In the wake of the hundreds of killings involving drug personalities, an awareness campaign was launched by netizens and artists online, dubbed #CardboardJustice.
Now, another artist, Patricia Ramos, has joined the campaign with her Spoliarium-inspired painting portraying extrajudicial killings, as reported by GMA News Online.
It shows what seemed like wounded people, based on the bloody marks they left behind, being dragged as the media recorded everything. But there are two things that are significantly remarkable in the painting – the cardboard bearing what looked like words, saying “Drug Pusher Huwag Tularan” and the signage saying “PULIS,” marking the presence of a police station.
Since she posted her painting online on July 19, it has garnered 5,400 reactions and 3,940 shares, as of writing.
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While many of the comments were from Facebook users who reacted negatively to the painting, saying that it was a swipe against President Rodrigo Duterte, there were also those who defended Ramos by clarifying that the painting was in no way against Duterte, but against extrajudicial killings.
Also, one of the Facebook users who commented on Ramos’ post is Adrienne Onday, who is one of active campaigners in this movement. They’re obviously proud of each other, judging from their exchange of comments.
According to a Philippine Daily Inquirer article, Onday is a 19-year-old sociology student at the University of the Philippines Diliman. As part of the awareness campaign, she wore her “accessory,” a cardboard with the words “Lahat tayo posibleng drug pusher,” as she boarded the train from her home in Marikina City all the way to the De La Salle University in Manila, where she was invited as the speaker about student activism.
But Onday clarified that she got the idea of #Cardboard Justice from a friend, Hope Swann, who started bringing around a cardboard with a message “We could all be PUSHERS.”
According to Philippine National Police (PNP) records, there have been 207 reported killings of suspected drug pushers and users from July 1 to 20. This meant that since Duterte’s first day in office as the President of the Philippines, about 10 drug suspects met their end daily.
This raised concerns about extrajudicial killings that prompted Vice President Leni Robredo, the Congress, and Senator Leila de Lima, among others, to call for an investigation into these killings.
Even PNP chief Director General Ronald dela Rosa said on Wednesday, July 20, that extrajudicial killings have to stop “because that is against the law.”
For those who want to monitor the campaign against extrajudicial killings, just follow posts with #CardBoardJustice on Twitter and Facebook.
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