Service Honor Justice
Apparently, people are finding it convenient to blame the uniform and as a result of this, our own police service itself might quite easily identify itself with ideals that should in no-wise belong to it and this should not be the case.
I've heard it said, O my nation, that our first responders - in this case, our cops - are only too well remembered when they are called for and all the times they are called for are those times we would rather soon forget.
With the current climate of our Republic not fair-going at this time, it shall behoove this nation to exercise more prudence and discernment in the passing of judgments like these. It would not be right for any of us to forget that in the courts of public opinion, we should always take into our best regard the disinterested, anonymous service of many of our nameless first responders.
Why?
First of all, it is impossible for any nation to exist were it not for the common decency of its own people. The very marrow of Country lies in the strength of its prevailing sense of morality.
And in the sphere of community policing, if there were no decent cops left in the nation to uphold the public peace, civil society would soon begin to implode under the sheer weight of the forces of crime and anarchy.
But since we are still very much here, I think it is reasonably safe to say that not all of our police officers who are serving in the PNP are either corrupted or misled.
There must be more than a few people in our national civilian police service who know what they are doing and who they are serving and try as hard and as best they can to live up to their ideals of Service Honor Justice.
True there is much to improve upon at the wake of this incident, and the on-going investigations spearheaded by Secretary de Lima of the DOJ, and the political commitment of our President, PNoy, ascertain for us that these improvements are sure to be forthcoming.
But these are improvements still that have to be built upon the enduring ideals of Philippine community policing.
The guilty should never be punished with the innocent.
Lastly, there was a recent news article about a successful handling in Silver Spring, Maryland of a hostage-taking incident at the Discovery Channel last September 1. It was the talk some days ago. Again, there was much despairing: Why were the U.S. cops successful and why were our cops not? It's useless...
No it's not.
We should not try to compare ourselves with other nations just to be reminded of how less and less we are of ourselves. We must never compare ourselves to other, more mature endeavors of Country only to see how spectacularly we are able to fall short of who we are supposed to be. This is being bitter.
We have our own path to tread as a nation - our own arcs in the sky. When we do compare, we should measure the distance by the light of our longing for a better Philippines. This way we are apt to become more empowered to be who we are supposed to be - ourselves - a nation distinct from all the other nations of the one family of the nations of Mankind. This is being faithful.
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Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.