WHY THE PHILIPPINES NEEDS A SUPERMAN

The past few months have been very tough for the Philippines and that is why my five day stay in Singapore last week could have been a welcome respite so to speak, against the very bad news that have been coming out in the country. I was wrong.

Barely two days in Singapore, I saw a shocker in CNN about how 57 persons, twenty or plus of them journalists, were treacherously, brutally, and mercilessly butchered in Maguindanao over what is initially seen as the start of what the Philippines is best known for- election violence. There is no amount of words that can express my disgust over this senseless killing. When will the Philippines ever be spared of these problems that have been coming one a plenty in recent times.

While in Singapore, a continuous re-run of my favorite movie, Superman starring Christopher Reeve was shown over HBO. I must have seen this movie a hundred times but it never fails to amaze me each time I see it. Nevermind that the special effects were crude compared to what we see now in the CGI ladened movies in Hollywood. The spirit of a Superman movie was what counts most.

It certainly brings back great memories of my childhood for the same happens to be the first film I have seen in the big screen. As a young boy, I dreamt of having superpowers, to be able to do anything beyond the realm of imagination and eventually become the instant solution to problems that befall mankind. As I grew up, the fantasy of becoming a superhero diminished but at times when big and seemingly insurmountable problems come our way, while I do not necessarily fantasize of being one, I did hope that out of nowhere, faster than a speeding bullet, someone in a red cape and blue suit suddenly appears in the sky, to capture the moment and take the cudgels for mankind.

The last time I entertained these thoughts about having Superman in our midst was during the great earthquake and the eruption of Pinatubo of the early nineties. At a very young age, helpless at that, all I could do at that time was to pray silly to God- that if possible Superman comes from out of nowhere to save the day.

Silly I was then, and silly again I was this year. But who wouldn’t be with all the typhoons that came our way? Hundreds of homeless people borne out of the great floods, and a lot still stationed in evacuation centers where they wait for food rations just so that they can get by each day, and where they queue for hours before they can use a common toilet. The typhoons did not even have to come in the first place if Superman was there to change their routes where they cannot cause damage. And if they did, surely Superman can suck all the floods away after the damn politicians failed to fix our drainage which have been clogged because, similarly, the damn people like us failed to put away our garbage properly.

Superman’s help would have done the trick against all the helicopters that crashed this year. Like what he did with the Daily Planet chopper, he could have caught any airforce helicopter from crashing with his bare hands saving the lives of everyone on board. The only difference is that the Daily Planet chopper wasn’t dilapidated like the ones our poor air-force buddies have been using all these years. Ours were even lucky enough to fly that if they did crash, such could have been divine providence just so that new ones, este, a little bit refurbished models could be brought in at higher cost on the part of the government. And if they did have to crash with our corrupt politicians on board, I hope Superman was busy doing something else, just so that he would not arrive in time to save them. But he would not do that of course as he makes no exception on who to save or not. He does not practice double standard unlike our elected officials who at a daily basis only know the ones from whom they derive benefit. The poor ones they only know during the elections.

Same goes with our ports. I know Superman would not mind tending them just so that unscrupulous ship operators cannot overload their ships during peak months in order to double their profits in the process endangering the lives and limbs of their passengers. While capable, I’m sure Superman would not enjoy picking dead bodies at sea which takes weeks, maybe months for our Coast Guard to finish.

Certainly, PACQUIAO wouldn’t mind sharing the limelight with Superman in inspiring the Filipinos. We rally behind PACQUIAO in each of his fights and bask in his glories afterwards like we were up there with him in the ring. Similarly, I know we would be screaming our hears out when we get to witness Superman’s exploits unfolding before our eyes, every second of it far more fantastic than every round the PACMAN clobbers the opposition. But unlike we do with PACQUIAO, we wouldn’t be backsliding against Superman, for unlike the latter whom we suspect of being an infidel, the Man of Steel only had eyes for Lois Lane, notwithstanding the millions of adoring fans who are willing to have their minds read by him.

Oh why oh why is Superman just a figment of JERRY SIEGEL and JOE SCHUSTER’s imagination? From a thousand miles away, he could have heard danger lurking and could have flown like the wind and prevented a single shot from hurting those innocent civilians in that fateful day in Maguindanao. Better yet, as CLARK KENT, he could have formed part of the press convoy which joined the Mangadudatus and without the need for a phone booth simply change from his press suit to his costume and cut short the braggadocio of men who borrow courage from pieces of metals that they call guns. I could just imagine how he would catch every shot fired and then strangle those “cowards” necks with their own firearms like he did in the movies. That said, there would have been no 57 families despairing over the sudden and tragic loss of their loved ones. There wouldn’t be additional children who would grow up with one less parent, and there wouldn’t be any more news featuring dead bodies in the headlines in the guise of journalistic freedom. The search for all these loose firearms would have been cut short for these couldn’t escape his xray eyes. In addition, there would be no forty or so lawyers who would reason out the need to protect the innocent just so that they could defend the most glaringly guilty of suspects who up to the end would like to make feces out of our laws.

If Superman was true, there wouldn’t be a need for politicians pretending to be heroes in their distinct red, white, blue and yellow shirts for he can don all these colors all at the same time without even having to promise to get things done sans the publicities. There wouldn’t be segregation due to shirt color, no yellows attributed to promised change and greens symbolizing the powers that be. There wouldn’t be cheats, or people employing cheats just so that they can win in elections and do a DAVID BLAINE to make money out of their elected posts. If Superman was true, there wouldn’t be the need for all of these. We have had enough. Let us just bring in Superman if we could.

But Superman isn’t true. And because he is not, we need to watch over each other's backs just so that we would be assured that no foolish guys were surveying our asses. Because he is not, we have to be constantly reminded that you and me, our loved ones, despite of the amount of hero worship we give unto them, and the admiration and expectations we visualized they could do, commit mistakes too. That if they fall short of our expectations, we should understand somehow that they could have given everything we wanted, performed exceeding the limits, show up in the right place at the right time, just like what Superman does, except that their humanities can only do so much. Sometimes love makes us believe that we can do everything, or that our better half was God’s answer to all our problems that we tend to forget that what makes them superhero in our eyes is the love we have for them. For I am sure that given the chance, our loved ones would willingly bite the bullet for us, and face even their most frightening kryptonites, regardless of the consequences, provided that they are there.

Lastly, we may be foolish at times in believing that we need a Superman as an answer to all the problems that come our way. But when realization sets in that he is just a product of creative writing, it is time for us to step up, stop whining, and start picking up the pieces. We do not have to don a blue suit and red cape to be a superhero. All we have to do is dig deep into our system and start believing that we were created from the image of the greatest Superhero that ever lived.