critical thinking.” However, joining the NPA to overthrow a legitimate, democratically elected government and replace it with what critics describe as a failed and obsolete ideology is not “critical thinking” but sheer stupidity.
The question that begs to be asked of these so-called militant groups is this: Why do a significant number of their members, often found carrying firearms, almost always end up in combat zones during the government’s armed encounters with the CPP-NPA-NDF?
And finally, calling them “artists,” “researchers,” or “cultural workers” is so passé that it has become downright ridiculous./PN
