Gerry Alanguilan's Blog, page 2

Who I Will Vote for President

Those following my tweets would know that I will not be voting for Jojo Binay. I will not be voting for Mar Roxas either. If Miriam Santiago runs, I’ll vote for her. If Rodrigo Duterte runs, I’ll probably vote for him. If both of them run for the same position, I’ll have a big debate with myself until election day.

Some of you would probably be indignant at the idea of Duterte as president due to his reputation. But you know what? Every single candidate out there have faults in them. None of their hands are clean. In this and in any election, you do not have the luxury of choosing the purest candidate. You only choose the lesser evil. Would you choose a relentlessly self promoting candidate with a corrupt reputation who has done nothing to alleviate this country’s hardship, or would you choose a candidate who made his city one of the safest in the world, but has an alleged reputation of doing away with criminals on the side? I’d choose his crimes over the other guy.

The problem with a lot of Filipinos is that they cry and bellyache about how this country is going nowhere, but are perfectly unwilling to make drastic changes and make sacrifices to solve the problem. Of all the candidates laid out before us so far, Miriam and Duterte would be the two people with enough balls in them to actually make real and lasting changes. It will be hard, I have no doubt about that. We will be sacrificing a lot of things. But good things cannot happen easily or be granted to us just like that without working hard for it, or sacrificing a little bit of our idealism.

We can no longer afford to be completely idealistic. I thought I could live my life like that, but I’ve come to believe that I need to get my feet dirty once in a while just so I can achieve a greater good. Waiting for the completely, and perfectly ideal dirt free candidate is like waiting for Godot. It is someone who will never come.

I for one would be willing to get my hands dirty just to see a better future. Duterte himself has said that he doesn’t mind going to hell just as long as his people can live in paradise. He knows that he will get his hands dirty (if they aren’t already), just to ensure everyone else lives a better life. And we can see that right now in Davao. He has already proven himself with actions, not with empty words.

A vote for Binay or Roxas, I fear, would just be a vote to continue the status quo. This horrible, unbearable status quo we’ve been living for such a long time. I think it’s time for change. REAL change. Binay and Roxas will not, cannot, and are completely unable make that happen. We need something risky, something drastic.I think we can no longer afford to let things continue as they are.

Videos and Me

It’s been months since I made a video on You Tube. One or two people have missed me and asked on Twitter why I don’t upload new ones. I’ve thought about that. In the past couple of years I have attempted to restart vlogging and you can see my efforts up at my You Tube channel. I made videos saying “It’s been a while since I’ve made videos”, after which I’d say why and they all involve me being busy with this or that.

To date I’ve uploaded six hundred and fourteen videos, counting a few that are private. When I realized how much videos I’ve done, I’m surprised. 614. Holy Shit. Where did I find the time?

I realize now that my burst of You Tube activity coincided with my hiatus from inking for Marvel/DC. I had quit inking in 2005 and soon after I was doing these videos on You Tube with seemingly crazy abandon. It also coincided with the time I got my first digicam and I was giddy with the thought that I could make my own little films. It was something I dreamed about when I was younger. I really enjoyed making these little videos. I particularly enjoyed editing it all together. I think this is one of the videos that I enjoyed editing the most:

But by far the most notorious video of mine is THIS one:

Right now it’s up to 5.8 million views. That’s kind of crazy. All of a sudden I’m seeing this video on TV on shows both here in the Philippines and abroad. The Japanese got a little excited about it which led to this:

And THIS:

The good stuff starts at 9:43m.

And there are lots more! I’ve gotten offers to appear at commercials and things like that. I’ve always declined because I don’t know… I feel that it’s just not my thing.

I wouldn’t say it changed my life, but it has been quite an interesting experience. I do get recognized once in a while, but not as often as you would expect. Earlier today a tricycle driver recognized me and asked how my comics work was going and I said it was just going fine. I didn’t know the guy. I don’t think I’ve met him. But I keep wondering if I have. I don’t know. I guess when people recognize me, I always assume it’s someone I’ve already met before.

In those days I was active at You Tube I would get all these ideas for videos. I guess that’s why I kept making them. My most favorite video of mine is this one, from August 2008:

I had this rough idea for a topic. All I did was switch on the camera and just started talking. I didn’t have a script. It was just stream of consciousness stuff. I think it came out pretty well. To this day I had no idea how I did it. I seriously doubt I can come up with something like this now.

When I started working for Marvel again in 2009, I continued to make videos, but the enthusiasm for it became less and less. I don’t think I’ve made any videos at all this year and it’s already August. I guess you can say I’m pretty much retired from it. It wasn’t a conscious decision to quit. It just happened. I think it’s got to be like falling out of love with someone. You probably wouldn’t want it to happen, but it does. And you just don’t know why.

I remain grateful to all those who have followed my videos, watched and left comments. I’ve met a lot of people through it with whom I remain on friendly terms to this day. It was a great experience and although I’ve made a damned fool of myself in a lot of those videos, I regret nothing. It was fun.

Are you just being selfish?

There are a lot of countries now that have legalized gay marriage, including the US. It’s cause for celebration for a lot of people, and also a cause for despair, disappointment and anger in other people. The question is why?

If you are a Catholic, or Baptist (or any kind of religion that doesn’t support gay marriage), the legalization of gay marriage doesn’t automatically mean that gay marriage will suddenly be allowed in your church. Of course not. It will still not be allowed, and it will still only honor “traditional” marriage between man and and a woman. For you, nothing will really change. NOTHING.

So how does the legalization of gay marriage affect you? It doesn’t, and it shouldn’t.

But why are you angry, indignant, disappointed and all those things?

Why do you want to dictate how other people live?

Have you considered the possibility that you are simply selfish? Because why would you care about what OTHER people do?

Why would you want to deprive them of the benefits of a legal marriage that YOU have always enjoyed?

1. You want to deprive other people of being “next of kin” when it comes to medical benefits.

2. You want to deny inheritance rights if their partner dies.

3. You want to deny them joint home insurance and other kinds of insurance.

4. You want to deny them the right to legally protect each other in court cases.

5. You want to deny them benefits (such as leave, social security, insurance etc) in case their partner dies.

There are so many other rights you enjoy right now that you want to deprive other people simply because you are personally offended by how they live their lives. Think about how “right” that is. If you are a Christian, would you call that attitude kind? Charitable? Compassionate? Loving? Understanding?

I wouldn’t. I call it selfish.

If I may give any kind of advice, worry about your marriage, your morality and your life first, before worrying about other people’s lives.

An Open Letter to You Tube and Viacom

In 2009 I created and uploaded a video called “Hey, Baby!” to You Tube. It’s just a series of short shots of me around the house smiling at the camera. That’s it. I didn’t use content created by another party, nor did I use music created by any other party. In fact, my video didn’t contain any kind of music at all. The last time I checked, my video had up around 5.8 million views. Which is just incredible. And so unexpected.

People made their own versions of the video, and some of them even used my video and added music and other things. That was done without my permission, but that’s OK. That’s the nature of viral videos on the Internet.

Because the video became so popular, TV shows started showing it in viral video themed programs. Some of them asked for permission, but most of them didn’t.

Tosh.0 was one such case. This show used my video a lot as a punchline to jokes. I didn’t mind it too much. They didn’t ask for permission to use it nor did they compensate me for it. They linked to my channel, but they spelled my channel incorrectly.

A couple of weeks ago You Tube took my video down citing copyright infringement on a complaint from Viacom. They were waving a big ass finger in front of my face, saying I shouldn’t upload content created by other people, threatening me with the closure of my channel if I had another copyright strike. And I’m like, what the fuck are they talking about?

Hey, Baby is owned 100% by ME, and no one else. I think what happened is this: Tosh.0 used my video without permission and compensation. Tosh.0 is owned by Viacom and now Viacom thinks my video belongs to them. Screwed up right?

This is not the first time it happened. ABS-CBN here in the Philippines used my video as well in one of their programs. Later, they tried to claim ownership of my video on You Tube. So for a while there was a notice that this video was owned by them.

Of course I went berserk. I filed a counter copyright infringement notice and got in touch with the Viacom contact person “Brad” cited in the copyright strike notice. I was angry, but I tried to keep it in control. Times like this logic over anger wins out. But I gotta admit, there’s nothing more infuriating than a big media corporation trying to grab something you own, threatening legal action.

A week or so later, my video is back online, without any note or even an apology from You Tube OR Viacom. Figures.

First, a word with You Tube: You Tube…. I spent years creating original content for my Komikero channel, working hard on each video. Do you understand this? YEARS. Couldn’t one employee spend one God damned minute verifying if some greedy media corporation actually have grounds to cite me for infringement? ONE GOD DAMNED FUCKING MINUTE.

Viacom… couldn’t you have “Brad” have less of a copyright infringement trigger finger and ask him to actually LOOK at the video and see if it’s actually owned by them? When you create viral video shows like Tosh.0, you are going to be using content NOT CREATED BY YOU. And as in my case, you most likely DIDN’T EVEN ASK FOR PERMISSION. How many copyright infringement strikes have you given original content creators on You Tube just because their videos appeared on shows that you own?

Arghh… I wish I could…. but I’ll just move on.

Half Kidding

For those who actually read my last post, which was my April Fool’s thing for this year… you might be interested to know that I was only half kidding. I do feel that way about social media, about Twitter and mostly Facebook. Except for approving a few tags, I actually haven’t posted anything myself in my profile for the past 14 days. Not that anyone would notice.

Besides I’ve got a lot of things going on offline lately which I just find crushing and it’s really wearing on me. April has been the most difficult month so far yet for this year, second only to May last year when my mom passed away. Things really just went downhill after Komiket. In a way things have been going downhill for quite a while. It only accelerated after Komiket. I feel so worn out. I need to swim in a beach, or maybe even just a pool. Hang out on a lounge chair watching the sun go down with an ice cold green apple soda in my hand. I would kill for that right now.

I wish April was over. Once April is over and things we’re expecting fall into place, I think it will get better from there. But right now it’s still right in the thick of the month and the end of the tunnel is still so far away.

Final Update (April Fool’s)

As you may have probably noticed, I really don’t post much on this blog anymore. Most people who have been active as bloggers have shifted to Twitter and Facebook to update their friends. In my case though, I haven’t been posting THAT much to Twitter and Facebook already. I don’t know, I guess I’m just getting tired of the Internet. You go online and you just see lies everywhere. It’s gotten so bad that you just don’t know what the truth is anymore. I’m just sick of it. I go on Facebook and all I see are rants, people complaining out loud to everyone and anyone except the people who really need to hear it, people passing off hoaxes as the truth (without even knowing it), people posting their dirty dishes (as if it’s a cool God damn thing to do), people having knee jerk reactions to news before thinking things out, people being jerks, people being homophobes, people being sexist, people being overly preachy… as I said I’m sick of it.

Many times I wish I could just unplug this damned thing. I think the time has finally come to do it. The only time I’ll be going online from now on will be to check my email for work related stuff, and that’s it.

I won’t go all drama queen and lament all this on Facebook before saying I will now be closing my account (like many people do). In fact, I won’t be closing my account at all. My FB and Twitter will still be there. This blog will still be here. But I won’t be.

Sorry to disappoint the few people who still read this blog and those who follow me on my online haunts. You know my email naman, so just drop be a line there and whenever I find myself online, I’ll try to respond. It might take a while.

Final Update

As you may have probably noticed, I really don’t post much on this blog anymore. Most people who have been active as bloggers have shifted to Twitter and Facebook to update their friends. In my case though, I haven’t been posting THAT much to Twitter and Facebook already. I don’t know, I guess I’m just getting tired of the Internet. You go online and you just see lies everywhere. It’s gotten so bad that you just don’t know what the truth is anymore. I’m just sick of it. I go on Facebook and all I see are rants, people complaining out loud to everyone and anyone except the people who really need to hear it, people passing off hoaxes as the truth (without even knowing it), people posting their dirty dishes (as if it’s a cool God damn thing to do), people having knee jerk reactions to news before thinking things out, people being jerks, people being homophobes, people being sexist, people being overly preachy… as I said I’m sick of it.

Many times I wish I could just unplug this damned thing. I think the time has finally come to do it. The only time I’ll be going online from now on will be to check my email for work related stuff, and that’s it.

I won’t go all drama queen and lament all this on Facebook before saying I will now be closing my account (like many people do). In fact, I won’t be closing my account at all. My FB and Twitter will still be there. This blog will still be here. But I won’t be.

Sorry to disappoint the few people who still read this blog and those who follow me on my online haunts. You know my email naman, so just drop be a line there and whenever I find myself online, I’ll try to respond. It might take a while.

Ranty Rant

Looking back on this blog, I realized how much of a ranty rant I was. At the same time, I suffered from hypertension. I was also mad a lot of the time. It wasn’t good. I started to rant less. Sure, things still bothered me, but more and more I just close my eyes, go to my happy place and just let it go. There are many things I could rant about the local komiks industry and the people in it, but I find that I’m a happier person just letting things be. After all, I do notice an incredible amount of improvement in the quality of local komiks in the last 10 years. That’s great, isn’t it?

Once in a while I do see something in Facebook that just flips my lid. More often I just move on, but on the rare occasion my lid is flipped so much that I just can’t help but launch an angry comment. The sheer amount of stupidity in people’s opinion just boggles my mind. People are entitled to their opinion of course, but sometimes it’s pretty obvious it’s just the wrong opinion. I mean, really, come on. These people are unfollowed right away. In the old days I’d rant about people tagging me, adding me to groups without my permission, posting their dirty dishes, posting preachy stuff. posting dead animals and people… right now I can’t be bothered to type anything. I just unfollow them right away. If the offense is just unbearable (like ignorant kids talking about the good old days of the dictator, or people condemning an entire religion for the actions of a few nuts), they get an automatic defriend without any more comment from me. I mean, why waste my time arguing? It’s not my fault they didn’t get the proper education.

I’ve also recently decided to make my profile less political and more just about fun stuff. That doesn’t mean I don’t care about current events and other important goings on, but FB just won’t be the place I’ll talk about it. Once in while I will post something like that, but it will be rare. If anyone makes a conclusion about my apathy towards current events based on my FB posts, then they would just be barking up the wrong tree.

“Sandali ng Katotohanan” by Nestor Redondo

“Sandali ng Katotohanan” (Moment of Truth) is a short story that’s both written and drawn by legendary Filipino komiks creator Nestor Redondo (Rima, Swamp Thing) for Espesyal Komiks #102, September 3, 1956.

“Sandali ng Katotohanan” tells the story of matador Paco Salazar, renowned for his cowardice during bullfights. It isn’t until he gets some encouraging reading of his future from a fortune teller that his fear disappears. The results are rather devastating.

Click for larger images.

Related link: Nestor Redondo, Philippine Komiks Illustrator

http://www.alanguilan.com/museum/redondo.html

Bakit Putol Ang Mga Kamay Ni Venus? Illustrated by Emilio D. Rodriguez

Here’s another short story illustrated by one of the Philippines’ best but relatively unknown komiks illustrators, Emilio “Emil” D. Rodriguez. This is a story of how Venus lost her arms as researched and written by Deo C. Gonzales.

The source material wasn’t that good as some of the edges are missing, but I just couldn’t help but post it because the artwork is just so spectacular. You can click on the images for much larger versions for better viewing.

This story was taken from Espesyal Komiks #177, July 20, 1959.