The right thing

Like everyone else, I’ve always had problems doing the right thing. Yes, I’m no saint. In fact, a favorite saying of mine is “To err is human, to forgive is divine.” I particularly love the first part of that saying.

But, since I was a kid, my parents-- especially my mom – tried hard to teach me and my siblings to do the right thing most of the time, if not all the time. I was a regular little rascal when I was little, and my father (who always believed that by sparing the rod, you are spoiling the child) didn’t think twice in whacking me with a broomstick or a leather belt whenever I did something stupid. Yes, I remember those times like it was yesterday; my butt being at the receiving end of my father’s weapon of choice, leaving it swollen like a frat neophyte’s legs.

Of course, as a child, you fail to put things in proper perspective, chiefly when it comes to punishment. In my case, I’m thankful that my parents raised me right, although it took me a long time to realize this.

Lately, though, I don’t know if my parents still want me to do the right thing.

I’ve always been vocal about my disgust with Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo since she lied about not running in the last presidential elections. I’ve always been vocal about my anger for GMA when she joined George W. Bush in waging his war in Iraq, which the late Pope John Paul II protested aggressively against. I’ve always been vocal in expressing my contempt for GMA for obviously rigging the last elections just so she could cling to the presidency. Now I’m aggressively vocal about scorning GMA’s move to stifle the citizens of this country in their quest of seeking the truth. I once blurted out while watching the late night news that GMA should not be stupid enough to declare martial law. I was surprised and shocked of my father’s response: “That’s the right thing to do (declare martial law). She gave every chance so that the opposition could topple her. Now that they’ve failed, that’s her way of retaliating.”

I’m not sure if this is the same father who once told me that I was lucky not to have experienced martial law in Ferdinand Marcos’s time; the same father who once trooped to EDSA many years ago to help bring down a tyrant; the same father who cursed Marcos to the heights of heaven and the depths of hell; the same father who once taught me to always do the right thing, and gave me a terrible beating to prove his point.

But, because my father has taught me well, I know that what I believe in is the right thing; that speaking out against a tyrant who has rivaled (maybe even surpassed, who knows?) Marcos is the right thing and that by doing everything that I can do to help bring her down is the right thing.

When I was still active in the student publication in college and I joined rallies at the height of my activism, my mom told me to stop. She said that it was just my youth, that it was just my idealism. She said that what I was doing was wrong. She asked me to do the right thing, to stop joining rallies. To stop being an activist. I believed what I did was right, but I stopped anyway. It’s because I love her, and I don’t want to worry her. But now, in this case, if I should be forced to take to the streets again, I won’t give in to her pleading. It’s because my parents have taught me well.

I want to do the right thing.