The thrill is gone
Life without Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos is dull to those of us in media who have been arrested, investigated, harrassed, hounded oppressed and forced to resign and go underground or go about in disguise as the alternative press.
Gives you a nice feeling —- knowing you are wanted.
No more looking behind to see if we are being followed. No more office raids and bomb threats. We can only pray for our salvaged colleagues, but that’s no fun either (being salvaged, that is).
Who’s going to invite us now to speak before Rotarians, Ateneans, PTA meetings and ladies and gentlemen in need of stimulation after lunch? Farewell to the open forums where after we answered the tough questions (“Who really killed Ninoy?”) we were sure a METROCOM car would be at the door to pick us up. So exciting.
Who will be so daring today as to call us “libelous”, “subversive”, “seditious” and a “threat to national security”?
Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos did. They came on heavy as only they knew how. Bravo.
And for us, the once oppressed women in media, when will we ever be acclaimed again as the “women with balls”? It’s a habit we can’t kick.
These days, the aforementioned women in media hardly meet. We have nothing to talk about. No tales of censorship (always worth a good, cleansing cry); no crony abuses to report (not yet to date) and most of all, there are no rumors that Marcos has died — again. How I miss our good times.
Also, the Marcoses were always good for a temptation or two such as: “Go down on your knees and worship me and you can see the world with Imelda.” The distribution of envelopes was more subtle, of course. But this is what we mean. They thought up of variations to avoid boring anyone.
We’ve had to cut out our visions of martyrdom and perchance merit a few lines of sympathy in the column of Crispina Belen. We’ve had to surrender our crown of Miss Press Freedom and turn it over to our most likely successor, Rita Gaddi Baltazar if she’s hounded any further.
The honors, the accolades are gone.
We are Cory-nies (dangerously exciting only last month) strutting on Main Street where Joker Arroyo says hi to us.
What’s the fun in that?
The thrill is gone.
