Filipino Web Magazine: July 2020

Thursday 30 July 2020

Low-Income, Racialized Groups Hit Hardest by COVID-19

Volume 2, Issue No. 4

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

. . . . . A community service of The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail. com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America . . .

Our latest as of Thursday, July 30, 2020

~ Toronto's visible minorities, Canada's demographic category that includes Filipinos, appear to bear the brunt of coronavirus infection, official data indicated. The release of a preliminary study on COVID's impact comes on the heels of the re-opening on Friday, July 31, of businesses and public spaces in the city, except for venues considered high-risk, which stay closed.

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IN TORONTO, CAPITAL OF ONTARIO PROVINCE

Visible Minorities Highly-Impacted by COVID-19

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

TORONTO - The coronavirus infection appears to have impacted more people among "racialized groups" or "visible minorities" in the city of Toronto than their Caucasian or white counterparts, new socio-demographic COVID-19 data reveal.

In findings from data collected from May 20, 2020, to July 16, 2020, Toronto Public Health has disclosed that:

• 83 percent of people with reported COVID-19 infection identified with a racialized group;

• 51 percent of reported cases in Toronto were living in households that could be considered lower-income; and

• 27 percent of COVID-19 cases were among individuals who live in households with five or more people.

"Frequently referred to as 'visible minorities' the term ‘racialized communities’ encompasses all people that are non-Caucasian in race or non-white in colour. Aboriginal peoples in Canada are sometimes excluded from this definition, but should not be," according to the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness.

Per the official definition of Statistics Canada, Filipinos are among the "visible minorities" or "racialized group" which also includes South Asian, Chinese, Black, Latin American, Arab, Southeast Asian, West Asian, Korean, and Japanese.

TPH did not identify the COVID-19-infected residents by ethnic group. Nor did it say how many "83 percent of people" actually represents.

As of Thursday, July 30, Toronto has registered 15,377 confirmed cases and 1,150 deaths. A total of 13,772 have recovered. Ontario-wide, there are 39,075 confirmed cases; 2,772 deaths; and 34,906 recovered. In entire Canada, the figure stands at 116,000 (including 476 new) confirmed cases; 8,917 (including 5 new) deaths; and 100,000 recovered.

"The data was collected from people infected with COVID-19 and who answered voluntary questions on these topics. These data are collected at the individual case level but being reported as overall data summaries and trends," TPH said in a press statement furnished The Filipino Web Channel on Thursday, July 30, 2020.

"This ensures that data are not identifiable and remain confidential. While there are some limitations with these data, they provide powerful insight into how COVID-19 is impacting our community," TPH explained.

According to TPH, earlier area-based findings suggested that COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations were more commonly reported among those living in areas with higher proportions of low-income earners and recent immigrants.

"Certain racialized groups were found to be over-represented in areas with higher COVID-19 case rates, including people who are Black, South Asian, Southeast Asian, and Latin American," it said. "Over-represented" appears to be a euphemism for having the most number of COVID-19 cases in those racial groups.

“While COVID-19 has affected all of us, unfortunately it has had a greater impact on those in our community who face greater health inequities," said Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto's Medical Officer of Health.

“In public health we have long known that it's your postal code, rather than your genetic code, that is the biggest driver of health," Councillor Joe Cressy (Ward 10 Spadina-Fort York), Chair of the Board of Health, commented.

"The social determinants of health – race, income, housing status – have long determined who gets sick, who lives, and who dies. This has always been the case: COVID-19 just exposed it for all to see," he added.

Toronto Mayor John Tory said “The data that has been collected and presented by Toronto Public Health will help us in our response to the COVID-19 pandemic by allowing us to help specific neighbourhoods that we know are being more severely impacted by COVID-19". (Copyright 2020. All Rights Reserved).

The Pandemic Makes Us Look Older

Volume 2, Issue No. 3

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

Our latest as of Thursday, July 30, 2020

~ It's cultural, the fear of aging, to paraphrase American author Ashton Applewhite. That comes to mind upon seeing members of the Philippine Senate suddenly turned older than when last seen before the novel coronavirus struck. For example, the well-coiffed Senator Vicente Sotto III, age 71, and Migz Zubiri, 51, presumably were in their natural state, except for this crown of white hair, when they attended the SONA. Prior to the pandemic and their evidently-dyed black hair then, they looked robust. Black hair rejuvenates and white hair depresses?

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GROWING YOUNG, GROWING OLD

Aging by Hair in the Time of COVID-19

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old, they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams.” ― Gabriel García Márquez

TORONTO - In a span of five months, that's from March to July, people appeared to have turned many years older than their purported age.

At the State of the Nation address by President Rodrigo Duterte a few days ago, I saw videos of now white-haired Philippine senators Vicente Sotto III and Mike Zubiri looking so unlike themselves before the arrival of the coronavirus. I have yet to see Mr. Duterte in that same situation.

Hair, specifically white hair, does make a lot of difference in perception. Generally, a man (or woman) with greying hair is regarded as an old fogey, a grandpa or grandma, a person deserving priority in transit seating, a person entitled to senior discounts, etc.

As a boomer, I have experienced being offered a seat a few times while commuting during the rush hours, and I'm truly thankful for those who did so, even though I felt there were others more deserving than I.

I realized later at home that the culprit, or the cause of the burst of seat offerings, was not so much my physical appearance as my lengthy white mane. That countenance has conveyed the visual impression that since my hair was already silvery, and therefore old, I was entitled to one of the priority seats on the bus.

Right now, my salt-and-pepper hair appears to be thinning faster than I could grow a beard. This mixture of black, grey, and white is actually a return to its natural condition. I mean I started dying my hair black or brown only in Toronto for reasons other than vanity.

From the time the coronavirus struck, I've gone back to growing a ponytail. It's now eleven inches long from scalp to the tip of the hair. The length is twice shorter than when I first had it almost to the waist in my former hometown of San Diego, California. There I braided it sometimes.

Having a ponytail then was a political - not fashion - statement to indicate my journalism independence. I also wanted to show my non-conformity to the accepted and unchallenged norms which I thought hindered free and fearless expression of ideas.

I started to grow it in June 1998, the month and year I quit being editor-in-chief of the popular and most-read community newspaper, the Philippine Mabuhay News, after its owners had refused to publish my story critical of its main advertiser. (Full story at: https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2001/jun/14/cover-sinister-hero/?page=1&).

That same month, I published my own broadsheet paper, Diario Veritas, in time with the celebration of the centennial of Philippine independence on June 12, 1998. From that time on, people identified me as the journalist with the ponytail. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9vcuamfGCI).

Not once was I mistaken for a covert operative, a detective, an undercover, and journalism was supposedly my screen. I was also thought of as a member of one of the Indigenous tribes, the First Nations people, who inhabited Canada before the Europeans packed them off to reservations. All those misconceptions because of a ponytail.

In 2014 in Toronto, I gave in to constant ribbing by friends and had my hair cut and dyed dark brown. Why not? I was starting a new life away from the antagonism that my investigative journalism had engendered in California.

So, after so much back and forth I finally succumbed to the kindly pressure. My friends then said tongue-in-cheek that the shorter hair and the disappearance of salt-and-pepper had made me look younger by ten years.

Well, I must have believed that for whatever comfort it gave me because in the years that followed until 2019, I was having a regular hair treatment courtesy of a close friend whose family I consider my own.

That changed, however, when one other friendship had gone sour because of professional and personal differences. Grow the ponytail back! I told myself. Make that statement again.

And so, I made the decision to free myself from the yoke of non-professionals who barely knew anything about journalism.

I didn't hesitate to uphold my journalism and gave up its practice in an environment that was selective and beholden to friends. I wanted my freedom back, detached, and untethered to selfish interests.

As of this moment, there's no better expression of this than in my lengthening ponytail, still abundant, and returning to its old salt-and-pepper self.

When I came to the US in the mid-1990s, I had pitch-black hair. As I became more engaged in community journalism, first in San Diego and now in Toronto, the plastic comb I use to groom myself catches more strands of hair every time.

Tuesday 21 July 2020

Coping Amidst the Pandemic

Volume 2, Issue No. 2

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

Our latest as of Tuesday, July 21, 2020

~ A semblance of normalcy appears on the horizon amidst the coronavirus pandemic. Toronto is on stage 2 reopening, but with a reminder to practice physical distancing, wear masks, frequent hand washing, among the health and safety protocols to be observed. When COVID invaded, we resorted to practical measures to cope with the stress, such as backyard gardening to raise vegetables and fruits to complement what's available in the supermarket. Within weeks, we have an abundance of items needed for a healthy meal.

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RELIEVING STRESS THROUGH GARDENING

Feasting on Home-Grown Produce

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul. ” - Alfred Austin

TORONTO - These days, we're feasting on organics - our own local produce - from the backyard garden we fashioned from patches of grasses, weeds, shrubs, and walkways that had been once beautifully landscaped fitting a quiet and relaxing lawn.

The unwelcome arrival of the novel coronavirus in January has dramatically changed our way of life. The invisible invader has held us hostage since then. Only a vaccine, yet to be found, could set us free.

In the meantime, we could also live with it by carefully observing and following health and safety protocols put in place, such as wearing face masks, practicing physical distancing, frequent hand washing, avoiding large crowds, etc.

The disease that the virus causes, COVID-19, continues to claim lives and infect people on a global scale. In this capital of Ontario province, Canada's largest city, the situation stays fluid. (Full report at: https://www.toronto.ca/home/covid-19/covid-19-latest-city-of-toronto-news/covid-19-status-of-cases-in-toronto/).

Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto's medical officer of health, reports that there are now 15,144 cases in the city, an increase of 107 cases since July 10, 2020. The death toll is at 1,137 as of this Tuesday, July 21, 2020. Overall, Health Canada reports that Canada has 111,299 cases, 97,566 recovered, and 8,859 deaths.

The COVID invasion remains a cautionary tale. It is a reminder of the fragility of life, of man's vulnerability.

So, the usual gatherings of family, friends, and neighbours have been discouraged as a precautionary measure to stop the spread of the disease. Our movements have been restricted to the most basic, i.e. to get food supplies from grocers without resorting to panic-buying.

There have been some relaxations put in place. In fact, Toronto is on stage 2 reopening, which means residents can now visit parks and community centres and can now enjoy outdoor dining.

When COVID was at its peak and isolation a healthy recourse, we turned our attention to backyard gardening. It's a comforting break from working from home or from just sitting and watching the news or from walking back and forth within the limited confines of the house.

We cultivated the lawn, replaced grass with a raised garden, and planted seeds of the different varieties of seasonal fruits, vegetables, and herbs. (Related video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVQUTSkFSR4).

Small miracles do happen. In a matter of weeks, the yard of grass, weeds, and shrubs has transformed itself into a rich source of food. There's an abundance of eggplant, broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes, zucchini, cucumber, bell pepper, basil, mint, chili, calamansi, among others. The old apple and plum trees are bearing fruits now.

On the first day of harvest, we went Italian for lunch and dinner. The next day, the menu was Mexican, basically tacos and burritos. The following day, it's Filipino food, actually pork sinigang (soured by calamansi) that had more eggplant, broccoli, and taro. The food cycle will continue until we've exhausted the produce.

All the food preparations relied on what we could harvest from the garden. Prior to this newfound pastime, vegetables used in Filipino cuisine are regularly bought from supermarkets. We cared little about how much we paid; it's the convenience of having them at a moment's need.

The pandemic changed that, personally for us. Raising vegetables and fruits in the backyard undoubtedly saves money, however little, and offers a delightful and teachable moment for everyone, especially for kids. It's time spent away from electronic gadgets.

Wednesday 15 July 2020

Community Journalists as Watchdogs

Volume 2, Issue No. 1

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

Our latest as of Wednesday, July 15, 2020

~ The period of more than four decades has produced a wealth of experience in journalism. Nearly half of them were gained in North America. From old-fashioned cut and paste to the modern gizmos that replaced it, truthful, honest journalism is very much the same as it was many years ago. Its progression has produced subsets, specialties necessitated by advances in technology and changing world views.

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COUNTING CONTENT, NOT YEARS

Milestone for Real Journalism

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“The swiftest hours, as they flew.” - Shakespeare

TORONTO - How time flies. From one hot summer day last year to another summer drastically changed by the scourge of the coronavirus.

Nonetheless, without fanfare, I celebrate my newest blog, which is essentially my online archive - the Filipino Web Magazine (https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/) - to complement my flagship social media outlet, The Filipino Web Channel, on YouTube.

I can't seem to divorce myself from the media even as I have accumulated more than four decades of working in various capacities - as a foreign correspondent, editor, publisher, reporter, photographer, videographer, proofreader, and paste-up artist. (Related article: https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2001/jun/14/cover-sinister-hero/?page=1&).

Those years involved arduous work that also had its rewards, that of being brought to foreign lands in Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Honestly, as penniless as I am, my journalism journeys were above and beyond my expectations. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik0AXXyPXaE).

Having this blog and my other online vlogs under Romar Media Canada is a milestone of sorts for me. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42YXRLqaQYA). They fill in the vacuum and provide the continuity necessary to keep one's sanity in times when greed overtakes principle, when compromises are set aside in favor of the truth a journalist is sworn to uphold.

A year older, and fifty-four articles later, I commemorate the birth of my blog. This month, I also mark the 27th year of my newspaper column, Prerogative, which came into being in San Diego, California when nobody in the Filipino community dared spoke and exposed the truth regardless of how painful it was.

So as not to cause confusion on where it's published outside California, I retitled the column to Password, which ran for years in Chicago and Arizona. The contents were basically the same.

I haven't missed a beat since Prerogative begun in 1993 right after I ended my work with a major foreign news agency. My journalism from print to online to print and again online continued in Toronto in 2010. Ten years later (it's now 2020), I'm doing both print and online.

The print part has been compromised, however, by the coronavirus pandemic. It seems newspapers have become outdated. Reader preference has shifted to social media where interaction is immediate and expedient than in newspapers whose frequency - monthly, fortnightly, weekly - work against being an effective medium of communication.

According to a survey that I read somewhere, people are now migrating to social media (Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, etc.) to get news through their computers and smartphones than reading newspapers. That sounds like a death knell to local news publishing.

Community journalism is more impactful and personal than, say the more prestigious and financially-satisfying job as a foreign correspondent. Admittedly, writing locally pays peanuts. The edifying part, for me at least, is in being able to disseminate accurate information and help people understand issues relevant to them. That's an invaluable community outreach.

The launch of Prerogative in Toronto has caused, unsurprisingly, a backlash against my journalism. I was a marked man the moment a so-called writer called me "journalist daw" (journalist allegedly), which was echoed by his left-leaning minions. That was fine with me. I knew where I stood.

And I also knew I was courting adversaries who would discredit me. I wasn't cowed nor frightened nor rattled. Instead, I dug deep into their background and found them to be a bunch of fakes, pretenders basically, and their claim to being writers spurious. In fact, the promoter of the remark turned out to be a computer thief!

It was their ignorance that betrayed them. I knew that in the Filipino community, nobody has ever heard of the foreign news agency that I worked with some time. I knew many members of the community were so used to meaningless entertainment news and endless variety shows promoted by docile media to distract from the daily grind.

Well, I said to myself, the problem is not my reporting; rather, it is the readers' lack of understanding. The fault lies with their unfamiliarity with real journalism which, in Toronto, is aggravated by the presence of a number of newspapers publishing the same inane content.

Real journalism, and in my case, investigative journalism, is journalism on tenterhooks, an edgy venture not for the spineless and weak of heart. Its practice invites legal and financial troubles as proven by the number of lawsuits filed in court against me.

But that's exactly the point of journalism. Dissent, name-calling, threats, lawsuits only mean one's reportage is having an impact. That's gratifying enough even when the peanuts come in trickles. (Copyright 2020. All Rights Reserved).

Friday 10 July 2020

The End Has Come for ABS-CBN

Volume 1, Issue No. 53

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

Our latest as of Friday, July 10, 2020

~ This is no requiem for the billionaire broadcast giant that had lapsed, supposedly, into silence twice already; one in May and the latest, yesterday (July 10, Manila time). This last gasp may not be final, for the owners of ABS-CBN could still revive it in the not-so-distant future when the wind blows are more favorable. When lawmakers drove the last nail into its coffin, people both grieve and rejoice, weep and cheer. There's no love lost.

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ABS-CBN - THE PHILIPPINES' LARGEST NETWORK

Sad Day for a Spurned Giant

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“It all goes away. Eventually, everything goes away.” ― Elizabeth Gilbert

TORONTO - The end did not come unexpectedly. It was ordained on the very day congressmen started marathon scrutiny of ABS-CBN, the erstwhile broadcast giant that had lorded it over the airwaves of every nook and cranny of the Philippines and Filipino communities in foreign lands.

Practically every day during the nearly two weeks of hearings at the legislative franchises committee, the public gaze open-mouthed at the spectacle of timid-looking network officials being grilled by lawmakers who once were either demonized, wronged, harassed, persecuted. It's déjà vu for the most part.

And when the decisive moment came on Friday, July 10, 2020, in Manila, seventy (70) congressmen, including those previously bruised and tattered in its radio and television broadcasts, voted to trash ABS-CBN's request for a fresh 25-year franchise.

The committee of 85 members needed only forty-four (44) votes to deny the application, but 70 came forward - that's more than 82 percent. The voting pattern was 70 for denial, 11 against, 2 inhibit, and 1 abstain. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE5MMfF2gxA).

The 70 decided to “deny the application of ABS-CBN Corporation for a franchise to construct, install, establish, operate and maintain radio and broadcasting stations in the Philippines.”

To me, it's an indication of how representatives, voicing out the sentiments of their constituents, loathed ABS-CBN and its brand of biased/slanted/distorted reporting, on the one hand, and the many asinine programs, on the other, it dished out during its heyday.

It's interesting to note that of the 11 who voted against, two once worked with ABS-CBN, namely former movie star Vilma Santos, and former reporter Sol Aragones, which means their loyalty and personal interests came first before the people's. Another, Carlos Zarate, is identified with Bayan Muna party-list, which authorities consider a communist front.

There seemed to be so much disgust for the network when it held sway to the point that the 70 men and women who thumbed it down instantly became heroes in the eyes of many people, and, of course, villains among the bleeding hearts of opposing political ideologues and devoted supporters.

The impassioned pleas of the latter did not dent the resolve of most members of the committee to reject the franchise, especially when evidence showed ABS-CBN had committed violations of the law. Personal testimonies of both lawmakers and former employees only buttressed the findings.

At the height of its dominance, ABS-CBN could make or unmake any politician, officials in and out of government, friends, enemies, movie stars. It decided who rose and fell. It picked who the light shone on and dimmed. It was kingmaker by the sheer might of its radio-television empire.

After the committee junked the franchise application, Mark Lopez, ABS-CBN chairman, issued a statement, saying the mission to reopen the network continues. But it is his confession that struck me.

"Mahal na mahal namin ang Filipino. Mahal na mahal namin ang kapamilya" (We love the Filipino very much. We love the Kapamilya very much), he said. Oh yeah?

I was tearing up, furious and indignant at the injustice while watching the personal accounts of former employees who have not been paid their dues, salaries, and benefits for at least 10 years. And there were those that ABS-CBN had sued in court for attempting to better their life and working conditions.

Having won a judgment in their favor, the network would run to the Court of Appeals, and then to the Supreme Court to evade payment and prolong their agony. Given these circumstances, Lopez' words are hollow.

If ABS-CBN truly cared, why did it allow its employees to suffer? "Mahal na mahal namin ang Filipino" is nothing but empty rhetoric. What kind of love is that? (Related story at: https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/2020/07/day-of-reckoning-for-abs-cbn-network.html).

Meanwhile, Carlo Katigbak, ABS-CBN president, also issued his statement. He said:

"Labis po kaming nasasaktan sa desisyon ng committee on legislative franchises na tangihan ang franchise ng ABS-CBN," he declared not with a tinge of sorrow.

"Naniniwala kaming nakapagbigay kami ng serbisyong makabuluhan at mahalaga sa mga Filipino. x x x Kasama ng aming empleyado, karamay ninyo kami sa inyong kalungkutan . . . " (Related video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZbdunLl4KM)

Wow, I almost threw up! Listening to these top executives has now convinced me that the 70 lawmakers who voted against ABC-CBN had all the valid reasons to do what they did. I would have cast my vote with them if I had a chance, no second thoughts! (Copyright 2020. All Rights Reserved).