When Cheering squad and Cheerdancers Collide

It's been a month or so since I heard that one of the more prominent members of the oldest collegiate league in the Philippines, the NCAA, have suspended their whole cheering squad for the entire season. Letran's Cheering Squad and Cheerdance have been suspended by their Rector for fighting.

They were fighting alright, but there's a twist. They were fighting...amongst themselves.

Goodness gracious me.

I mean, you should be supporting each other but what's this? Now there's no one who will raise up the spirit of the crowd and the Letran Knights in games.

What's even more bamboozling about it is that it stemmed from the Letran Cheering Squad's (those who do the yells), declining his squad's assignment to perform at the JRU game by Letran's cultural affairs office. The excus? The same lame "oh we're not available" tune. So what did the school's cultural affairs do?

Simple. Contact the cheerdance coach, Buck Briones, and have their turn in performing for the audience at halftime. It was all set and game day was on. That's when things got ugly.

The cheering squad showed up. And they were fuming since they, in my opinion, always want the limelight for themselvea. "Men of old Letran," they say. Where there is no place for sissy cheerdancing.

So the handler, Louie de Leon, decided to pick a fight with Briones and things got ugly, bred by jealousy and hate might I add. Soon enough, the kids were punching with each other in the stands.

Personal and sexual slurs were hurled at Briones. And the admin of the school? They did not escape unscathed. "Manly" alumni ranted on Facebook at the "Taga Letran Manila ka kung" page. They called out incompetency by their Rector, the director of the school's cultural affairs and Briones among others. Worst of all, they wanted to kixk the gays out of Letran, saying as far as degrading the institution itself.

Downright ugly? No doubt.

Who came out looking like idiots? The alumni themselves.

Worse? They're now banned and deemed persona non grata by their alma mater.

Idiots. That's what these "manly men" are.

Courtside spotter signing out.

Bush League Blues

How about that?

Charles Mammie got a one-game suspension for subsequently kicking Adamson's Roider "I Don't Hesistate" Cabrera while Jeff Javillonar, the UAAP's most famous villain so far, got slapped a warning when he shoved down Jeric Teng, subsequently injury the shoulder of the latter while giving a free lane to the former.

I ask, why only give Javillonar a warning? I mean, there was the karate chop on Nico Elorde, which bled profusely before miraculously stopping. It's not like this was his first booboo as opposed to Charles Mammie. A three game suspension for such a bush league act may be sever, but maybe a two game suspension is a good compromise. Come on, this guy has been attested to such dirty plays by former RP Youth U-16 teammates of his like Kiefer Ravena and Jeric's very furious brother, Jeron (who has his own problems, but that's for later).

If you've seen the slo-mo, then you can swear off there was a follow-through on the push. You don't follow-through on an accidental bump, you stop yourself. Why? If you are sensible enough, you know that you would merit a whistle. That's why you put your hands up, but this guy? Nah. All bush league on ya Jeric Teng!

Then there's brother Jeron Teng. That punch to Newsome's face? Pretty much bush league too! Ain't that ironic. Before swearing off, I guess he should've checked himself first and say hey, I punched Newsome in the face but I got away with it while this guy who shoved my brother deserves a suspension. Hey, a punch is a punch. Both of you warranted some time off the court.

Keep it clean guys. Don't go bush league on me now.

Courtside Spotter, out.

Death of the Newspaper?

Is it really dying? The newspaper and print in general I mean.

Because if it is so, I’m sure as hell not felling it. When I want to cross-reference and fact check on certain stories, I still turn to newspapers. You say online is the way to go? I beg to differ. There’s only so much the online community can do.

For example, there’s an article wherein the title feels so real. The content in itself sounds real and fairly happens to your immediate surrounding. You share it immediately upon reading the entirety of it’s first paragraph. Alone. It’s a knee-jerk reaction of course, but let’s admit, once or twice in our social media lives, we have done this. And guess what, to your shame, once you read the article in its ENTIRETY, from top to bottom, there’s a disclaimer saying:

This is a satiric article posted by blah blah blah. For the purpose of making you think for yourself, blah blah blah.

Your credibility instantly crumbles down, especially if you’ve thrown invectives at say, the catholic church for that matter. In an instant, the knee-jerk reaction of wanting to share, wanting to illuminate others, turns out to be a dud, and you’re the biggest clown there is. Haters would be feasting on you if you’ve garnered enough attention to warrant a hater.

But the bottom line is:

You effed up by believing the online source and resorted to a knee-jerk reaction.

I’ve been there, done that, but thank goodness it got cleaned up just fine. I’ve learned from it. That before reacting to a certain article online, I always have to double check. Not with other online materials, but with the newspaper.

Why do I insist?

Think, what gets written in the paper? Do you utmostly believe that the big three will run stories that are fake, satiric and just want to boggle your mind? Of course not. There may be a spring of errata here and there, but serious papers don’t run fictionaliled stuff. They mean real, serious business people and are not clowning around like the next door “blogger” (I think I’m one of them) who pretty much sounds off on everything (well in my defense, there’s politics in sports).

The newspaper won’t die. Every Juan wants a tangible, readable, and very real material that has news written all over it. It will die only in somebody else’s dreams. When you want the real, hard, serious stuff, the newspapers have it (sans the Entertainment section, I mean rumor-mongering and all). Especially if it’s one of the three major publications in the country. They won’t pussy-foot around with the information.

And I’m pretty sure they don’t have a disclaimer kicker at the end of their articles. They don’t have to. It’s real, hard facts. Why would you need a disclaimer?

Disclaimers are only for the gullible. It’s time we stop being gullible. Stick to the papers. They’ll be your saving grace.

Back from the Dead

It's been a literal long while since I have posted anything. Blame it on fatigue and being overzealous with other rakets that made me burn out of blogging. Anyway, why don't we discuss something nice to begin with? Like Journalism. Boring? Yeah, just a bit. The definition side that is. But in practice, it's one hell of a job, or career.

So what is journalism? If we base it on my own terms, it's reporting via a medium, whether that be through this blog or the internet in general or through print or broadcast, of information that is deemed critical and a must for society to know. The kind of information usually varies. It can range from news, lifestyle, sports, technology and even entertainment (which, let's face it, is worth scrat for knowledge gathering).

COMFORT THE AFFLICTED, AFFLICT THE COMFORTABLE

It is said to be the purpose of journalism. In a way I believe it is rightfully so. Meandering in their lives, people tend to look only on their problems and not give a single glance at the cancer slowly eating up the community, the nation.

The elites, no matter how philanthropic they get, still get to go home in brick houses, sturdy mansions, and ride under the torrential rains in their shiny cars. The working class and the poor they said they donate a million or two of their bank accounts here and there? Still the same old, same old.

We've been lucky to be living an affluent life. But what about others that aren't as lucky as us? It's our job to make you aware. But the methods shouldn't be nice. It's a shock treatment kind of thing. It's no use if you are brought up to date with it in a nice way, you'll just disregard it.

We're not the heroes you need. Never was. Never will be. But we'll make you very angry at yourself.