I very rarely – if I ever – write a “final cut;” I refuse to be the guy who has a final word on anything. Granted that a lot of bloggers already had something to say about the Valley Golf incident between Delfin dela Paz, DAR Secretary Nasser Pangandaman, and Masiu Mayor Nasser Pangandaman, Jr.; yet my passing thoughts here are not meant to be the be-all-end-all of this feud. That’s the job of the courts, considering that the case/s has/have already been filed.
Yes, it’s the proper forum. Well, don’t that beat all.
Yet over the past few days that I didn’t write about the Valley Golf brawl, I did have some time to chew on the dozens of blogs – and versions of the incident – that have come up since December 26 of last year when the incident happened:
- On the one hand, there’s a claim (the Bambee dela Paz version) that it was the Pangandamans who instigated the incident.
- On the other hand, there’s a claim (the Pangandaman supporter/sympathizer version) that it was Delfin dela Paz who started the brawl.
Like I said before, it’s difficult to be a fence-sitter on this issue. Again: the Pangandaman-dela Paz feud is an “expanded version” of everyday abuses many of us encounter from Government officials. The question as of late is whether or not some members of the blogging community are judgmental, or have prejudged the incident, on the basis of Pangandaman being a Government official.
I won’t wash my hands of the issue: I did, in fact, became rather judgmental and critical of the Pangandaman side on the basis of two things:
- Pangandaman and his bodyguards had no right to beat anyone up.
- There is an injustice in the caprices of our Government officials; the fact that the brawl happened in a golf course is just one of the many levels of injustices that are to be explored in this incident.
OK, for that, sorry.
The new “problem,” so to speak, is whether or not the blogosphere was right to take on this issue as a sort of “advocacy.” Now that the details are getting a bit clear, some bloggers and commenters may be right to claim that a lot of Pangandaman critics in the blogosphere are backpedaling on the issue a bit.
Maybe it was a bit pre-judgmental, maybe the verdict was a bit prejudiced, advanced and tried in the court of public opinion; in this case, the Philippine blogosphere.
Then again, was it? Hmmm…
