Journalists and the Truth under Threat

 

A Japanese journalist has been arrested and held in prison in Myanmar for reporting the news. He is accused of reporting “fake news” under the tough restriction on reporting by the military junta. The killing goes on but it is not mainstream journalists that are widely reporting it. A new generation of amateur volunteer journalists- the civil reporters- who are often in the thick of the demonstrations reporting live over the internet when it is not shut off.

In Zimbabwe, two Spanish journalists, David Beriain and cameraman Roberto Fraile, have been killed in an ambush attack against an army convoy in the tri-border Sahel zone of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso in the African Sahel region. They were on the way to a national park where poachers and armed groups are active killing wildlife like elephants and rhino.

Life for professional journalists is increasingly precarious and dangerous. Many countries have introduced draconian anti-terrorist laws and media restriction laws that consider criticism of the government an act of subversion or even terrorism. Many professional journalists, while trying to report the news, have been arrested, jailed, and killed.

In 2015, there were 73 journalists killed, in 2018, as many as 56 were killed. In 2019, there were 26 killed. In 2020, another 32 killed and so far in 2021there have been 5 killed, according to the Committee to Defend Journalists (CDJ). Shocking records of violent response against the Free Press, most have been murdered for reporting unfavorably about corruption among politicians and criminal gangs. Others were caught in the crossfire in war zones.

That is not all. Hundreds have been jailed. Since 2020, the number of incarcerated journalists is 274 in jails around the world for their work telling the truth. The majority are in prisons in China and Turkey. There are 30 plus journalists jailed in each. These countries are among the most severe violators of human rights and free speech. They are oppressors of journalists and manipulators of the truth. Many more journalists are imprisoned in India, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran, and Syria. In Belarus, 10 are in prison for reporting on the demonstrations.

Then there are the new generations of reporters from the streets, jungles and mountains around the world who give their lives in getting the truth out to the world using smart phone cameras and recording connected to the Internet. In Myanmar, more than 700 people have been shot to death with bullets to the head and some have been killed reporting police and military violence. The technology has made for more efficient and effective way of reporting live but in conflict zones it is fraught with danger. We see in countries like the United States street side reporters reporting by video, sometimes live, acts of police brutality. The reports highlight the news bulletins around the world. The day of the civil journalist is here.

The life and work of journalists was once considered among the most respected, adventurous and exciting of professions. They were mostly professionally trained in schools of journalism and universities. They worked on every kind of news in every sphere of public and private life. The international journalist was considered a revered figure reporting from war-torn and disaster-prone regions. The most ambitious were after the next big scoop, exposing crime and corruption, reporting wars and conflicts and deep into politics and human rights issues. Those days of the protected member of the press are no more. They are targeted persons to be silenced and killed.

Reporting the news in an honest and truthful manner was the code of conduct in years past. They are long gone since the onslaught of attacks against the media and journalists in recent years over the internet platforms. Around the world, the attacks are disgusting and blatant lying by politicians spurred on by Trump and his supporters who have sought to undermine the credibility of a Free Press. They branded the truth as “fake news” because it did not favor their point of view or it criticized them.

It is a common practice by politicians, police, security officials and military to silence the Free Press and hide their criminal behavior that is frequently corrupt and detrimental to the good of the people. Trump before and later as president of the United States went further and openly challenged and called out journalists by name and ridiculed and insulted them in public. He called all reporting “fake news” if it criticized him. He was so successful at this that “fake news” became the cry of every politician, tyrant, killer dictator, business tycoon who had a dark side to hide. Regimes passed laws that branded critical reporting as communist propaganda and jailed and manufactured baseless and false charges against many journalists and tried or succeeded to close television stations and media outlets.

They can gag truthful reporters and honest critics. The organized social media trolls spread the political propaganda and lies through a network to keep the image of the oppressor looking clean. They use internet platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, Reddit, and TikTok. These are used by the enemies of the truth allowing the spread of propaganda, personal attacks, false news and hate speech.

After public outrage, Trump is now banned indefinitely from Twitter and Facebook after instigating his followers to attack the US Capitol building in Washington on February 6, 2021.

There needs to be a review and rewriting of Section 230 of the US Internet legislation known as the Communications Decency Act (CDA). Section 230 gives immunity to website platforms.
It says “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” That’s why abuse is rampant.

For truth and freedom of the press to be respected and flourish, the false news, hate speech, and the proliferation of propaganda on the Internet must be stopped. Repealing section 230 is the way to guarantee the truth will prevail.www.preda.org

For those interested in Free Speech, the values of life, here is an new interesting take on an old story https://www.facebook.com/JesusOfNazarethStories/

Speaking the Truth

What greater duty does any person of integrity have than to speak the truth about that which is morally wrong, unjust and despicable? To speak one’s mind, to challenge injustice, abuse, exploitation, torture and the unlawful taking of life is a serious obligation. It is a constitutional right to do so supposedly without fear of retaliation and persecution. There is always the threat, fear and acts of retaliation against those brave and courageous people who speak the truth to power. History is full of heroes who were arrested, tried in a court, condemned, and put to death for speaking the truth, challenging injustice and oppression, taking a stand against what is clearly wrong and immoral.

When we look upon a crucifix we see there an innocent man that believed and practiced the great values of equality, rights of all, justice, truth, freedom and dignity of women and children. We see there a person who stood his ground. He taught the truth, healed the sick, championed the poor and challenged corrupt oppressive authorities. He was plotted against, betrayed, falsely accused of subversion, libel, and blasphemy. He was arrested, jailed, tortured and put on trial, wrongly condemned, and given the death penalty.

He is a person we can admire and imitate and those who are true believers in the values he taught and lived and died for will do likewise. They will proclaim the truth and oppose wrongdoing by individuals, groups, institutions or government. This is to follow that example and live out a courageous unselfish commitment.

Hundreds of people living out that commitment to justice have suffered. Many had their lives taken away or destroyed by the forces they challenged, questioned, and opposed while working for human rights and social justice. It is a privilege and honor to fight for justice and defend the right to life and dignity and to be persecuted for it.  

So the four Philippine bishops, several priests, a religious brother and lay people who are being charged with sedition and libel by the authorities can count themselves blessed and privileged to follow in the footsteps of Jesus of Nazareth. 

The National Catholic Reporter wrote, “Philippine authorities have filed sedition, cyber-libel, libel, and obstruction of justice charges against 36 people including the country's vice president and members of the opposition. Church leaders charged include Archbishop Socrates Villegas of Lingayen-Dagupan, Bishop Honesto Ongtioco of Cubao, Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan, retired Bishop Teodoro Bacani Jr. of Novaliches, Divine Word Fr. Flaviano Villanueva, Jesuit Fr. Albert Alejo, Fr. Robert Reyes, and Lasallian Br. Armin Luistro, former education secretary.”

They are all seen to have advocated the right to life and security and have spoken out in protest at the killing of many people by death squads and police raids on suspected drug users and dealers. However they are being charged with sedition, more or less as Jesus was.

He said to his disciples, “If the world hates you, you must remember that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, then the world would love you as its own. But I choose you from this world and you do not belong to it, this is why the world hates you. Remember what I told you, ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you too.” Gospel of John 15:18-20.

The charges however are for libel, cyber libel, and sedition. This is how UCAN news reported it. “The charges stem from the release of a video that went viral on several social media platforms early this year that linked President Rodrigo Duterte and his family to the illegal drug trade.  A certain Peter Joemel Advincula claimed on a video and in a media briefing early this year that Duterte’s son, Paolo Duterte, and presidential aide Bong Go were involved in drug syndicates.”

Weeks later, however, he was presented at a press conference by the Philippine National Police where he claimed Vice President Leni Robredo, opposition members and several church people were behind a plot against the president. The complaint of obstruction of justice, which was filed, was supposedly based on information about a meeting between Advincula and the accused “despite them being clearly aware of Mr. Advincula being a fugitive from the law."

As UCAN reported:  “The complaint alleged that the crimes of inciting sedition, libel and obstruction of justice were committed inside Jesuit-run Ateneo de Manila University "wherein they planned to spread false information" against the president's family and administration officials. It said the accused aimed to "agitate the general population into staging mass protests with the possibility of bringing down the president.” Opposition senator Francis Pangilinan of the Liberal Party said the complaint smacked of "political harassment and persecution.”  The other accused are mostly staff members of the Liberal Party, lawyer Theodore Te of the Free Legal Assistance Group, and officials of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines,” UCAN said.

All the accused have filed their affidavits in response to the charges denying anything whatsoever to do with that video and the allegations it proposed. Other commentators observe  that it is an attempt to silence the criticism from the critical dissenting voices.

The presidential palace has distanced itself from the police action. "We have nothing to do with this case. Not at all," said Salvador Panelo, Duterte's spokesman. Others observe that the police charges brought before the prosecutor is ill-advised, as it will only hurt the president and his family by continually bringing before the public the baseless allegations by playing the outrageous videos over social media.

Whatever the outcome of the charges against the Church people, the outspoken bishops, priests and laity- one shocking thing is clear: there are so few bishops, priests and lay people speaking out. Many are asking, who else is standing up for human rights, besides these people and brave media people and rights advocates? Surveys show that the president is receiving 80 percent approval rates in surveys.   

When the Truth Will Set us Free

 

If there is one thing that humans hunger and thirst for, it is the truth. Knowledge is vital for human learning, survival, safety, progress and interpersonal and social relationships. At the beginning of human kind, knowing where in the forest to gather food, how to hunt and to be alert to danger was a life or death learning process.

  

Millions of students strive to learn and graduate and qualify for a job to support themselves and a family. Knowing the truth about people and society is essential for a successful personal relationship and a harmonious peaceful and integrated community life.

 

The freedom to know and publish the truth is essential for a peaceful, harmonious society and for true democracy to succeed and human rights to be protected. It is a free, intelligent, reliable media, worthy, tested and proven, that is essential for a free, democratic, and just society.

 

That’s why lying, spreading false information, making propaganda, writing fake news stories and manipulation of the media is so detrimental to a healthy society free from fear and oppression. When the freedom of the media and the truth is stifled and covered up, the way is open for runaway skulduggery, fascism, corruption, and dictatorship. Clever politicians lie carefully, craftily and believably to gain people’s trust, support, and votes. Others don’t care and lie continually thinking that if they do it frequently enough, the tsunami of lies will be believed.

   

CNN, a trustworthy news organization says this: “In his first 869 days as president, Donald Trump said 10,796 things that were either misleading or outright false, according to The Washington Post's Fact Checker. Do the math and you get this: The President of the United States is saying 12 untrue things a day.”

 

It’s likely that in his case, by the time he gets to the third he has forgotten the previous two. Politicians react angrily to the truth when it is critical of them. What is true, they say, is false. What is right, they say, is wrong and what is good, they say, is bad. Their only refuge is denial and branding the truth as fake news. Trump is typical.

 

Politicians with dictatorial tendencies, engaging in corrupt practices, accumulating wealth criminally, and violating the rights of the people to stay in power cannot tolerate a open, free probing press. Their first move is to bring the media under government control. Turkey and Russia are examples of this.

 

Investigative journalist Ivan Golunov was a thorn and threat to the rich oligarchs and business tycoons in cahoots with corrupt politicians in Moscow. To silence him, police planted illegal drugs in his backpack and in his apartment and arrested and jailed him. However in an unusual and rare response, the government media, normally adoring and subservient to President Putin, was shocked. There was widespread public outrage and social media was alive in condemnation. Three main government media newspapers came out in solidarity with Ivan Golunov and had the same front-page message, “We are Golunov.”

 

The Russian government was shaken and dropped the charges and freed him from jail and suspended the senior police involved in the frame up. The police were enraged, too at Ivan. Opposition critics of the Russian government officials usually get shot or convicted on false charges. He was beaten up and was hospitalized after being released. Crowds of supporters met him as he came out of detention and demonstrated and they were arrested.  It was a rare media and public awakening and outcry that brought about his release.

 

Journalists are illegally arrested all over the world on false trumped up charges and in the Philippines, too. Last 9 June, Philippine journalist Margarita Valle, 61, a mother of  four children, a columnist of the Davao Today newspaper, was arrested at the airport in Cagayan de Oro. She was held for nine hours in detention in Pagadian until help came and the police then admitted that they had made a mistake. Pagadian Bishop Ronald Lunas gave her protection.

 

The National Union of Journalists in the Philippines called on the government to solve the murder of journalist Adam Moraleta, 56, an executive in a government TV station who was shot last June 6, near his house in Holy Spirit Village in Quezon City. Adam Moraleta is the third member of the Press Club to be killed in the previous five years.

 

The record shows that as many as 185 journalists have been assassinated in the Philippines since 1986. Twelve journalists have been murdered since 2016. The Philippines is among the most dangerous places to be a journalist after Afghanistan and Syria. But most Philippine journalists are true to their professions to report the truth and safeguard the rights of press freedom, come what may. They are mostly resilient, brave and courageous journalists that endure the dangers of false charges, harassment and even death.

 

The manipulation of the social media by paid trolls spreading false stories, placing misleading headlines and promoting political propaganda is also a world-wide phenomena and a grave danger to true democracy.  Russian interference in the US elections has been clearly established. The involvement of Cambridge Analytical, a company that allegedly used stolen email address to sow confusion and send political propaganda over the internet are tactics that are still going on today.

  

The media practitioners that are dedicated to publishing the truth are the defenders of democratic, moral, and spiritual values. The truth will mobilize public opinion and feelings of outrage at wrongdoing and corruption and will bring tyrants, criminals and thieves to justice as we have seen many times worldwide. Honest, committed journalists are also called upon to be defenders of human rights and dignity. They are the last stand against the oppression of the powerful and the corrupt. They will endure, prosper and succeed. 

Child Abuse in the Church

We live in a new age of freedom of expression when the long history of suppression and cover up of the truth is breaking out and social and mainstream media have championed the voice of victims and survivors of child sexual abuse. The controlling power and influence of some leaders in traditional institutions like the Catholic Church to instill fear, bury the realities, deny crimes of child abuse and silence the complainants are being challenged and their credibility has weakened.

More and more abused women are speaking out and children too are bringing criminal cases against their abusers. It is an age of truth-telling and there is more justice for the victims and survivors, thanks to the mandatory reporting of child abuse in the Church and government. What was once hidden, denied and covered up by deceit, threats and lies is coming out. Bishops and priests speaking against it and fighting this evil are few but nevertheless there is strong action by many religious superiors and some bishops against the suspected abusing priests but few are ever brought to trial.

The public is slowly realizing the frequency and extent of these heinous child rapes, incest and the sexual abuse of children. The perpetrators are their biological fathers, step-fathers, live-in partners, grandfathers, brothers, neighbors and clergy. The child abusers are not monsters hiding in alleyways and snatching children. Child abusers are found among ordinary people in most professions: doctors, dentists, sports coaches, teachers, swimming instructors, religious and clergy. There are secret pedophiles all around us. Justice is replacing lies and shame, telling the truth does set some of the children free. Today, all churches are being challenged and held to account. Despite the revelations and the new growing levels of awareness, what we see is just the tip of the iceberg, most cases never come to light. One in every four children is a victim of sexual abuse according to survivor groups.   

Protecting the image of the institutional church has been their first priority and has led bishops, archbishops and priests to remain silent and cold and uncaring for the victims. They have lost credibility. The evidence of denial, cover-up and transferring priests from place to place has been the undoing of the church hierarchy in many countries. Many bishops have resigned. Pope Francis has said that child abuse by priests is “an absolute monstrosity, a terrible sin that contradicts everything that the Church teaches.” 

In Ireland, the USA, Australia and most recently Chile, widespread child abuse in the Church has been uncovered. In Chile, 34 bishops offered Pope Francis their resignations after widespread child sexual abuse by clergy and the bishops either ignored it or covered it up. Some fed wrong information to Pope Francis himself during his recent visit to Chile. He denounced the allegations against Bishop Barros saying there was no evidence when in fact there was. Survivors had sent him a personal letter describing the abuse they suffered from priests, which Bishop Barros had known about. 

Francis later apologized and asked forgiveness of the victims and sent his investigator Archbishop Charles Scicluna to Chile to find the truth and then invited the survivors to Rome where he asked them to forgive him for his mistake. The Chilean bishops had made greater mistakes. They confessed:

“We, all the bishops present in Rome, have tendered our resignation to the Holy Father so that he may decide freely for each of us,” the bishops confessed after Pope Francis had serious discussions with them in the Vatican. “We want to ask forgiveness for the pain caused to the victims, to the Pope, to God’s people and to our country for the grave errors and omissions we have committed,” they said in a humble apology.

Some church leaders have ignored the teaching of Jesus in Matthew 18. Jesus proclaimed that the most important in the Kingdom of God is a child, unless we become as innocent as a child we will not enter into the Kingdom and whoever accepts the child accepts him. He added that they who abuse a child causing that child to lose faith in Jesus should have a severe punishment.

Many thousands of good, honest, and virtuous laity, victims, survivors and clergy have stood by their faith in Jesus of Nazareth despite the child abuse scandals that have rocked the institutional Church to its foundations. Trust in some church leaders as the once unassailable teachers of morality has been tarnished. In Ireland, the majority voted recently to repeal the anti-abortion provision in the Constitution ignoring the moral stand of the institutional Church. Many priests have been tried and convicted for abusing children in different countries. They consider themselves Catholics but are not always Christian.

Archbishop Wilson in Australia is facing a possible jail sentence and Australian Cardinal Pell is on trial facing allegations of child abuse and covering it up. Pope Francis said: “We will counter those priests who betrayed their calling with the most strenuous measures. This also applies to the bishops and cardinals who protected these priests – as happened repeatedly in the past.” Despite the shame, millions of good believing Catholics hold on to their faith in the universal Gospel values.

In the Philippines, Archbishop Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle has said in television interviews on the BBC Hardtalk and EWTN, a Catholic news channel, that in the Philippines child abusing priests are dealt with internally by the Church’s canonical process and are not reported to the civil authorities. It appears that priests accused of child molestation are moved from place to place and can abuse with impunity and are above the law. It is presumed that an amicable settlement in cash is made to the parents of the child victims.

This is now considered criminal behavior and it is what has brought shame and disaster to the institutional Church in several countries and made it a target for its critics. Child abusers must be reported to the authorities and the children must be assisted to file their formal complaint. Francis who meets with survivors regularly said that child abuse by priests and cover-up by bishops “. . .is a great humiliation. It shows not just our fragility but also - let’s say this clearly - our level of hypocrisy.”

The Profile of a Dictator

History is full of tyrants and dictators. Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Mao Ze Dong are among the worst in past history but today dictatorship is increasingly on the rise. True democracy is in retreat as elected officials turn to dictatorship as a way to stay in power and rule with an iron fist and declare they will save their nation from evil and make the nation great.  Putin, Erdoğan, Omar Al-Bashir, Kim Jong II are just a few of many that come to mind.

Dictators love to conduct wars, to issue threats, to present themselves as the strong person they are not, to imprison their critics, to change the constitution, to rule with authoritarian decrees, manipulate rubber stamp parliaments or congresses. They plot to remain in power indefinitely, to enrich themselves, to grow corrupt and vindictive, to insult their perceived enemies, to brand critics as terrorists and to rule with fear and oppressive decrees.

Tyrants and dictators assign blame to others for their failures and for social problems they persecute and kill their imagined enemies. They can be misogynists and even traitors. Others change laws to eliminate rivals and curb the independent power of the judiciary.

They love power and abuse it to dominate and control others and preserve their ill-gotten wealth, protect their entitlements, privileges, and deviant pleasures. They use bribery, vote-buying and the  sharing of ill-gotten wealth to buy support and consolidate political power for their family dynasty and cronies. They use the police and military to oppress and intimidate their opponents, dissidents and protestors. They cast a mantel of fear and threat that covers the population like the darkness of night and brings on the dawn of silence and paralysis of dissent. Such are the cruel tactics of a tyrant dictator.

In Poland and Hungary, we see some of these authoritarian tendencies as they pass laws to cripple the judiciary so the politicians will be immune from investigation.  We have the powerful Chinese leader Xi Jinping getting the constitution changed so he can remain in office indefinitely. Human rights violations are common practice.

Bashar al-Assad, president of Syria, is branded a war criminal for bombing with Russian help and killing and torturing thousands of his own people to stay in power. The worst dictator of our time.

President Donald Trump is a dictator in the making. He is campaigning for a second term when he has already destroyed his credibility and is facing sex abuse charges by many women and possible treason or impeachment for allowing foreign powers like Russia to subvert the election process and help get him elected. He says he approves torture and has appointed a new head of the CIA who is notorious for supporting horrific torture of suspects in the past.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey is now a dictator who gave himself additional power through an alleged rigged referendum, bringing journalists and critics to court on trumped up charges and jailing them. He allegedly tortures opponents branding them terrorists. He wages war in Northern Syria.

Sudan's President Omar Al-Bashir has an international arrest warrant out for him issued by the International Criminal Court to be arrested anywhere to face charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

President Vladimir Putin of Russia is a “strong-man” dictator twelve years in power and going again for another six years having taken over control of all media, silenced his opponents, barred them from elections and allegedly killed journalists. He is accused of murdering former spies in the UK with Russian military-made nerve poison and radioactive substance. He wages war by proxy in the Ukraine and annexed The Crimea.

The Maldives, the so-called Indian Ocean island paradise so popular with Japanese and western tourists, is ruled by a dictator president Abdulla Yameen who has declared his deposed former president a terrorist, arrested two court justices and is mired in corruption allegations.

The list goes on and we see the suffering of the victims wherever the tyrant takes more and more power. Human suffering, poverty, deprivation and social and personal injustice mire the land, plague the cities and infect the population of a dictatorship. Economic disruption, inequality and a cloud of great sadness and pain descend to cover all in misery like soot from a polluting chimney. Such is the dire outcome of dictatorship. The dictators have their supporters and hanger-ons who seek rewards and a share of the ill-gotten wealth, petty power and privilege.

The answer to dictatorships is to spread true awareness and enlightenment among the people. Provide social and political education with the truth and organize people’s cooperatives and opposition parties when possible. Peaceful and legitimate people power movements can change corrupt regimes without bloodshed or massacres. Working daily for justice and human rights, supporting the dignity of the people in every dire circumstance are steps towards freedom from dictatorship. Above all, courage and commitment to the truth and justice is what brings peace and liberty.

Journalists Risk Death for the Truth

Journalists, writers, reporters, commentators will just have to curb their passion for speaking and exposing the truth if they want to continue to live. Too many end up a corpse in a cold dark morgue, silence their only companion. That is just the way it is in the Philippines and elsewhere. More than a 146 journalists, have been assassinated since 1986.

 

Last November 23 was the 8th anniversary of the mass murder of 58 Filipinos 32 of them journalists, in Ampatuan town, Maguindanao province, in 2009. This was the worse of all violent assaults on the freedom of the press anywhere in one single blow. A powerful political family allegedly carried out the killings against their opponents and killed the 32 journalists covering the elections. No one has been convicted for the brutal heinous killings.

 

The sheer audacity of politicians or corrupt business personalities to quell the truth and the blind power behind the greed and personal vanity that orders killings of journalists is outrageous and there is little that can be done to stop it.  

 

Journalists are just ordinary people with a story to tell; yet to tell the truth is to risk one's life in many cases. Exposing what is corrupt and damaging to the public, is to challenge the seat of political power and it has dire consequences. No vengeance is as fierce as that of a corrupt politician exposed, a shady business corporation laid bare, no ignorance as painful as an uninformed and uncaring public.  

 

The killings go on to this day and the freedom of the press is at stake as some politicians try to control the message and cover up the truth about their inadequacies and wrong doings. The task of the media is to report the facts, bring to the people the truth about the achievements, success and the failure and wrongdoings of government and the corporate world. That is at the heart of a democracy. Tyranny is the alternative, and it descends like a dark cold cloud of threats and intimidation.

 

Media practitioners can be compliant, cowardly or courageous and brave. The powerful make accusations against some journalists claiming what they publish is "Fake News", when in fact it is the truth. The supporters of the politicians through blogs or biased columnists spread the Fake News, or propaganda.

 

Government officials have accountability for the billions of taxpayers' money that too often end up in their personal bank accounts as we have seen so many times in the past. It was the media who exposed the politicians who used fake NGOs to steal billions of pesos of government funds for their personal use. The Ombudsman is presently trying their cases.  

 

That is the duty and role of the media and they need the constitutional freedom to tell the truth, which is essential to praise or question the policies and power of government. Without this freedom there is no institution or individual or group, to reveal corruption and plunder.

 

If evil persists unchecked human rights will continue to be abused, and the national economy will be damaged as it was during the Marcos regime. President Ferdinand Marcos closed newspapers and radio stations and controlled all the media and he plundered at will. Those who opposed him paid with their lives.

 

In the Philippines violence against journalists is frequently the response to media exposés of wrongdoing and corrupt practices. As many as 42 journalists have been assassinated since 2007 and no one has been convicted. The killers act with impunity and get away with murder. However in the 2017 Global Impunity Index of the New York-based watchdog Committee to Project Journalists (CPJ) the Philippines dropped from 4th to 5th place on the index.  

 

Turkey is the jailer of the most journalists. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has arrested many journalists, and charged them with crimes to silence their critical voices. The Stockholm Center for Freedom, says that Erdogan has jailed 240 journalists who languish behind bars since May 12, 2017, more have been jailed since then. 

 

So why do powerful government officials and politicians fear and try to silence journalists as happened to the dedicated Maltese writer Caruana Galizia. She was killed by a bomb blast under her car. The Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat was suing the journalist over her allegations of corruption in that EU country. Three suspects have been arrested but the mastermind behind it has not been named.

 

The state, corrupt tycoons or mafia have the power to silence the journalists. They can use bombs, bullets, incarceration, threats, false charges, and accusations. Yet the power of the word, with one well-placed out-spoken journalist, armed with the truth, and evidence of corruption, can be a bomb-shell.

 

The truth can bring down the corrupt politician, expose the movie mogul, or business tycoon, as seen in the "#Metoo" movement. That is why the investigative journalists of integrity are a dangerous threat to the wrong doers in society. They need protection and the freedom to speak and write the truth and tell it as it is.

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth. 

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth. 

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth.