Cynicism is a function of alienation. When one no longer considers oneself part of a something, when one no longer has or no longer cares to have a stake in a system, then one can afford to be cynical. In the cold embrace of cynicism one is insulated from dashed hopes and impossible expectations. Cynicism is the complete and utter destruction of hope. Viewed this way, it is frightfully easy to see that idealism and cynicism are end points of the same trajectory.
The best idealists make the worst cynics. Pragmatists, those who see the world in shades of gray, probably have plenty more room to accommodate failure, inconsistencies and illogic. Pragmatists order the world by taking the good and the bad to incorporate into her worldview. Idealists aim for the normative – what should be. An exercise of idealism then is ordering the world based on what does not yet exist. It is placing faith in the cusp of what could be, in the glimmer of something in the horizon, in the intangibles. Idealism can often be a fruitless exercise, a constant anticipation, a breathless waiting for signs of what one desires to come in fruition.
I returned to the Philippines a year and a half ago full of hope, my mind filled with notions of right and justice. I had not been gone that long, but I was far away enough to have forgotten what it was like, the chaos and the madness. In my mind’s eye, home was a damsel in distress waiting to be rescued. And there I was, her gallant knight. Not all believe themselves to be heroic. It takes a certain kind of conceit and delusion to believe that what one does matters in the larger scheme of things.
Since my return I made a conscious decision to climb down from my ivory tower. Ensconced in the private spaces we inhabit, we can afford to tune out the undesirable public. What we all possess in our private spaces – our families and friends, work – we have in our immediate control. The public – that jungle of common rules, common values and common spaces – are owned by no one and everyone. Here it isn’t easily discernible who are responsible, where our interests lie, what we have at stake and what we can and cannot control. Because the rules that dictate the public are arbitrary and because enforcement itself is arbitrary, it is easy to feel helpless. In such a system it often seems it is each person for herself.
A year and a half ago, I climbed down my ivory tower, afraid of the ugliness that I would see. Called to duty, the knight errant wanted to come to the rescue anyway. And here I am, a year and a half later. I have not quite earned my battle spurs. All I have are a few scrapes. I have had but a glimpse of what teems underneath our public skin. I am at once amazed and disgusted. This is my country. This is my people. This is me.
With one eye to the horizon, I ask myself these days whether these exercises in fruitlessness truly matters. Or that they work in bringing the normative in fruition. I am but a gnat, cowed by the mountain. Perhaps it is me who needs rescuing.
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nice story about your self. kung masya ka dyan sa choices at decisions mo then so be it. dapat you should be at peace with yourself na.
benigno has made an entirely different choice than yours mahirap bang tanggapin yun. Eh yun ang gusto nyang gawin eh at ddoon din sya masaya. katulad mo maganda rinyung advocacies ni Bengino eh.
like it or not both of you are interesting personality in pinoy blogsphere. hinid lang ikaw I mean both of you.
happy thanksgiving!
Nice post. I’ve been on a similar journey.
Instead of “This is my country. This is my people. This is me.” my version is “This is a country. These are people. This is me.” At the end of the day there are, of course, cultural differences across the world. But we’re all people. And countries are but arbitrary constructs.
Five years ago I too made a “return” to the Philippines. I too have (and maintain) a certain conceit, delusion, heroic streak – regarding the electricity sector. But so what? It gives me direction, though the “rules are arbitrary … enforcement is arbitrary” and it’s easy to feel helpless.
I’m still climbing down off my ivory tower. I was way way up there. And I still have a ways to go. Learning each humbling step of the way down – not so much about the electric sector, as about people, peoples, and our hopes and struggles.
Well, I guess you’ll be saying goodbye to the world of Globalization and flowing champagne. Welcome, prepared to be mindfracked.
Sparks, we all have our days of bitterness where we shake our head in disgust. When I look at this whole Massacre thing, part of me shakes, this isn’t going to end well. When I look at our electoral landscape, can they pull it off? If Aquino wins, will he be a force of change or a force that will break our people’s heart?
On the flip side, we have interesting stories of success: more than Pacquiao, Peñaflorida is a prime example of what Filipinos can do with what little thing he has. Is it the small battles that we need to win? Is it the battles that we can win first?
Sam Knight of Financial Times wrote about Marilyn vos Savant, who has a recorded IQ of 228:
Perhaps the question is: how do we define success in the personal and our national life? What is it that we want?
Perhaps we need to let go of the following notions/myths around what it means to be a ‘good citizen’:
- That Filipinos are some sort of ‘victim’ that needs to be ‘rescued’;
- That any initiative considered to be ‘noble’ due to the delivery of an outcome that benefits the ‘less fortunate’ is necessarily borne out of a “selfless”, altruistic, motive; and,
- That ‘contributing’ to the national effort necessarily involves something undertaken with extraordinary effort on top of one’s normal role in society.
Rather we should:
- See Filipinos as a people who are applying an approach that happens to not be in tune with the sort of approach that enables one to succeed in this world order;
- Understand that the ultimate source of sustained motivation to see an initiative through is one’s self, one’s interests, and one’s sense of personal fulfillment; and,
- Do one’s job properly no matter how inconsequential one may think it is.
The last one is the one that I feel inclined to emphasize the most. Why is it that there seems to be a constant call for us to all be heroes and that the salvation of the country lies in such ‘heroic’ effort? The reality is that simply doing one’s job or things in general properly already seems to be something that is a challenge in Philippine society to begin with.
We feel hopeless, or inadequate because of a pressure to be a hero who walks away from ordinariness to step up to the task of rescuing a hapless victim. Yet a simple thing as regarding The Vote in the proper perspective — to be wielded responsibly and not on the basis of an addiction to over-used platitudes — already comes across as a monumental challenge to most. Being a hero means doing things beyond the ordinary. But doing so does not make sense if we cannot even do the ordinary properly to begin with.
The commentor “Ilda” pretty summed it up quite well in an article she contributed to AntiPinoy:
These are the very same people who turn their roads into chaotic battlefields (when traffic is moving) by not obeying traffic rules and regulations, all at a cost of unnecessary loss of life and limb, lost productivity, and pollution. They are also the very same people that continue to elect the same sorts of public officials that have ruled the country for decades. They select them based on popularity gained from making empty promises, expressing hollow platitudes, and associating with glamorous celebrities and sports heroes. In the end, it is these elected politicians who are left laughing all the way to the bank.
* * *
Marck in his piece “Me and the Pacman” makes an almost identical lament as yours, Ms Sparks:
And here is an excerpt of my comment there in response to that:
The salvation of the nation lies in a collective outcome that emerges from individuals doing the right things properly within their immediate individual domains of influence. The trouble is we are a society that relies on heroic effort to subsidise the sub-standard and less-than-proper output of the majority.
And that is why the Philippines fails consistently.
Hear, hear.
We do not have to do something grand and be elevated to a hero status in order to put meaning into our existence. We can find meaning in the little things we do and by just being a good daughter, sister, brother, friend, employee, employer or citizen.
If we give in to the pressure of doing something out of the ordinary or “heroic”, we also give in to pretense, cheating or lying to ourselves. Let’s just be true and real and do what we can. It should be more than enough if we are consistent with following the rules of the land.
Possibility — benign0 describes a lot of what is in Pilipinas: following the law or doing one’s job as citizen or employee as still being among the sub-standard and less-than-proper output of the majority. It is like “Of course, I vote”, the retort being “…but you vote idiots into office!”.
“It takes a certain kind of conceit and delusion to believe that what one does matters in the larger scheme of things.”
Well put. My response:
Well, you get a million chimps typing and eventually they hammer out a Shakespearean sonnet. You get enough bloggers hammering away, enough consciences speaking, and eventually they move the mountain.
The choice is do something, or do nothing. The conceit is in doing nothing.
Joe
“The best thing you can do is the right thing,
The second best thing you can do is the wrong thing
The worst is doing nothing”
Well we’re good on number 2 and 3.
Just do it.
http://www.moveonphil.org
Much worse than conceit is thumping ones foot down on the fellow who’s already down.
My people, the Filipino people, is down now, but we will rise. Give the people clean, efficient, and honest governance and the people will rise to the occasion.
One has to get out of the cultural cringe, wherever you are. The cringe begets a nonchalant cynicism.
Cultural cringe and objective SWOT analysis are apples and oranges :)
let the facts stand for itself and come to the conclusion accordingly.
PI is now one of the most corrupt countries of Asia, the KPI benchmarks show retrogression on nearly all fields. Snap out of denial and face the challenges head on.
We got the legal way to do corruption from the American Colonies! PI is a colonial designation. BTW BongV, the most corrupt country on earth is Afghanistan, another nation screwed up by the American Colonies!
Blackshama,
Right. The US did it. The dysfunctional Afghans, who have warred with each other for centuries, rather like some Mindanao clans, had nothing to do with it.
Rather like too many in the Philippines, eh, you lay it on the colonists. Filipinos have nothing to do with it.
Next you will argue that the US should just sit back and let its cities be bombed, because to do something about the real cause might interfere with someone else’s national lifestyle.
Get a grip, get a life. Get a perspective.
Joe
Joe,
Sorry Joe, I do try to separate America from American Imperialism.
But many know that Afghanistan is a puppet state just as South Vietnam was. That they helped Hamid Karzai in the elections, whether through fraud or through popularity. Karzai’s brother is both a drug dealer and employed by the CIA. People are deceived to blame the puppets or even the people themselves by having a “fair” election.
The U.S. Government is much too involved in the politics of other countries violating sovereign rights. There is an organized group in America (I suspect includes Federal Reserve) who push their interests through the government. One who was exempt was Pres. John Kennedy who respected the sovereign rights of South Vietnam.
http://www.rawa.org/temp/runews/2009/11/04/robert-fisk-america-is-performing-its-familiar-role-of-propping-up-a-dictator.html
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=15967
Edward,
The is in Afghanistan because the Taliban protected the instigators of terrorist attacks against the US. The US ousted the Taliban and gave Afghans a chance for democracy and Western style freedoms and wealth. That Afghan culture is steeped in corruption, warlordism, and extremist oppression – and is not suited for Western style freedoms and wealth — does not make the US attempt for reason and stability ill-motivated. The US would not be there except for its own defense. By what standard is this “imperialism”? What is the saying? The only ground the US requests from others is space enough to bury its soldiers.
Joe
Cynicism results when you are frustrated. We were also once an
Idealist. We know that our country is ruled by Fuedal Political
Warlords. We call it DATUISM. Ruling families rule Provinces as
their Private Fiefdoms. With their Private Armies or Private Political Machineries. National Politicians tolerate these “status qous”. It wins them VOTES by captive voting provincial population.
Unless we revise our way of thinking to a better level. We will
remain in the same political situations of family political dynasties
called FEUDALISM /WARLORDS (DATUISM). We the common people will
all have the same SCARCITY MENTALITY, as shown in prize game shows.
And the ruling political families will live in Mansions. Amidst
the shanties of the poor. You can see this situation in Maguindanao.
I dont have easy answer. Nor a quick fix. It is a bad political system. It is a WIN – LOSS situation for all of us.
No different from the Singsons, Crisologos, the oligarchs of Luzon and their private armies.
They are the same political dogs…
…. ergo… delusion of grandeur. hehehehe… peace Benign0.
oh sparky… It’s a state of mind. You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man’s freedom. You can only be free if I am free and the rest of the MANG Juan’s are free.
Violence exists in many forms and at multiple levels. Whether physical, verbal, sexual, or psychological, whether inflicted by individuals, groups, institutions, or nations, violence threatens the body in numerous and complex ways.
Freedom is like taking a bath — you have to keep doing it every day…
Don’t be a BenignO state of mind, it will not do you any good. I hope this feeling is temporary and you probably have moved on by now.
oh sparky… It’s a state of mind. You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man’s freedom. You can only be free if I am free and the rest of the MANG Juan’s are free.
Violence exists in many forms and at multiple levels. Whether physical, verbal, sexual, or psychological, whether inflicted by individuals, groups, institutions, or nations, violence threatens the body in numerous and complex ways.
Freedom is like taking a bath — you have to keep doing it every day…
Don’t be a BenignO state of mind, it will not do you any good. I hope this feeling is temporary and you probably have moved on by now.
Rule No. 1 in problem solving – identify the problem.
Using a solution that is far detached from the identified problem (or worse, using solutions without a specifically defined problem/goal) does not just merit cynicism – it deserves to be corrected – and that’s not being cynical – that’s being a realist.
Get real.
I can see the truth of what you are saying, but I still think that we must have purpose on our life’s journey; otherwise we just drift, and purpose means future, doesn’t it? How do we reconcile that with living in the present?
Does it matter whether we achieve our outer purpose, whether we succeed or fail in the world. Isn’t it helpful to understand the past and so understand why we do certain things, react in certain ways, or why we unconsciously create our particular kind of drama, patterns in relationships, and so on.
Life is wonderful, it’s for us to enjoy.
Sometimes I say to myself, I have reach the top of the stairs. For there’s nothing else to climb, but a podium.
Climbing down the ivory tower, is by far meaningful to me. So on the way downstairs, I can share my life’s moment to someone else climbing upstairs.
Excellent post, caffeine_sparks
Why the one dimensional perspective of what it means to be good citizens?
The people of the Philippines have not reached that level of appreciation yet. Tribal familist culture abounds in varying degrees.
Look at guy arrested yesterday. He put on a so called warriors headband similar to the ones worn by the Apaches as a sign of his artificial construct.
His face saying, what is the fuss all about? They were simply exterminating vermin in their minds.
We have to accept ourselves as Pinoys with all our warts. Philippines society straddles the line between barbarity and civility.
We with the means live in gated communities keeping those barbarians out. This massive failure of societal institutions we are all responsible for.
Civilization requires a categorical imperative to frame its existence. There are times when this imperative overshoots but the best safeguard is openness.
This is one time that the media gets to play a critical role. GMA should immediately sign the Rome Statute/Treaty and civil society groups should bring this to the International Criminal Court. Only by showing to the world how man can becomes a beast that we all help ourselves. Never again, never again….
The purpose of life is:
1. To Love – love yourself and your family, children, etc… love everybody.
2. To Live – live a full purpose driven life. Not just exist.
3. To Learn – learn as much as you can while you are breathing.
4. To Leave a legacy – leave something good and usefull for the next
generation. This is our purpose in living.
In dark times such as these, it’s doesn’t take much effort to have skeptical perception in everything. It’s easier to succumb and be overwhelmed by our surroundings. There is solace in despair, in apathy, in defeatism. In this path you do not have to hope, to have high expectations, idealism is lost. No bright future can be seen in the horizon.
It’s easy to see the wrongs, but it takes a lot of work to see the good. Anyone can easily focus on the weaknesses of a country (or even person) and write numerous observations. Ignoring accomplishments such as that of Efren Penaflorida, discovery of a new rice planting technique, Manny Pacquiao’s victory, and the strength of the Filipino character. It’s easy to see anything in a negative light. Just as it is easy to watch/read main stream media at prime time which capitalize on the negative. But If one cannot see the positive, how can one pursue on something that will give something positive?
I think its alright to be sad. But its important to have caution not to lose all hope. The greatest enemy right now is hoplessness and despair. If everyone just gets down on their ivory towers, who will be on the lookout? Someone must always be on guard and make sure that the torches are ablaze amidst the darkness.
@Edward
Multiply one law abiding citizen by 90 million = one great nation. Efren Penaflorida will then have to find another hobby to keep himself busy if and when this happens.
Efren P cannot do it alone. Besides, Efren does not have to do what he does if only the government allocated more funds into educating the people, especially those who do not have access to private schools. Education is every citizen’s right just in case you didn’t know. We should demand this. Start by voting for the right people in the coming election.
ilda: it will take a miracle before Pinas has enough money so that NGO and charity work like medical missions and Efren P’s “Kariton Klasrum” (pushcart classroom) are not needed. The tax base — the number of Pinoys who pay income tax — very small. A miracle needed so that there is a job waiting for one out of every two college graduates each year. You can cut the kurakot-kupit in two (and we know it takes a miracle to do this) and still not enough money to build the number of new classrooms needed much less pay for the teachers and principals for the classrooms.
Or maybe I am catching the cynicism virus, too.
Lito H
I believe you are not being cynical. You are just being factual.
I don’t really see Efren as the absolute solution. I long to see the day when Efren no longer sees the necessity to do what he does and the government starts serving its purpose. But as we all know, its a long way to go. I’m just glad to see that even when government fails, people rise up to serve selflessly.
BTW do any of you people know what’s the literacy rate in the Philippines? Just curious.
Your outlook in life depends on your way to look on any
situation. The glass can be half empty, or half full.
Inspite of the evil, the lack of hopelessness we can see. There
is hope. If we just work it out. It is easy to throw up our
hands. Just give up, for it is useless.
Look at the situation of Europe during World War II. Half of
Europe was under the NAZI leader Hitler of NAZI Germany. The
other half was under his bombardment in order to surrender.
America seemed to be not interested to help. A few brave
souls like Winston Churchill of Great Britain. WORKED and
WON. So long as your purpose is just. Dont give up!
When I said this I was actually partially thinking of the people at the Nazi camp Auschwitz who said they thought that they were going to be imprisoned for the rest of their lives and were not hoping anymore to be saved.
And the merry-go-round goes its merry way around again.
Poor Pinoys, the sorry subjects of subsidized beneficence from an enlightened minority.
I wish.
Sounds really like sparks here shares benigno’s perceived sense of cynicism in much the same breadth and limit – fine or not fine.
Where cynicism actually means getting isolated from mainstream or in fact insulated from what one presently preoccupies himself or herself with, either way it goes, something is wanting in the menu.
Point is, people do get the chance to travel around the world, get to see better settings, better governments, and better scheme of things. Ours, compared to any of the European countries or any states in America are really just ‘civilizations apart’.
This realization make cynics in us cry wolf. Even have to curse or condemn the Filipinos as inhabitants, and the country itself as the ‘worst place in hell’.
Cynicism at bottom is not a healthy kind of mindset and this pretention of one having to descend from an Ivory Tower is itself a myth.
BF does not have to descend from anywhere like an Ivory Tower. Doing things the way one perceives things should be is just the key to level off to that desired ‘intellectual threshold’. If people leave their country, it is just that they cannot fulfill their dreams here.
Simple, really.
The Benign0 state of mind is cynical about the Filipino madlang people,
(not just voters but also including Pinoy media people like EllenT or MLQ3). But the Bgz mind still has energy to write about “what should happen” like what Mar-NoyNoy should yap about if they had a platform like the Liberal Party platform.
http://antipinoy.com/heres-a-platform-but-no-ones-standing-on-it/
Huh? The LP platform has been there since way back, i’m surprised that they only found out about it recently. IAnyway, the Aquino-Roxas camp has also come out with their platform, hope the anti-pinoys can find out about it sooner this time around.
Since way back – sounds like a 19 kupong kupong platform in a digital word.
What’s being asked is the candidates platform NOT the LP platform – unless the LP is intellectually bankrupt as the candidates – and all they have to do is take the platform – hook, line, and sinker – even if it reeks with motherhood statements totally devoid of substance.
We all bring our perspectives to the table. Let me draw a parallel for those of you inclined to think like Blackshama, that the US retains some untoward colonizing agenda in its endeavors about the globe.
Let us project forward the most powerful Muslim Clan on Mindanao taking control of the entire island through ruthless faith-based order, or simply self-serving power as the faith. Through violence and intimidation, the Clan separates Mindanao from the Philippines as a Muslim state, then allows Abu Sayef to use its protected status to carry out attacks against Manila. After all, that is a bastion of Catholic infidels, daily sinning against the tenets of Islam, thereby insulting the Prophet.
That is a reasonable parallel to the condition of Afghanistan prior to US engagement there . . . call it “occupation” if you so inclined to twist a defensive motive into an offensive slant.
If that condition were to repeat in the Philippines, and the Clan turned its attention to Manila, bombing the major office towers there, what would you expect Manila to do? Roll over in quaking fear? Or bomb back? And screw what those sitting in comfortable arm chairs, with nothing to gain or lose, think.
Anyone who believes the US has an easy course should journey to Mindanao and file for governorship against Clan candidates. Reality will smack you in the face as it recently did some 60 innocent Filipinos, as it did the US when several thousand died in the World Trade Center bombings, as it does every day as its young Americans try to eradicate bestial, animalistic thinking in foreign lands.
The Devil resides on your own land. I suggest you focus your attention on him, ridding the landscape of his instruments, these animals, these less-than-men. The US is not your real problem.
Joe
Joe,
Let’s see if the pinoy-in-pinas gets a paradigm shift on this one. For now, let’s focus on how they would handle their own stupidity for letting this happen. And this is my people, what a shame.
Joe those people in the WTC did not know that the fury and anger that was being built up for years of Anglo-Saxon oppression by men who cleverly used the thread of Islam for men to channel what is really a struggle for national liberation in their own minds.
Now even a place in Waziristan is the center of battles. This is a place where once the British army also used poison gas against the natives.
Today the U.S. has had to become a smart colonial power. The main tool of dollar imperialism wearing thin. The emerging competitors to the U.S. now know that the achilles heel of the U.S. is the economy.
The lunatic fringe is becoming more and more dominant in the U.S. The U.S. and the multi-laterals continue to fund corrupt government to do their bidding.
The Philippine government is the moral hazard of the men who preach such high ideals about human rights but in the pragmatic real world they simply pay lip service to it.
Joe:
The Clan called Lopez and the posse of Clans called Zobel Ayala are already in control.
Ampatuan is just a side show.
Fact:
Rule of law: Vicarious Liability
example: The officer in charge of loaning guns to a person can be held vicariously liable for negligence committed by this person to whom the guns has been loaned, as if the officer was a principal and the person who fired the gun is his or her agent, if the person using the guns is primarily for the purpose of performing a task for the officer or principal.
Questions:
1.who oversees the proper purpose of the guns at the local level? is it not the Sr Ampatuan? if so then he is vicariously liable.
2. Who oversees the Sr. Ampatuan? is it not the higher commission?
I hope many pinoys will learn how to demand accountability and responsibility from their representatives. Majority of them are incompetent. Ampatuan Sr. must go to jail regardless if he was involved or was not present at the crime scene. The fact that he is the regional governor, his negligence of letting the guns be used illegally and the backhoe, will make him CONTRIBUTORY or an ACCESSORY before the fact.
No need for evidence or investigation. Strict Official DUTY to preserve peace and order is a primary function of any government personnel.
leytenian,
Liability wise, as the Laws declares it, as it is written.
If pinoy-in-pinas don’t get this. Let them be dumbasses Filipino.
Pinoy-in-Pinas, you have every right to the constitution, use it. Damn it!
p.s.
hi there girl, or should I say, you go gùrl.
Rule of Law: Illegal Purpose
The illegal purpose of the guns and backhoe. The guns were used for illegal purpose BEFORE the fact and the backhoe was used BEFORE and After the fact ( before=to dig and after =to bury) The crime committed by the Sr Ampatuan was his reckless decision to the act of his subordinates injurious to public health, morals, an obstruction of justice or a conspiracy to impede the current administration of the government.
Any person can sue any public official. The old story of the Pangandamans was also a perfect example of illegal use of the guns outside of their jurisdiction. Using it at the golf course was an abuse of power thru illegal use. The golf course did not have any insurgents that could pose a threat to their public duty that to carry a gun was necessary. Therefore the used( showing offf) of guns was illegal and inappropriate to be seen in the golf course. But now the Pangandamans are free of shit. Guns versus a golf ball? This country’s rule of law sucks…
One should recall a particular detail — Many things suggested by the 1987 Constitution do not have corresponding enabling laws. Pinoys can insist that things should be happening already (Hey! It is in the Constitution!!!) and Pinoys should continue to shout and insist they should get constitutionally-guaranteed rights (like cradle-to-grave health-care benefits, living wage for all, rice-self-sufficiency). Just expect to be frustrated. No enabling laws —> no implementation. If there is no law which says that there should be one classroom for every 100 students (as required by the constitutional right to education for all), then what you have is what you have.
Very important detail — it takes Pinas Congress to write the laws. If the people elected by Pinoy voters are of the caliber who do not write the enabling laws (and there may be good reason for missing laws, like Pilipinas is a poor country — not enough tax-revenue collected), then the Constitution will just “sit there” providing guidance, and the Pinas blogworld will continue to moan and groan.
May2010 elections, coming up! Very important because the GMA-replacement will most likely preside over the creating of a new Constitution.
Heartened to hear that some idealists are clambering out of their lofty perches. And hopefully, ready to deal with harsh realities seasoned and made palatable with well-thought compromises and less-than-perfect solutions.
Man is perfectible, but it does not appear to be so in this life.
Really sounds tempting to pack one’s bags and hightail it outta here. I’m being pestered to do that. I’m almost giving in. But it more feels that I’m being pushed out of this country. “You’re one of the good guys? Then get out!”
good guys don’t abandon the ship at the first sight of a slight breeze.
the bad guys abandoned the ship already then settled in the most convenient foreign land of their choice. some of them spend their time pelting vitriol at the ship they abandoned as well as at the good guys who stood it out with their beloved beleaguered ship.