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Beyond the cyclical and repetitive event coverages, student publications must be seen as more than an uncompensated apparatus for media exposure. Lest, campus journalists must be regarded as socio-political watchdogs for truth and justice, while facing rabid disinformation networks and relentless terror-tagging. When the studentry was taunted by fear and silence, student journalists stood their ground, stroked their pens, held their line, and calibrated their lenses to capture the naked truth that is being denied from peoples’ naked eye.
Now, when did campus journalism become dangerous? It was when the poets and the journos started to unceasingly resist.
Journo Youngblood of History
History books reflected how the revolutionaries of the youth penned the blatant critique against the Spanish colonial rule. The youthful exuberance of the students, Marcelo H. Del Pilar, Jose Rizal, Mariano Ponce, and Graciano López Jaena birthed the First Propaganda Movement that officially established La Solidaridad broadsheet publication in 1889. While cloaked behind peculiar pseudonyms, they wrote articles with words that were sharp as scythe – piercing the braggadocio and glory of the conquistadors.
In 1934, Wenceslao Vinzons of UP College of Law first founded the College Editors’ Guild of the Philippines (CEGP), the broadest alliance of tertiary student publications in the Asia-Pacific. When he was seated as the Editor-in-Chief of The Philippine Collegian, he blazed the trail of the Guilders who sought to fight against the looming threat of inter-imperialism at the peak of the Second World War. From the newsroom to a warzone, Vinzons transformatively used his idealism to actively organize guerilla warfare units in the countryside. Guilder-turned-Guerilla, Vinzons rendered his life to the country at the age of 31. When Vinzons firmly refused to cooperate with the Japanese forces, he was bayoneted in cold-blood by the Japanese Imperial Army in Daet, Camarines Norte.
Bedan Journos and Resistance
Bedan studentry is no stranger to mass movements when faced with inhumane State repression, and dehumanizing militarization. The Bedan, the oldest campus press ever established in the Bedan Community, explicitly echoed the cries of the oppressed during the Martial Law. The late Senator Rene A.V. Saguisag, a former Editor-in-Chief of The Bedan, exposed the pandora’s jar of malodorous anomalies brought by the Marcosian rule. As the publication collectively worked with the prominent student press in the name of resistance such as The Varsitarian, The Philippine Collegian, and The Guidon, the Marcos Administration was gravely irked. Following the crackdown, student publications were forced to shut down by the regime when the formidable dekada sitenta welcomed the Martial Law era.
Indeed, history has set its eyes on how the Bedans and the youth – empowered by collective effervescence – faced the fearmongering and attacks of an immoral and a rotten state. At the height of the Second Propaganda Movement, the dictatorial regime attempted to quash campus and mosquito presses. Student media crackdown was eventually put to a halt when the sitting dictator met his ouster.
Campus presses remain under siege
Student presses had been confronting state-sponsored attacks and media discrediting since their consistent rejection of the plagued status quo.
In 2023, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) denounced and condemned the persistent harassment and intimidation of Filipino student journalists. Incident reports revealed that several unidentified state forces summoned Aila Joy Esperida, a student journalist of The Democrat publication, through a letter. Neither official seal nor reason was indicated in the letter sent by the Naga City Barangay. Likewise, John Harvee Cabal, a photojournalist of The Democrat, received the same letter. Thereafter, state forces forcibly harassed the campus journalists, took the photos of the student journos without consent, and finally tagged them as ‘terrorists.’
The Red Chronicles, the official student publication of SBCA SOL, faced rabid attacks from disinformation agents, and fake news peddlers last 2024. Terror-tagging comments and blurbs were commented by anonymous trolls on its official Facebook handle.
Earlier this year, Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Raymund “Lray” Villafuerte Jr. was involved in an online harassment fiasco with the SPARK, the official student paper of Camarines Sur Polytechnic College (CSPC) Nabua Campus. Various campus editors slammed the legislator for uttering blurbs against the publication editors. The fiasco stemmed from the arbitrary taking down of the mock election results published by SPARK. Such results reflected the win of the political rival of Villafuerte.
Radical Journalism: A Must
Packed with the history of bloodied pens and papers, it is a moral imperative for every campus journalist to keep our eyes wide open. Despite the current political climate’s rejection of reality and revelation, the student press cannot take a risk to stop writing for the masses. As vanguards of justice, the press cannot afford to stay silent, when the disenfranchised are devoid of speaking truth. Now more than ever, radical journalism can never be hushed.
EDITORIAL NOTE: The editors speak for the publication as a whole, represented by the Editorial Board on the crucial matters and prevailing national issues.
NOTE TO THE READERS: Volume XVIII, Issue 2, penned and published by The Red Chronicles, is a Back Issue for the Publication Year 2024-2025. Note that this article aligns with the events relevant to the previous Academic Year 2024-2025. For further viewing of the same, you may view the flipbook version or visit our official website at theredchronicles.net.
REFERENCES:
AlterMidya. “Journalism Is Such a Radical Thing.” AlterMidya, June 24, 2024. https://www.altermidya.net/journalism-is-such-a-radical-thing/.
Barbosa, Roy. “Carrying the Task of the Propaganda Movement – | Manila Today.” Manila Today, September 21, 2024. https://manilatoday.net/carrying-the-task-of-the-propaganda-movement/.
Bedan. “HISTORY – the Bedan.” The Bedan, June 28, 2024. https://thebedan.com/about/.
Elmer Recuerdo, and Elmer Recuerdo. “Campus Editors Group Hits Villafuerte for Mock Poll ‘attack.’” Daily Tribune, February 9, 2025. Elmer Recuerdo, and Elmer Recuerdo. “Campus Editors Group Hits Villafuerte for Mock Poll ‘attack.’” Daily Tribune, February 9, 2025. https://tribune.net.ph/2025/02/09/campus-editors-group-hits-villafuerte-for-mock-poll-attack.
Philippines: Student Journalists Harassed and Summoned by Army / IFJ,” September 29, 2023. https://www.ifj.org/media-centre/news/detail/article/philippines-student-journalists-harassed-and-summoned-by-army.
Research, Dona Z. Pazzibugan Inquirer. “Rights Defender, Former Senator, Writer Rene Saguisag; 84.” INQUIRER.net, April 25, 2024. https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1933307/rights-defender-former-senator-writer-rene-saguisag-84.
Torres, Jose Victor Z. ““OUR LITTLE NEWSPAPER” THE LA SOLIDARIDAD AND PHILIPPINE JOURNALISM IN SPAIN (1889-1895).” Luz y Saber, vol. 11, no. 2, 2017.