EDITORIAL - The rights of one cancels not the rights of others

When "unretired activist" Renato Constantino Jr. crashed (he was uninvited) a press conference called by the leadership of the House of Representatives and stood up to speak without having been recognized, he was, at the very least rude and impolite.

Explaining his actions later, Constantino said he needed no invitation to the press conference nor an acknowledgement to speak because he was a "law-abiding citizen" who was exercising his right to express himself.

No one is disputing Mr. Constantino on that point. But perhaps Mr. Constantino should be reminded that invoking his rights as a citizen does not automatically result in the cancellation of the same rights of others.

In fact, Mr. Constantino not only needs to be reminded, he should be lectured about the dangers of invoking one's rights as a citizen and taking it to mean as a license to do anything. Imagine what horrors we face if all 87 million Filipinos thought like Constantino.

Why, how would Mr. Constantino feel if somebody barged into his house and, invoking his right as a citizen to be able to sleep soundly at night, slapped him silly for being such a noisy snorer?

Indeed, shortly after he disrupted the press conference, Mr. Constantino got a dose of his own medicine when Vic Agustin, a business gossip columnist of the Inquirer, got a glass of water and emptied its contents on his face.

We do not question the Inquirer's prerogative in suspending the column of Agustin for a day. But we take the relatively light "punishment" to mean it tacitly agreed with the action of Agustin. And rightly so. Those who saw the incident on tv say a punch was more appropriate.

Thus Mr. Constantino should consider himself lucky he only got cold water on his face. But he should now be forewarned not to repeat his antics elsewhere because some people might just invoke their own rights as offended citizens with more vigor and zeal than Agustin.