While surfing channels last Saturday out of lacking of something productive to do, I came across Media in Focus, a show on the ABS-CBN News Channel supposedly tackling issues about media. The usual corporate social responsibility media crap. They were discussing this issue about Brian Gorrell and his infamous blog (that struck me almost immediately after I realized this was the cheesy thing Bikay was talking about while my head was fixated on the laptop doing x-sight and Barry was busy polishing his Socio101 paper about a week ago) that attacked the junior crowd of our society’s upper echelons. Hahaha, mud slinging in the higher-ups, this is getting exciting.

I was about to discuss this issue in a pseudo political science - slash - elite families approach to Philippine society manner but my mind is currently in a state of goo after a hell of a month of research papers, so I think I’d just talk about it in the usual way—the twistedsasori way.

I know, Harry would argue that I was once a fan of Tim Yap (who is gravely involved in this issue), at least of his eclectic fashion style. But ever since I have read Brian’s blog (which is like, two minutes ago), I have lost any kind of admiration to this person. And yes, I am also talking about his clothes. Brian Gorrell’s blog is basically instated as his mechanism to recover the $70,000 his ex-boyfriend had duped him off. The guy was DJ Montano, of which the full name was slathered across Brian’s site that I am starting to have hallucinations of the name everywhere I look. According to Brian, he sent DJ money amounting to that for a restaurant they were supposed to put up in Greenbelt named Bonanza. And from here Brian’s blog branched off to a variety of topic, including cocaine abuse and biting off people’s heads.

I am not afraid of libel, and neither am I being salaried by any major network like ABS-CBN, so I think I can namedrop some of the people Brian mentioned in his blog. Oops, I think I already did in the previous paragraph. Anyway, the personalities included Tim Yap, Celine Lopez (Yes, the Celine Lopez of the Lopez clan and STAR columnist. The same clan that owns the TV network. I hope you’re starting to get the big picture), DJ Montano and I think a whole lot of other personalities that Brian referred to as ‘The Gucci Gang’. He could have not named it any better to capture the extravagant, apathetic and pseudo bacchanalian lifestyle these people live. Brian claimed this gang to have been really coked up people, judging from the way Brian described them. This issue has also been like the case study for Australian and Philippine libel laws, as Brian himself noted in his blog. Brian, welcome to the Philippine press experience where the freedom of speech is celebrated as long as it does not brush against the interest of those from the upper regions of society. This is the kind of freedom Korina Sanchez got a memo for, by just mentioning a news story about Lucio Tan on radio.

I liked the way Brian attacked the Philippine social structure in general (oh no, I’m starting to feel RED. You know what I mean. The crescent and the hammer wink wink). Its very refreshing when every once in a while a people from the outside slaps us into consciousness about the state we’re currently in, inequalities and all, because sometimes we get to become so desensitized about the issue of social disparity to the point that it reaches the state of normalcy to many of us. Brian pointed out that this kind of thing would never happen in Australia, and in terms of freedom of speech, it is held there at a premium, over any single family’s supposed ‘reputation’. Brian also laughs at the kind of media we have, especially ABS-CBN who has done so little to bring the spotlight to the story, and the one time they did, they warped the facts, which can be attributed to the reason that one of their kin is involved. The only media outlet Brian was happy about was the Inquirer though.

Back to the ANC show, the pace of the program was very restrained, and Luchi Cruz-Valdez also admitted that she is becoming extra careful not to be liable for libel herself (because broadcasting a libelous story, etc would be libelous too). The few things I liked about the whole discussion were UP anthropology professor Michael Tan’s view on the situation, explaining that the whole experience might be a way of people from below the economic ladder to get back at the elites (more specifically the middleclass laughing at the upper class, since those from the classes D to E have very little, if any access to the internet) and the addition of a new word to my vocabulary, schadenfreude (that means taking pleasure  from other people’s miseries). I also liked the way that in the legal aspect, it was stated somewhere in the show that our brand of libel law is designed to protect the well-off in life.

Right now, Brian is being harassed by the tentacles of our few well heeled families. He was investigated by the police took his computer away, as a response to the request of some blockhead there in the Philippine embassy in Australia, and of course we know who the people behind those actions were. This is so Gossip Girl. The only difference is that this is neither a novel nor the TV adaptation of it. This is real life. In this age of reality TV, its great fun to see that our supposedly prim and proper counterparts up there are really equally messed up like us.

For crying out loud, media, speak up! Do not hide under your corporate crap, refuse to be censored by corporate interests! Talk about this issue Goddammit! It tells a lot about our dysfunctions as a society and as a people. But I think the media will choose to be silent, that’s what bound to happen when money talks here in the Philippines, anyway. So I think it is left to us, the youth to do our part. Let’s talk about this in our blogs, send the issue through our emails, or even utilize text brigades if needed be. I’m just so sick of hearing families giving a Picasso to their daughter while 80% of the population is under the poverty line. Okay, I’m blabbering now, and I ended up giving it this entry a shade of red but I don’t know, maybe this issue just struck a patriotic nerve somewhere. I just hope that it did struck one in you too.

XOXO, twistedsasori.

I am not writing this to pick a fight, I am writing this because I can.

You wake up in a room 6:30 in the morning thousands of kilometers away from home. It took you about twenty seconds before your brain loaded into consciousness from slumber that you prefer to call a beauty rest. You realize that this was the same room you have been waking up to for the most part of the last three years that you have spent in Los Banos. You stare at the ceiling and pondered about your activities for the day while you wipe off the dried drool in your face. A few moments ago it flowed freshly from the corner of your lips to the pillow like a river of goo. This is yet another day.

You got off your bed and like a reflex action you automatically scoured the room for a mirror because you have to know if you still look good. Or at least convince yourself that you do look good. Once you've hypnotized yourself in deep Narcissism, you approach the sink to wash your face. You look at the mirror again. Lately you seemed to have a really good relationship with shiny objects because they let you check your reflection every two seconds. You wipe your face dry with a towel carefully doing that upward movement that you have learned from the stack of fashion magazines now resting in the corner of the room. It’s supposed to make your skin more firm and prevent sagging.

You fancy to be on the cover of those glossies in the future. You'd die for it. But all you had under your name was to star in a measly karaoke flick and do some occasional ramp modeling for a proletarian jeans brand. You try to be a model. In cyberspace, your profile proclaims that you are beauteous and professes your affection for cosmetics. You even murdered some words in the process. Still you do your best to create your fantasy identity. In your obsession you even dreamt a couple of times to have achieved the power to Photoshop yourself. You immediately airbrushed yourself to plasticity until you get your desired effect. But then you wake up and you end up more depressed.

You brush your teeth eventually until you feel your gums sting. Your teeth have to be perfectly pearl white, because you think the world out there is a giant fashion show. Never mind that the normal color of an adult human teeth is beige, you have to stand out. You only stopped brushing when you saw blood in your toothbrush. You skipped your breakfast just like the many mornings you have spent with an empty stomach. You have been an unknowing victim of anorexia and bulimia in your quest to attain the perfect figure, just like the millions of other women in America. Afterwards you go to the bathroom to take a shower. Stripped of clothes, you looked at yourself again in the mirror there. You hate your dark complexion. You hate to be referred to as a black beauty.

You lather yourself with chemicals purported to give you a fairer complexion but you have realized by now that it does not work. You shampoo your hair with the most expensive brand you can find in the grocery. And that goes for the conditioner too. Your hair is something you are genuinely proud of, the one thing about you that is not debatable. You sometimes wish you'd wake up in a parallel universe where people have been reduced to great lumps of hair, where in there; you would be the most beautiful. But reality bites, not everything we wish comes true.

You dry yourself and sat near the bed. You look at the clock, 7:35. You have consumed more than an hour scrubbing yourself hoping that it would kill all the melanin in your skin, but it doesn't work that way. You stood up and opened your closet and gazed at your wardrobe. You picked up an incandescent pink blouse and a pair of jeans courtesy of your sideline in the pseudo-catwalk. You don't care if pink doesn't go that good with a dark skin but you chose to wear it anyway for the day. In Paris you could have been arrested for crime against the fashion industry, but hell you are in one of the country's premiere university’s campus that puts premium in diversity. You surely are an endangered specie. Still you were not contented. You once tried to apply for the main campus but didn't make it; all the embarrassment pushed you to keep all that have transpired a secret.

You worm your way to fit into your clothes. Then from your bag emerged your new best friends. You splattered liquid foundation all over your face to conceal every little bit of imperfection. As you gently rubbed over your cheek area you remembered your friends in high school. You cannot forget their photos in the World Wide Web. They were unquestionably mocking you. You squint at your seat at the thought of it but you realized that you can't blame them. You have ditched them for a pair of lipstick and mascara. You recall the every single instance that you stood them up. Even your former teachers who have waited for you patiently in a local food joint were not saved from this. You have even devised a list of excuses that goes from an unexpected out of town trip to a lightning fast round trip from Quezon City to back to your campus. You'd pass for a great fictionist.

You grabbed your mascara then your eye liner. You poked them around your eyes until they impede your sight. For you, this is the definition of make-up; the more, the merrier. Then you pulled out your lipstick. You want it sultry and seductive. You have already graduated from the lip-gloss phase where you appear to have devoured a whole lechon with the oil stuck in your lips. Now you look just like a manananngal after a human meal with your bloody red kisser. You looked at the clock, its 8 am.

You are not alarmed although you know that you are going to be late. You like to be late. You like the attention; you crave for it, especially if the attention came from the boys. You want them to burn with desire on how deliciously you have made yourself look like, though most of them think that you look like a slut. The best slut in town. You want the idea of voyeurism that’s why you have sold yourself to sites like ModeloAko.com just to proclaim your supposedly model status. You darkened your primary picture’s background there to hide the plates and kitchen utensils in the backdrop. But you forgot that most of the people now know how to use Photoshop, they’ve already blown your cover. You’ve spent hours in front of the webcam just to find your perfect angle, but it never came so you settled for the in-your-face cheek pose. The same pose your friends copied that infuriated you.

You grabbed your kikay bag and stood near the door. You took one more gaze in the mirror until you have realized that you have done everything humanely possible to improve your looks. Right now, aside from the cosmetics, you also have friends who have no other choice but to hang out with you because you are stuck in the same college. You headed to the door and left for school. Halfway to class you have realized that you have forgotten something. You forgot to do your homework.

*Disclaimer: Any likeness to any actual person/s, living or dead, is purely coincidental