Ninotchka Rosca writes to ‘Nicole’

This is in response to the plight of Filipina rape victim "Nicole" who went through a gruelling year of trial and investigation for the conviction of her US Marine rapist. I watched the final hearing live and still couldn't sense justice since the rest of the "onlookers", the marines that were present during the rape were acquited. I also feel for Filipinas who were not violated through physical abuse but of emotional abuse, those promised with false love by their GI Joes and left them to bear their bastard children without any support. Oh yes, she is the Philippines.

*I wish i could write like Ninotchka*

Ninotchka Rosca writes to ‘Nicole’
INQUIRER.net
Last updated 03:19am (Mla time)
01/06/2007

I READ about all the issues swirling around you, Nicole, in the various newspapers and Internet news services, and wish we could know you in all your fortitude. I wish we could say "we feel your pain" but we can't really, only imagine it.

I am tempted to say you have already made history; that at least, you got one convicted, at least you got a trial, at least you precipitated a crisis, at least… But that is a cop-out. Filipinos have been trained to live on the “at-least” level. I hear it all the time, from exported Filipinas: at least, you have a job; at least, you’re in the US; at least, you can send money home; at least, your “amo” [master] is kind; at least… It’s become our prime and only virtue: survival by whatever means, under whatever conditions. I hear it often from women who work 18/7 to enable parents, siblings and various relations to continue to exist in an archipelago so wealthy it’s globalization’s paradise.

There are no words of comfort to make up for this travesty, to you and to millions of Filipinas living lives of quiet desperation. The Philippines ranks fifth in the world in the number of women working. The first four are all Western developed nations, like Sweden, Denmark, etc. It is a painful irony that a country dependent on women’s labor does not have the political will to defend, protect and assert one woman’s right to redress of grievance.

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