EDITORIAL — Something terribly wrong in a killing society

The recent murder of a congressman, the bomb-rigging of the vehicle of another, and the reported death threats on yet two other congressmen seem too chilling to be true. But in fact they are true, leaving us to wonder what is happening to our country.

As if the unresolved murders of close to a hundred journalists since democracy was restored in 1986 were not enough, the recent attacks and threats on congressmen are forcing many Filipinos to come to the conclusion that no one is same anymore.

Journalists and congressmen are supposedly not ordinary people. But if they can be felled by assassins bullets with seeming impunity, then the vast majority of Filipinos who are less influential have every reason to feel defenseless.

And indeed they are. Killings happen everyday across the country for a variety of reasons. But the most disturbing of all are those that can be described as systematic, those that are born of decisions to eliminate.

It is very easy to blame these killings on the failure of law enforcement. And maybe they should be. But the killings can also be due to weak leadership. Perhaps some sectors are running amuck on the belief that nobody is in control of the situation anymore.

Yet that is not all. To most God-fearing people, killing is an abhorrent act. People who know right from wrong know it is a sin to kill. People who are civilized find killing unjust and unwarranted.

Despite these premises, we find that killings are in fact escalating, leading us to the inevitable conclusion that there is a failure somewhere in those who are tasked to shepherd mankind away from the path of this evil.

Some argue it is unfair to blame the moral guardians of society for the carnage. But rightly or wrongly, murder happens because of the loss of compunction by one man to kill another. When that happens, it is proof of the failure of man to distinguish right from wrong.