[Opinion] Say Something

Not long ago, I attended a comic convention somewhere up north and like thousands of con goers, I was bombarded with merchandise —or simply merch as we often call it— from different artists who had their artworks reproduced in stickers, art prints, and of course, comics; some of these were original contents, others were fan-made works from known franchises like the  Disney owned properties such as Marvel and Star Wars, to works featuring even our very own historical figures with the likes of Heneral Luna, whose popularity skyrocketed due to the 2015 historical biopic about the fiery general. 

I went about the convention browsing and buying merch from different fandoms and when I had my fill of these fan-made materials, I decided to look around for more original content from other creators. Now here’s the thing about local comic conventions like this: they usually table one of my favorite comic creators, Pol Medina Jr. Not many may know his name, but almost everyone would recognize his work, Pugad Baboy. For those who aren’t aware, Pugad Baboy is a political satire comic set in a community of the same name with its inhabitants often commenting on the current political situation. In one of the panels I remember reading as a kid, there was a mini story arc where some of the main characters travelled to the future where they found that in this future, the Philippine roads and highways were filled with highways and flyovers just to ease the traffic. This was, of course a reflection of the traffic conditions at the time of its publication—not as worse as the conditions that we have now of course, but it just shows that the concerns then and now have not changed a bit. 

“It just shows that one cannot escape politics even if they claim to be apolitical—that they’d rather let themselves be consumed in their own fandoms and won’t let themselves be bothered by real world politics.”

But as I walked around the convention some more, I realized that Pugad Baboy wasn’t the only comic there that had something to say politically. As a matter of fact, I noticed that almost all (if not ALL) of the merch from the fandoms that I had in my hand, as well as other works that we consume in order to entertain ourselves through different media whether it be through TV, novels, movies or videogames, more often than not have something fairly political to say in their own right: Star Wars, though it had stories of space wizards and hand-cutting fathers, involves the fight of the rebels against a government that was clearly inspired by Nazi rule (Stormtroopers, anyone?); Marvel, through its many heroes tackled topics on feminism (Captain Marvel), the United States’ tendency for meddling with countries’ internal affairs (Iron Man), and even resource economics (Thanos) just to name a few; The Lord of the Rings had gravity defying elves and magic rings, but it was  also Tolkien’s commentary on industrialization and its ill effects on the environment; Steven Universe, though a kids’ show, deals with class and societal issues; and the Fallout video game franchise, though a fun RPG (roleplaying game) with lots of crazy quests including one which you have to find a sex robot of all things, is a criticism on a hyper capitalist society. 

It just shows that one cannot escape politics even if they claim to be apolitical—that they’d rather let themselves be consumed in their own fandoms and won’t let themselves be bothered by real world politics. Aristotle said that human beings are political animals; so, it begs the question: are those apolitical persons apolitical because they don’t care about the politics of the world around them? Or are they apolitical because they’re not actually human beings? Makes you think. ■

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