Humblebola

Hi Karl,

During the season opener of the Ateneo Blue Eagles, a lot of buzz circled around the attendance of Divine Adili’s parents, as well as the mother of Rene Bartebonia. Our astute photographers (@docpapicture and @mambito_shots) captured emotional moments of Divine’s parents sharing a somber smile as they remembered their son through the sport he played. It was a heart warming moment, for the Ateneo community, yet I noticed something a bit off. In the comments of our post, several Facebook users commented, “Justice for Divine and Rene.” which gave me pause.

As a lawyer by profession, I deal with questions of justice on a daily basis. Those comments made me wonder, what kind of justice are they after? In my line of work, justice is about the righting of wrongs. Justice comes in many forms, most directly through punishment from the justice system, sometimes justice comes through indirect means. However it comes, justice is only the first step toward healing for the victims and their loved ones.

Divine and Rene, their parents, their loved ones, do deserve justice.

But what is this in our comment section about a “Attention sa mga pumatay kay Rene” and “Sila ang mga player na sangkot sa pagkamatay ni Rene at Divine”. Some even commented “Mga hudas ng admu..” in a post featuring the photos of the Ateneo players.

Are they saying it was the players who intentionally caused the deaths of Divine and Rene? Based on what?

In all reports that emerged regarding the tragedy, the student-athletes, Jared, Kieffer, all of them, had no part in planning the activity in Aurora. They were there to train. The people responsible, the person ultimately responsible for the training activity and who should have been looking out for their safety are Tab Baldwin and his coaching staff.

Charges have been filed against Tab and the others involved in the tragedy. The process is moving. Are the commenters saying the authorities have the wrong people under investigation?

Seeking punishment for those who have done wrong is a form of justice. But for it to be justice, the persons punished should be the people who did the wrong. Seeking punishment, retribution, vengeance against persons who were not responsible for the wrongdoing, is not justice. It’s bloodlust. Violence for violence sake.

Understandably, Rene Bartebonia’s mother continues to call for justice for her son’s death. After all, the wheels of justice are still turning, and there can be no peace without justice. The same way justice must be served for the many wrongs that people in our country suffered in the past. Be it the abuses of Martial Law, extrajudicial killings or the straight up plundering of public resources for personal gain, there will be no justice until the people responsible are brought to justice, there can be no healing or moving on until justice is finally attained.

And maybe justice is still far from reach, but what’s certain is that it will not be reached by grasping at the wrong people. There are no indications that the players of Ateneo were responsible for the deaths of Divine and Rene, yet somehow they have been turned into scapegoats by these Facebook commenters. Proxy targets for a class war between the haves and have-nots? Maybe. But if calling for justice is their goal, this is not going to achieve it. If they have a different motive, they’re probably being very effective at it right now.

It’s bizarre how these commenters are acting. It’s one thing to have a rabid fanbase overreact to every win and loss, but this, this has nothing to do with basketball, and by the looks of it, nothing to do with justice either.

In any case, I do hope for justice, not just for Divine and Rene, but for everyone that was failed by the system.

No basketball this time. Some things are just lifer than ball.

See you on the court.

Yours,

Toby