Explanation

By ERIC S.B. LIBRE
Mindanews .

THE sly chameleonic old man, the late dictator’s right hand, told the dictator’s namesake son  that under his father’s martial law there was none — no, not even one – arrested or sent to prison  for their political opinion, religion or similar such reason.

Oh yes, he said with a straight face, there were those who were “inconvenienced” (as if merely passing through a road being repaired) with some period of being temporarily detained — forgetting the beatings, isolation, electrocution and other forms of torture they experienced (as well as those who were involuntarily disappeared or outrightly violently “salvaged”).

Outraged I may be at this version of history (make no mistake, I am OUTRAGED definitely), yet I think I can take what he said lightly – I’d credit it to forgetfulness and senility or maybe the old man was being shrewd and wily and ingratiating himself with the son of the man he did betray.

But what leaves me really confounded and has me scratching my head is the number of people more or less my age who hold in their heads a version of history that ignores the painful experience of many and glorifies as a nostalgic golden age that era of legalized looting and carnage, who peddle the abominable fiction that the despot sought the nation’s salvation while those who fought against his dispensation were brainwashed simpletons or blinded by ambition and who later engaged in historical manipulation to make the dictator and his family appear like the demon.

I do not want to believe that these guys are being paid. I do not want to believe that they’ve been brainwashed or misled. I do not want to believe they’re mindless minions of the dictator long dead. I do not want to believe that these people are blinded by idolatry and hatred. I do not want to believe that these guys’ brains have been fried. I do not want to believe all that because I want to believe that these are people who believe sincerely in what they believe, that these people are honest in what they say they believe, and that they believe and say they believe in a truth they really perceive.

What then could be the plausible possible explanation for such distorted (albeit perhaps honest) historical appreciation?

From where and how did they acquire such a different perception?

Long and hard did I rack my little brain in serious reflection, hoping to find some reason for such an effing phenomenon (which I am strongly tempted to call an aberration).

And finally, I have come to this realization, this conclusion: These people who hold such a different historical perception are actually, without their knowing it at all, possessed by the consciousness of beings from a parallel dimension or an alternative reality where things unfolded differently although the characters were the same as here essentially.

Sorry, I must have been watching and reading too much science fiction lately…

(Eric S.B. Libre is a freelance development consultant who has done some work in a number of conflict-affected areas of Mindanao and occasionally dabbles in creative writing. He lives in Digos City.)