Scapegoats, fall guys, smoke screens

CTALK

- CITO BELTRAN

Wikipedia defines "fall guy" as a person to whom blame is deliberately and falsely attributed in order to deflect blame from another. "Smoke screen" is defined as a dense cloud of smoke used to conceal something, most commonly in military context. It can also be used figuratively to describe anything that hides the truth or someone's intentions.

A "scapegoat" is a goat sent into the wilderness after the Jewish chief priest had symbolically laid the sins of the people upon it. Just like the curious case of Congressman Nick Briones who was "caught watching a sabong video while Congress was in session.

For his "mortal sin" he was shamed on social media, stripped of a committee chairmanship and told by a senator to make a public apology.

Briones has since apologized profusely but was he punished because of the video content or was he "used" or "ginamit siya" in order to make Congress look good after the presidential "Mahiya naman kayo" became the national mantra.

I find it hypocritical of people to use Briones as their whipping boy while everybody else is addicted to "doom scrolling," addicted to watching videos on their phones or tablets.

That he was already called out on social media was bad enough, but did the HoR need to "whip him some more?" Clearly, the self-righteous call of a senator for a public apology was nothing more than an opportunistic PR move.

At least half of the Philippine adult population that owns a cellphone is addicted to watching videos on our phone that we mindlessly do it with total disregard where or with whom.