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... ...Universal Declaration of Human Rights, December 10, 1948 -- "A Cause for Celebration" ... 'Demands of Dignity' 'Demands of Dignity' <DEVELOPING THE DISCOURSE ON OUR DECEMBER 1Oth DECLARATION>
On-Line Edition of the Book by Ed Aurelio C. Reyes Prologue -- A Fresh Historical Contribution |
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CONTENTS OF THIS BOOK:
Response
to the Spanish Response
Response to the American Non-Response
Demands of Dignity EXCERPTS: -o0o- "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed Dec. 10, 1948, has been a cause of celebration, and the Treaty of Paris, signed Dec. 10, 1898, has been a cause for indignation... on the part of ALL HUMANS." -o0o- "The HUMANITY of ALL is ONE! Assaults on the Rights of a human anywhere are assaults on the rights of all humans everywhere." -o0o- "The current Human Evolutionary Imperative is attaining Synergy in Conscious Oneness." -o0o- "We demand apologies not to uphold our national dignity, but to give the offenders the opportunity to uphold theirs." -o0o- "Demands for Human Dignity come from within Human Dignity itself." -o0o- "We seek redress, closure and healing... Since the governments involved and the international organizations that depend on the consent of governments cannot be expected to support these calls or accord them any serious attention, we are calling upon the citizens of these and other nations, on the citizenry of the world." -o0o- "One of the factors underpinning the habit of trying to hide or mangle the truth is the illusion that facts hidden well enough as secrets can stay as such forever. Another is the illusion that you can harm your fellow-humans without harming yourself." -o0o- "Inevitably, eventually and ultimately, all wrongs cry out to be fully acknowledged, regretted, and set aright. Your peace of mind now and in the future demands it. Your very dignity demands it." -o0o- "Smile for Synergy! Seek One Humanity!"
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Prologue --------------- A Fresh Historical Contribution DEMANDS OF DIGNITY by Ed Aurelio C. Reyes is a fresh historical contribution to the mainstream radical intellectual tradition of Philippine struggle for recognition of human dignity, independence, freedom and democracy. It exults the recognition of inborn human rights of any person regardless of race, religion, language, gender, social and economic status – the civil and political rights or “negative freedoms” and the social, economic, and cultural rights or the “positive freedoms” - by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights approved by the United Nations General Assembly at its 183rd meeting on December 10, 1948 at Geneva, Switzerland. On the other hand, it condemns the Treaty of Paris of 1898 whereby Spain sold to the United States the territory of the Philippines including the independent Sultanate of Sulu and the present autonomous region in northern Luzon had which remained independent under the indigenous peoples during the Spanish colonial period spanning three centuries. Worse, Spain sold through the Treaty of Paris some five million Filipinos whose Revolutionary Forces had already overthrown the Spanish colonial government all over the Christian territory of the Philippines, except the small enclave of Intramuros with an area of less than 100 hectares where the Spanish governor-general, handful of Spanish officers and soldiers holed in while negotiating to surrender to the US forces. In an act of arrogance and oppression, the two western powers completely ignored the historical fait accompli that the Filipino Revolutionary Forces had already promulgated the Declaration of Independence and established the Philippine Republic, the first republic in Asia and Africa. Both imperialist powers added insult to injury by barring the Philippine diplomatic representative from entry, attendance and participation in the treaty negotiation between the US and Spain in Paris. Ultimately, this resulted in the Philippine-American War triggered by an American soldier by shooting a Filipino soldier at the San Juan Bridge (part of what is now Metro Manila) on February 4, 1898. This happened on the eve of voting by the US Senate of the ratification of the Treaty of Paris which was approved by a margin of one vote over the required majority after Washington DC heard of the outbreak of Philippine-American War .The Massachussetts-based Anti-Imperialist Movement with Faneuil Hall in Boston as its meeting place had launched a strong opposition to the acquisition of the Philippines by giving strong moral and political support for the independence of the Philippines. They almost succeeded in defeating the ratification of the Treaty of Paris but was outwitted by President William McKinley and his “hawks” by triggering the outbreak of what they falsely called “Philippine insurrection.” The liberal American historians called the Philippine-American War as “The First Vietnam War”. The atrocities, massacres, pillaging, and burning into “howling wilderness” of whole villages are a hundred times worse than Guantanamo and Iraq prison tortures and other secret prisons in other parts of the world. All men, women, and children were killed in many villages in different provinces. The barbaric mass killings revealed in testimonies of American officers and soldiers in the US Senate investigation were a hundred times worse than the treatment of leaders and activists of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950’s and ‘60’s in the United States. All in all, over 600,000 Filipinos, mostly civilians, were killed in the Philippine-American War. With the recent election of Barak Hussein Obama as President of the United States, we see a populist, people’s president with broad intellectual perspectives and compassionate heart whose father may not have been served in a restaurant. For this reason, he can easily understand the war crimes, genocide, and the immorality of buying for $20 million a whole independent country and its free people governed by its own liberal democratic republican government established by a Constitution framed by a Constitutional Convention held in Malolos, Bulacan.
We therefore request President Barak Obama to do justice to history, the
Filipino people, the Republic of the Philippines, and the American
people by issuing a statement of apology to right the imprescriptible
wrongs committed by the Expeditionary Forces of the United States a
century ago. With the hindsight of history, we call on President Obama to issue a statement of apology to the Filipino people and the Republic of the Philippines to show to the world that America still stands by its basic values of respect for human dignity, life, liberty, freedom, truth, justice, and pursuit of happiness. We also request President Obama to order the immediate return of the historic Bells of Balangiga taken by the American forces and are still being kept in the US after more than 100 years. This bell is part of the national treasure of the Philippines.
Chairman-CEO, Visit www.wikipedia.org Search: Emmanuel T. Santos
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ANNOUNCEMENTS: Demands of Dignity THE HARDCOPY EDITION, in about 180 regular sized bookpaper pages with full-color paperback cover FREE ACCESS FOR ALL to the ON-LINE EDITION until February. 4, 2009, 110th Anni- versary of the Fil-Am War.
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