Rise for Rights: Breaking the Chains of State Terror
A message for International Human Rights Day
By Kat Ulrike
Today, the world marks International Human Rights Day, the 77th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)—a document born of struggle, blood, and the promise that no human being shall be denied dignity and freedom.
The UDHR stands not as a relic, but as a battle flag. Its significance is clear against the backdrop of a world where fascism is resurging, where imperial powers and their client states tighten the screws of control, and where liberal democracy gives way to naked oppression. The people must watch, resist, and defend every hard-won right in the relentless pursuit of social justice and liberation.
In the Philippines, the shadow of state terror looms large. Citizens face harassment, threats, red-tagging, and extrajudicial killings. Those who dare defend the defenseless—human rights defenders—find themselves targeted, vilified, and isolated.
When domestic laws are twisted into weapons—like the Terrorism Financing Prevention Act of 2012 or the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020—the path is cleared for unchecked violations of political and civil freedoms. Dissent is criminalized. Activists are lumped together with rebels, as enemies of the state, in blatant defiance of international law. The record of brutality under the current regime and its militarized enforcers is long, cruel, and unmistakable.
And with the absence of dissent and relentless violations of political and civil freedoms so is the aggravation of institutional corruption and exploitation by bureaucrats, despotic landlords, and compradores alike, using the laws meant to maim the people and claiming about having "rights" and "freedoms" abound in a pretentious, performative society. The recent scandals involving abuse of public funds exposed relentless self-interest that betrayed public trust, and in it also meant aggravating repression as people starting to seek truth from facts, exposing the rot, and asserting the need for justice.
Across history, and across continents, the pattern is clear. In advanced capitalist states, authoritarianism creeps in through “national security” and “counterterrorism.” In colonial and neo-colonial states, oppression wears the mask of law and order. The people everywhere have risen in protest, sometimes violently, often peacefully—but always with the fire of resistance in their hearts. The Philippines is no exception. The struggle is long, arduous, and perilous—but it is a struggle that must continue.
Call it idealism, heck even downplaying the fact that people has to go beyond the parameters to assert what's right and just, but regardless of the risks, the threats, and the incidents that trying to bend people's aspirations, the struggle is not over. Solidarity is urgent. The people cannot rely on the state to uphold their rights, for the reactionary machinery has never recognized them willingly. Justice for past abuses must be pursued relentlessly. Impunity must be shattered. Every extrajudicial killing, every unlawful detention, every act of harassment and intimidation must be documented, exposed, and answered for. This is not just a legal struggle—it is a moral imperative, a duty of conscience, and a fight for humanity itself. The people must demand that the government place human rights at the center of policy. Justice for past abuses must be pursued relentlessly. Impunity must be crushed.
The chains of violence and oppression can be broken only by unity and action. The masses, united, can reclaim the dignity, the freedom, and the rights that are theirs by birth. International Human Rights Day is a call to rise, resist, and reclaim humanity itself. The fight continues—undaunted, unbroken, uncompromising.