SIXTY years ago, unchecked authority and brutal power of the state were laid bare by the student movement: anti-Vietnam war protests in the US, occupation of universities in France, Britain, Italy, spreading eastward to Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaya and the Philippines, demonstrated how the combined power of students and workers can effect transformative changes in society.
The anti-authoritarianism and pro-democracy movement spread its wings internationally, without the worldwide web.
In the Philippines, mass demonstrations by students, workers, peasants and the under-represented of society reverberated in the streets, campus walls and union shops. No internet. Just personal and group solidarity spearheaded by the First Quarterstormers.
What a difference internet makes.
Thirty-five years after the worldwide web became publicly available — followed by the commercial browser Navigator, dial-up America Online, the birth and domination of Google, Chrome besting other browsers Firefox, Opera and even Microsoft’s own Explorer — mass demonstrations have been replaced by silent outrage.
Ranting on Reddit, Messenger, Facebook, X, Instagram, Telegraph stream silent codes that scream in a vacuum.
Even the million marchers of the “No Kings” rally in the US fail to change the narrative of a Divided States of America or hide the fact that the current authoritarian president’s policy of America First prances above the law, reveling in the sycophant admiration of the “yes men and women” in his administration and blind admiration of the MAGA trumpeteers.
Blindness and silence are not an American monopoly.
Veil of corruption
From the Guinness record holder for executing the “greatest robbery of a government” of Ferdinand Marcos the Father, corruption has ensured poverty, widening inequality between those who need and those who simply want.
Marcos the Father is said to have pillaged $10–$20 billion.
The succeeding six-termer presidents continued the legacy of corruption, the total of which even dwarfing the father’s record as reported on Dec. 2, 2025, by the East Asia Forum.
“The Philippines has lost an estimated P42.3–P118.5 billion ($713 to $2 billion) a year from flood control corruption since 2023. The scale of illegal wealth accrued by contractors and congresspeople from flood control public funds has left many outraged and dispirited. Media investigations, statements by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., and government hearings have exposed how deeply this corruption runs.”
In a published article, SEC Chairman Francis Lim didn’t mince words: “Corruption is a weapon of mass wealth destruction.”
It also deprives Filipinos of some P8.8 trillion drained from public coffers, which not only “directly fuels the country’s ballooning debt (projected to reach P19.143 trillion by the end of 2025), funds that could have been used to lift all boats instead of just the golden yachts.
“Instead of financing transformative infrastructure, universal health care, or climate resilience, borrowed funds have been used to plug budget gaps created by graft, vote buying, and elite capture. The result is a fiscal system distorted by corruption and sustained by debt dependency.”
And yet, other than intermittent demonstrations against this fiscal monstrosity, the public response has been a deafening silence. They curse the darkness inside their minds or under the cover and safety of Facebook, Reddit, Instagram, X profiles and TikTok reels.
Ang kakambal ng busog ay tulog.
A full mouth purchases protest.
Institutionalized safety valves prevent explosion. Congressional hearings and media coverage start fast and furious, until the next corruption or scandal explodes and the cycle continues.
The three- and six-year cycle of elections prevents a collective implosion, kindling embers of hope as candidates promise a better future until the present is past.
Those who can live with their ritualized existence, hoping for careers that never come, a mirage of a utopian future that may still appear.
Some brave the odds, pawn their present for a few dollars more — and leave.
The Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) says the Philippines now has more than 10 million Filipinos worldwide, including the 2.5 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who despite being just 2 percent of the Philippine population contribute close to 9 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).
In December 2025, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas reported that remittances from overseas Filipino workers “rose 4.2 percent year on year to $3.52 billion in December 2025, driven mainly by higher inflows from land-based workers.
The year’s remittance was a record $35.63 billion, up 3.3 percent from $34.49 billion in 2024.
OFWs raise their voices through silent financial transactions. Their families keep their misgivings and protests within the safe confines of homes, among trusted family members and friends.
The titans continue their rule, keeping the silent majority within the bandwidth of the internet. Apparently, the billionaires discovered how to keep the safety valves open.
Only an implosion or explosion of this silent outrage can result in transformative changes in this decade.
I look forward to it as a First Quarterstomer in the last decades of his life.