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Comment by jister | Hacker News Reader

DISCLAIMER: I am a Filipino and I live in the Philippines.

Oh please not this crap again! People outside the Philippines are greatly misinformed by the media. Duterte did not order to kill everyone on drugs. That's bullshit! 600K+ that surrendered are proof of that. The problem is it seems all homicide and murders are now Duterte's fault which is what the news emphasized.

If you want to know what's really going on come to the Philippines. Don't judge based on what the news says.

Also, take into account that there's politics involve here. Oligarchs who have been controlling the country for decades hates Duterte because he wants Philippines to become Federal -- no monopoly anymore.

If Duterte did not won, we are in status quo right now. You will not hear this kind of crap in the news until we are a full-pledge narco state.

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Sorry, but Duterte has literally gone on record to state that even normal citizens should kill drug addicts:

"If you know of any addicts, go ahead and kill them yourself as getting their parents to do it would be too painful."

You literally sound like Trump supporters who bash the 'media' because they take his 'words out of context', when he does in fact, say those things clear as day.

Trump is the result of a reality show. Duterte is not. Why the hell would you compare the two?

If you even read my comment, I'm not even comparing Duterte to Trump, I'm comparing your logic to Trump's supporters' logic of holier than-thou, media is biased non-sense.

Yes the media can be biased, but in this case, he was quoted word for word (and he's basing his platform on that, so you can't just say the media is misrepresenting him)

Anyway regardless, I don't want to get to an extended discussion with you, as you seem deeply entrenched with your views.

I agree, further discussion will not yield to productivity because you assumed that you are talking to someone with poor logic in the first place.

From the article.

> And he has warned drug dealers in particular: "Do not destroy my country, because I will kill you."

This is a strong message. And he used the media to spread this message. I'm not jiving with the idea that the media is wrong and yet the president was using the media as a channel for this message.

I also live in the Philippines, but I'm a foreigner and I'm not taking a side on this. My boots on the ground observation is that people have been shot under mysterious circumstances before the new president took office and the same is happening now after, but maybe at a greater rate. But I don't fear for my life here. It isn't the wild west with guns blazing on the street.

That's a threat. If you are living here you will notice that criminals doesn't fear the law before Duterte took office. Why would they? Corruption is from top to bottom that nobody gives a shit what would happen to ordinary people.

There's a documentary video where the head PDEA (Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency) said that are ordered not to arrest drug pushers even if they know who and where they are. Obviously the order came from the top.

> There's a documentary video where the head PDEA (Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency) said that are ordered not to arrest drug pushers even if they know who and where they are.

Any links to this video?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUVA6GDinvM&feature=youtu.be

> If you want to know what's really going on come to the Philippines. Don't judge based on what the news says.

You say this like we're such a beautiful country whose drinking water doesn't make people in rich countries sick. And no, they aren't likely to come here with all the violence and the supportiveness of people like you. We'll probably get a travel ban by other countries and have a crashing tourism industry.

Last I checked, oligarchs are still in control. PLDT has a monopoly on telephone lines. Meralco has a monopoly on electricity. The Lopezes are dominating TV entertainment. The Ayalas own the business districts and have the top real estate projects and banks in the country. And you, you're still where you were before Duterte became president. Arroyo got away with corruption. Peter Lim fled the country despite accusations on pushing drugs. People are still poor, hungry, unschooled.

Nothing's changed. You just worship Duterte too much.

Nothing changed, really?! How about crime rate down to 45%? Freedom of Information is signed. A free 911 implemented. 8888 to call for corrupt politicians. Laglag bala scam gone. etc etc...

If you can't see changes today then you have problem. And really, you expect everything to change upside down in just 2 months? Are you on drugs?

> Are you on drugs?

If he was, would you murder him?

600K+ that surrendered are still alive today. Don't be stupid.

600K+ that surrendered did so out of fear for their lives. However, mattquiros doesn't seem like he's one of those who surrendered. So should he be fearing for his life right now? If "being on drugs" is enough of a risk that over half a million people surrendered, then what is accusing someone of being on drugs?

"People outside the Philippines are greatly misinformed by the media."

I'm not sure that the people inside the country are any better informed. For one thing, I'm curious as to how you were presented with the "600K+ surrendered" figure. That number sounds very high to me. Where are all these people now?

All details aside, sorry, but whereas once your country was on my 'to visit' list, it's been crossed off now. This situation must be costing a bucket of tourist dollars.

Why are you concerned with your safety now where crime rate is 45% down? You should've come here before Duterte took office so that you will experience the "laglag bala" or bullet scam in the airport.

I wonder what did the previous administration did about drugs. Then when Duterte was elected, thousands of drug pushers and users surrendered. It seems too obvious that there were a lot of government officials were involved since the law had been almost optional for the people to do crime while drug lords are running their business inside a luxury jail. Since this is a war, lots of people will die and some of them are innocent.

Sadly they did nothing that's why we are in this state now.

Why couldn't he use this huge public push to reform the courts and simply arrest and prosecute the whole drug-pusher military industrial complex? If he has the military power to kill everyone, he has the military power to imprison and document everyone's transgressions. Why is there so much support for police being able to kill people without much documentation? In an environment where a given administration can pretty much kill anyone they want, why would you expect them to not take advantage and eliminate rivals?

I get that drugs are a problem, but why the support for extrajudicial killings when you have the resources to arrest, prosecute, and document?

First, we are not federal/parliament. The public has no power here. Second, Duterte wants to operate within the bounds of the law that's why he doesn't simply kill anyone. Third, nobody supports extrajudicial killings. The problem is the media and human rights made it to look that way. They emphasized and generalized that all killings are the same. Remember that the Oligarchs owned the media and the one heading Human Rights is pro-Oligarchs. Basically all homicide and murders is now Duterte's fault. There was even an article in Time magazine that insisted that it's all Duterte's fault. It's all political.

> First, we are not federal/parliament. The public has no power here.

Apparently you have power to get someone voted into office that can then make pretty big moves within the political apparatus of the country. Could you expand on the idea of "no power" here? You literally have no legislative body? Mass murder or complete political gridlock are the only two options?

> The problem is the media and human rights made it to look that way.

So you're saying that there hasn't been a big bump in homicide rates at the same time as the new president has been saying he's going to kill a bunch of people? I mean, maybe the media is warping the picture. But how do you account for that pile of dead bodies over there?

I'm just not clear of your argument here. Oligarchs control the media so these dead bodies are fakes, and to hell with due process because the public only has the power of a gun?

We can vote, yes, but that's it. After that we rely if the leaders that we voted will actually perform their duties. Our legislative, Judicial and Executive branches of the government are largely influenced by the Oligarchs before Duterte took office. We have selective justice here. People running can defy a TRO (temporary restraining order) just what happened a few years back then the head of Legislative, De Lima, defied the TRO given by Judiciary. That was during the Aquino administration. It was also during the Aquino term that he bribe the Senate to impeach Justice Corona who is the head of Judiciary. This was all in the news back then but was quickly buried. There were masacres of farmers before. 1,819 killed in 2010 and 2,089 in 2011 by "riding-in-tandem" (crimes perpetrated by more than one person, usually two men, on a motorcycle) but was quickly buried too. There are a lot of injustice that has been going on here that you don't see in the news. Oligarchs-owned media have been covering it up ever since.

During the previous Aquino administration crime rate increase to 350% but that did not made news. Most of these crimes are drug related. Information were being controlled by our local media.

Due process are given to those who surrendered. In front of a drug suspect holding a gun, what do you want to police to do talk them to death?

Western media has been going heavy on Duterte as a brutal drug warrior. Your perspective is quite different.

Care to share some additional background to bend the narrative in a different direction than we may usually hear?

Western media based their report on our local media here which are largely owned by the same Oligarchs who wants Duterte out.

Did anyone of you know that during the past administration of President Aquino the crime rate increased to 350%? Yeah not kidding and nobody talks about this. Did all of you know that there were 1,819 killed in 2010 and 2,089 in 2011 by "riding-in-tandem" (crimes perpetrated by more than one person, usually two men, on a motorcycle)? Well nobody gives a shit back then, not the Human Rights or the Media. There were no "kill list".

Your background information of the previous administration is much appreciated. However, I don't think that that excuses any of the actions of the current administration.

This might be an excuse that you mean:

When people do drugs for at least 6 months, their brains don't function well that they could rape young children, sell all their stuffs in exchange for drugs, kill the taxi drivers and all the crimes that can come in your imagination. They will do whatever they want (which includes killings) for their own needs since they're already retarded addict and since a lot of people do drugs the crime rate gets to increase rapidly. Look now, the crime rate just got lowered except for the drug related crimes that is happening now since drug lords would kill all the people they do not trust and do everything just to avoid the consequence that could happen when they got caught. There's no joke about the actions of the current government.

You aren't pragmatic enough. Syndicated crime sets up the equivalent of parallel governments inside of your country. They compromise the integrity of your people by taking advantage of weakness and fostering distrust.

There is nothing to negotiate: you give these people money and they will just want more. You give in to their demands, or ignore them, and you become a part of the problem. A war suddenly becomes a lot more tempting to wage...

Excuses of what exactly?

If Duterte did not won, we are in status quo right now.

I don't see how the current situation is any better. I can certainly see how it would look like Duterte did more than the other presidents, though.

1. Well crime rate is down by 45%. 2. 911 is implemented. It's free by the way. 3. A lot more has happened in 2 months....

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