In less confusing times, the act of those who stuck it out with ousted speaker Jose de Venecia right to the very end would have earned them the highest of praises. They would have been hailed as paragons of the virtue of loyalty.
To be sure, their sacrificial act did not go unnoticed, and they still drew the sincerest of admirations. But these were consigned to the deepest of personal silences, as if making a clean breast of true feelings would invite a crippling slap of the plague.
On the other hand, those who set de Venecia adrift all alone in the turbulent seas of crappy Philippine politics were vociferously vilified as if they were traitors when, in less confusing times, they ought to have been justified in finally setting things aright.
Unfortunately, things have gone topsy-turvy and nothing is what it seems any longer. The president of the land is suspected of high corruption and fraud but people, unable to find the inspiration to yank her out, end up unwittingly protecting her by their indifference.
At the bottom of the ladder, those who never had a shot at life have suddenly found themselves cloaked in fleeting veneers of self-importance, never mind if they are just being used as convenient pawns by manipulators out to carve out greater concessions for themselves.
And somewhere in-between, in a mind-boggling myriad of levels, is the swirl of madness that has engulfed everyone. Once mortal enemies now share the same bed. Sinners have become saints and shepherds have become the led.
The muck of society have risen to become edifices that people, in their confusion, now look up to as exemplars of purity and sinlessness. There is great passion toward cleaning up the backyards of other people and never mind their own.
This is Philippine society today, a slowly disintegrating mass of leaderless citizens fending off for their own selves, making up and improvising their own rules as they go along, and meeting out swift punishment at the slightest effrontery.
If there is still a God in this whole equation, He has difficulty getting His own message across. And who can blame Him, when his own ministers confuse their own ministries with those of others.