Ateneo Hardcore

So last Tuesday, I was floored by the following news item, which I will tag to through an image, since I don’t want you readers to miss clicking on, and reading through, the subject of my ire today:

Go ahead. Read it first.

You done? Okay, let us proceed.

If you’re anything like me, then you would have found this outrageous. For plenty of reasons, most of which, I’m betting, is the fact that Pinoy teleseryes are drivel-driven pieces of pandering commercialism disguising themselves as art. Feel free to disagree with me if you want.

Now here’s the thing: my parents watch ABS-CBN’s teleseryes often. And I usually catch glimpses of it every once in a while. So I’m not unaware that some of these shows do try, and can actually be entertaining, if not decent.

And if the intellectual society wants to study teleseryes, then who am I to argue? I think it might be a good thing to actually figure out how the local culture lends itself positively to the acceptance of these things.

But I read from a friend’s Facebook feed that this class was being offered as a LitPop class.

A LIT CLASS?!

Will they be studying the actual scripts for these? If yes, then I'm ok with it. But if they're not, then there's no point in putting it in a literature class. If you want to study moving pictures, there's a completely different course for that.

If you want to study literary themes, study Edilberto Tiempo and F. Sionil Jose, because they've got it down. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if teleseryes get their scripts from the success of these books.

So some of you are going to tell me that litpop classes in the past studied comics. And I’m going to tell you now that that’s like comparing apples to meatloaf. Komiks are an accepted medium because it is at the same time sequential visual art and literary art. There is nothing literary about teleseryes, except the deplorable fact that they're literally senseless most of the time.

I mean, if you're going to study pop lit, read ABNKKBSNPLKO. Or Xerex Xaviera. Hell, Mars Ravelo or CJ Caparas, or even Manix's News Hardcore are GREAT, too.

Or if the point is to give some of the potentially upper-crust Atenistas a taste of what the masses are interested in, why not make them read those love novels? Yung mga binabasa ng mga kasambahay? That's low-art popular culture, too, right?

Give me a break.