Latest among the maneuvers to distort history is the attempt to replace the term ‘martial law’ with ‘new society’ in all books and across all school curricula. The issue here is not simple semantics. Words are political. By changing the terminology, the history and context in which the word was originally used is lost. This is a part of the Marcoses’ attempts to manipulate and erase crucial parts of the Filipino nation’s collective memory.

Although it may seem trivial at first glance, replacing a word in the curriculum has giant and far-reaching consequences. Avenues to reinvent and reinterpret history, making it favorable to the dictator and nepotistic Marcos family after decades of wreaking havoc against the people, will burgeon. Rhetorics of the farcical new society will overshadow all the pain, destruction, suffering and deaths that have had always gone with martial law.

Indeed, the Marcoses will stop at nothing until they have completely buried the Filipino nation’s history. Now that their family is back in power, they have been systematically employing all possible opportunities their positions come with to expunge ther family’s crimes and the Filipino nation’s struggle against it.

It is a challenge to the present generation to prevent the Marcoses from distorting history. They must be persistent in making people understand, especially those who did not live during the martial law era, that the history tells a clear tale. It is not open for interpretation nor does it have versions. Either something happened or it did not. There were oppressors and there were the oppressed who fought back. There is no such thing as the people’s version and the Marcoses’ version. There is only the truth. And the rampant massacres, thousands of desaparecidos, prevalent hunger and poverty, economic decline, Marcoses’ unbridled corruption and squandering of the nation’s resources as well as all their other harrowing crimes against the Filipino people did happen.

It is dangerous to forget. A nation that forgets its history is a nation bound to repeat its mistakes. The previous generation’s struggles that have spanned across lifetimes must not be allowed to be for naught. It is a crime to let the valiant fight and the successes of those who came before be buried and forgotten. The story must be continued. The spirit of struggle must always be remembered and lived.