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I am
convinced by what Aristophanes, the great Athenian comic
dramatist, said that under every stone lurks a
politician. I like the prospect of finding politics and
politicians under every conceivable nook and cranny,
beneath shades where their pallor and, perhaps, their
true color can remain hidden from view. I savor the
thought that, indeed, under stones, almost dead, can be
found men and women who believe they are the ones to
chart our lives and our destiny.
The
truth is politicians never die; they just reinvent
themselves at the expense of people’s perspectives, and
with the help of experts whose presence and clout are
really due to us in the media.
What
better site to review these beings called politicians
and leaders than via the well-documented, thoughtfully
followed, albeit overanalyzed US primaries. I thought I
knew Americans. I thought we in the Philippines,
especially those who have gone to higher education, have
really developed a keen sense of smell about American
politics and politicians. I have to admit now I’m wrong.
At best, I hold on to stereotypes, and these are stock
images mostly engendered by instruments of the media and
some literature. I have to admit, too, that in this way
of seeing, I tend to define by default local politics
and local politicians. I have been unfair all the time.
The
antipoor sector in the media—and they are many and they
are not conscious of this—will tell us that Filipino
voters do not really go for the thinking side of
politics. That in this battle for position, we honor
more the gladiatorial: the ones that stand alone and
strong are those who have slain their opponents. Killing
by politics (literally in some of our towns and cities)
happens through a discourse where one dismisses the
other and, by the power of words and, believe me, by the
lack or even absence of logic. Now, in the coverage of
CNN and Aljazeera, two of my favorite networks, I am a
witness to a nation that, like this republic of ours,
has its share of soothsayers and pundits whose words do
not so much depend on the mirror or some oracle than on
a community that believes what it wants to believe.
There
are two images that run as separate strands of a
narrative told in many ways. One image is Barack Obama;
the other is Hillary Clinton. They are the present
ink-blots and, oh my, they do give away a lot of this
multi-ethnic nation called the US of A.
It is
mighty interesting to listen to media commentators talk
about how different Obama is from Hillary without ever
mentioning the racial divide. Race, of course, has
disappeared in discourses. In anthropology and allied
sciences, race is a discredited concept. Many social
scientists agree that the construct does not really
capture the elements of being a person, of being
different. Still, there is a big difference between what
academics have sifted theoretically to be limited and
what some people think about things out there. Is this a
case of political correctness? Or, is this one case of
media people convinced that the nation is not anymore
voting along colors or ethnic profiles?
A few
days before the
Iowa primary, a discussion went on the air about what
Americans like or do not like about their candidates.
The forum centered on emotionalism or the display of
emotions. An expert (for don’t we all become experts
when placed before the camera?) was delivering footnotes
on footages that showed candidates who readily displayed
their tears or did not hide the lump in the throat, or
disguised choking points. Comments were thrown about how
the display manifested not honesty or forthrightness but
a kind of weakness. Lack of control was one phrase
blurted. The photos moved from a female candidate and
finally to Hillary Clinton. The forum had it unsaid: it
was there again on that issue of men being able to check
their emotions and women not being able to do that at
all.
We know
the spin already: the young African-American male
Democrat candidate won the first primary in
Iowa. For a media industry that can be critical about
fuzziness, very few indeed brought up the issue of
motherhood statements, these totally abstract points
dramatized to a keening point by Obama. When
Clinton
won the second primary, media experts and commentators
had to zero in on that moment, shown on TV repeatedly,
capturing Hillary being “emotional.” Finally human, as
they said.
Given
this, I see a nation that is not really that much
different from ours. Review our own political landscape
and you find a stage that is frighteningly theatrical.
The winners mostly are those who are able to master the
art of impression management, if we are going to borrow
Erving Goffman’s old but astute concept about
personality presentation. You know, the backstage person
who faces the audience with the skill to exploit the
footlights.
Even as
I do not believe we have all become gender-sensitive, it
is still amazing how the old debate about manhood and
womanhood has remained one of the most contentious
issues, outside of religion.
In an
analysis about how Hillary’s “emotional” moment brought
votes and, not only that, the women’s votes to her camp,
another mind reader tells us that the vote for Hillary
in New Hampshire was really a vote against the media.
Come again?
Yes, the
poll critic was explaining. Newspapers and TV have
painted Clinton, a woman, as emotional. The women did
not like the slant, that women are emotional. Their
anger against that stereotyping got translated into a
vote for the woman—Hillary—caricatured. Their vote for
that woman was really a vote against the media, which is
perceived to remain antiwoman. It is circuitous as only
bland excuses go. If you are lost, don’t worry; people
are lost in politics even when it is not analyzed.
Infotainment? Media networks have labeled this Tuesday’s
primaries as the Super Tuesday. This is the day when a
large number of states hold their primaries. The name
calls to mind huge sports events. If that is not enough,
an episode in Aljazeera showed an interview with an
amateur boxer, an African-American, who echoed what is
said to be the mindset of young African-American voters,
that the Tuesday will be a knockout for Obama.
This is
a dangerous prediction if you factor in the fact that in
the fight or exchange of blows, a woman is fighting a
man. But who cares? Anything and everything is possible
in politics, including the use of religion and the
procession to prop one’s image as the leader of
tomorrow. After all, that the gods kiss those who are
good—and winning—is the best endorsement still one can
get in what we are deluded to take as the secular arena
of politics. |
