#moral gray areas

[openkook]

Blood, Meth and Duterte

What you’re about to read isn’t your typical glossy, feel-good story. This is a story about meth, Duterte, and what happens when life throws you into a fight you didn’t sign up for. This piece started as a Facebook post—a raw, unfiltered rant that somehow struck a nerve. It went viral with over 1.4 million views and nearly 22,000 shares, proving that people are just as obsessed with chaos as I am. The Manila Times even picked it up, with veteran journalist Robert Tiglao featuring it in their publication. Honestly, I thought it was too dark and personal for the masses, but apparently, oversharing is a national pastime. If you’re expecting a moral high ground or a neatly tied bow at the end, you’re in the wrong place. But if you want an honest look at addiction, survival, and the razor-thin line between safety and fear, then you’re in for a ride. Don't forget to check the Facebook link if you're curious about the comment section—it's a battlefield all on its own. Here’s the piece that made waves. Read it, judge it, share it, or just let it sit with you. Like I said, it’s not pretty—but then again, neither is life.

Can you kill crime without spilling blood? And who the hell are we to judge when we’ve never had to make that call?

I ask these questions as someone born and raised in Davao City, a place that, for better or worse, is synonymous with one man: Rodrigo Duterte. Over the years, I’ve seen people debate his extrajudicial killings (EJKs), his war on drugs, and the looming shadow of an ICC investigation. I don’t know what it’s like to run a city—let alone a country—but I know what it’s like to run a household shattered by drugs. Meth, to be exact.

Talking about the drug war means talking about addiction, not as a statistic but as lived reality. I’ve lived it. And unlike the polished speeches from politicians or the filtered reports in the media, my experience couldn’t be spun into a neat narrative. It was raw, bruised, and bloody. It hurt like hell. If I were to paint those years, they’d be black and blue—literal bruises, figurative shadows.

Living with a meth addict is like inviting chaos into your living room. It seeps into the walls, turning your place into a war zone. I spent a decade as the punching bag for a man whose mind had been hijacked by meth. He wasn’t always like that—no one starts out that way. But once meth got its claws in, the kind man I knew turned into a ticking time bomb. I lost track of the nights I’d hide my face, clutching the kids, praying we’d make it to sunrise.

It’s Psych and, well, Meth 101: The stuff doesn’t just mess with your head—it wrecks everything. Addicts live like cornered animals, lashing out with paranoia and desperation. When I heard about cops killing addicts in the street, I wasn’t surprised. I knew how quickly things could escalate, go south. The crackhead in my house once chased me with a knife, eyes wild like a rabid dog. I was bruised inside and out. And yeah, I stuck around too long—call it hope or masochism.

I learned a bitter lesson: Meth turns people into monsters and leaves their families in constant danger. Seen like that, it’s no wonder Duterte went straight for the jugular.

People talk about rehabilitation, and I agree—it’s necessary. But the reality is some addicts, the ones deep in the spiral, are beyond therapy, at least in the immediate sense. They need help, sure, but they also need to be contained and restrained before they hurt others. So when someone like Duterte, a prosecutor who’s seen the dark side of humanity, decides to impose strict, brutal measures, is it really that surprising?

A Game of Numbers and Corpses

People love to talk numbers when it comes to Duterte. The media says 30,000 dead from extrajudicial killings. The government says 6,000. The truth? Probably somewhere in the middle. But here’s another stat: 1.2 million addicts surrendered, 345,000 arrested. That’s almost 1.5 million who got a second chance. I wonder how many of those are like the bastard who made my kids' life and mine a living hell. How many had wives or kids who spent nights in fear, praying the man they loved wouldn’t turn into a monster before morning?

It’s ironic—Duterte’s threats did what our begging couldn’t: they scared these guys straight, at least for a while. It’s messed up, sure. But when your desperate, ten-year-long pleas—“Tama na, please, maluoy ka, tama nq”—choked out between punches, go unheard, there’s a twisted relief in knowing that Digong’s roar finally got through.

Choices and consequences—that’s life, isn’t it? We love to pretend every decision is black and white. But what happens when it’s all shades of gray? When it’s picking the lesser of two evils?

The Davao I Knew: Safety on a Knife’s Edge

I’ve lived in Davao all my life. I’m about to hit 47 next month, with three kids in their 20s and a bunch of grandkids. Davao under Duterte was a safe bubble in a chaotic country. I was 11 when he first became mayor, and I watched the city change. It wasn’t just safe—it was dull in its calmness. You could leave your bag at a café, walk home alone at night. The only chaos I knew was inside my own head and, yes, my household. The outside world? Duterte took care of that.

It wasn’t until I spent time in Manila in my mid-20s that I realized how different Davao was. I remember staying on Adriatico Street while training to be an entertainer for Japan. One day, I walked to Robinsons with a fellow trainee from Cavite. I stuck to the sidewalk, as I always did. She, on the other hand, walked dangerously close to the speeding traffic. I scolded her, worried she might get hit by a car. "Hoy, pag ikaw na hagip ng rumaragasang sasakyan dyan, good luck sa'yo." She just laughed and shot back, “At pag ikaw hinatak ng mga sanggalo dyan sa tabi-tabi, good luck rin sayo.” I glanced around and saw the shifty eyes of young men she called “sanggalos”—street thieves who could pull you into an alley faster than you could blink.

A few days later, I came across three barefoot kids, sniffing solvent from plastic bags as they begged for coins. You don’t see that in Davao. Sure, there are beggars, but never kids openly using drugs while asking for money. Even children in Davao know what will happen if they get caught.

Not long after that, my best friend had her earrings yanked off her ears by a rookie thief. They weren’t even real gold—just cheap plastic. She told me she was "used for practice." It left me speechless. Days later, she was still rattled.

Could I ever feel that kind of fear in Davao? Not likely. In Davao, it felt like someone always had your back. That someone was Duterte. He wasn’t gentle to criminals.

The Crude Protector

A lot of Manileños, especially the congress crowd, love to trash Duterte. They clutch their pearls over his foul language and his disregard for politeness. Maybe he’s a rough, uncouth bastard. But I’ve known men like him—uncles and grandpas who cursed like sailors but would fight tooth and nail for you. They weren’t polished, but they were dependable in ways polite society never is.

Then there’s the circus in Congress. Newbie congressmen, barely out of their 30s, grilling Digong like he’s some clueless old fool. The arrogance, the self-righteousness—from people who’ve never run a city, let alone a country. It’s depressing.

You had this one guy who couldn’t shut up about being a zumma cum laude, like that matters when you’re facing the blood and chaos of the real world—like Davao’s streets in the ’80s and ’90s, or the country’s drug mess before Digong’s presidency. He didn’t live through that. None of them did.

Then there were the former CPP-NPAs turned Congresswomen/men grilling Duterte—the same people whose comrades were out killing soldiers and recruiting kids for their battles. It’s laughable. Do they really think their cause is nobler than Duterte’s crackdown? Both left young bodies in the ground. The difference? Duterte’s war left 6,000 dead addicts. They’re still sending teenagers off to die in the mountains.

The Same Old Question

So here we are, still arguing about Duterte’s drug war. The ICC might drag him into court, but we’re still stuck on the same question: Were his methods justified? Did the ends justify the means? Is it better to live in a city where you don’t worry about your earrings being snatched, even if it means lives were lost?

Maybe the real question isn’t whether his methods were right or wrong, but whether they were necessary. Can we demand safety without blood, or is a peaceful society built on violence we prefer not to see?

Do I have the answers? No. I’m just a woman who survived a violent home, raised three kids in a city that felt safe. I’m not here to make grand statements about morality. But here’s what I know: The man who used me as his punching bag for a decade is still alive. He never gave himself up. But Duterte’s crackdown got to him. I saw it once: He was trembling, locking every window, convinced the cops were on his tail. It was raw fear, the kind I’d never seen from a meth head before. Part of me wished he’d been that scared of me. In the end, he got his second chance, despite everything he put us through. And while I don't wish him harm, I can't help but think of all the people spared his fists because someone like Digong decided to take extreme action.

I’ve walked the streets of Davao without fear. That’s a luxury I didn’t have elsewhere. I don’t love violence, but I also don’t have the luxury of pretending the world is safe without it.

Is this the kind of safety we should cheer for or fear? Depends which side of the sidewalk you’re standing on, I guess.

—Kooks D., Open Journal, 14 Nov 2024

[daisydisciple]

Ok thought not fully formed yet but I think everything would make a lot more sense if we thought of "sin" as more along the lines of "something that weakens your connection with God" and less "a morally bad action in the secular philosophical sense."

In modern secular philosophy, usually we only think of an action as "bad" if it causes measurable harm to society/the environment/another person etc. No victim = no crime. This makes perfect sense when we're thinking about regulating behavior with laws, rules, and, to an extent, social norms. The goal of this kind of thinking/regulating is to create a harmonious, free, and safe society in our mortal/temporal/earthly condition.

In contrast, Sin as a religious (Christian) concept is more concerned with the state of an individual soul and that soul's relationship with God. It is possible for something to be a sin and yet be a "victimless crime." (Arguably the "victim" here is actually the "perpetrator" but you know what I mean.) The goal of this kind of thinking is to help the individual be in harmony with God.

I think the problem here is when we conflate the two uncritically. Yes, there is a lot of overlap (murder, for example, would draw you further from God and also is harmful to the murder victim/their family/society.) But the two concepts are not one and the same. Just because a behavior is sinful doesn't mean it can and should be forbidden by law, rule, or even social norm. Likewise, just because enforcing or encouraging a certain behavior is beneficial to society doesn't mean that behavior is or isn't a sin.

I think this conflation is a source of miscommunication and misunderstanding. Lots of people seem to interpret calling a behavior sinful to mean "if you do this you are an bad person who is actively harming society."

I also think that's why people get so turned off by the concept of all sin being equal in the eyes of God. That isn't the same thing as all morally bad actions having equal weight or consequences in society. The point is that all sin separates us from God, and what His plan requires for us is for there to be zero separation. (That's where Jesus comes in). The point of saying all sin is the same in the eyes of God isn't to say that murder and not praying are equivalent in secular morality. The point is that someone "guilty" of not praying needs Jesus just as much as a murderer. (Because! We all need Jesus completely and equally.)

So anyway I guess my point is that Christians need to recognize that just because something is sinful (separates a soul from God) doesn't mean that that thing should be illegal or against the rules or even socially shamed.

But! Non-Christians should also understand that the concept of sin is distinct from secular morality. If I say that something is a sin, don't take it as me saying "anyone who does this is evil and depraved and deserves to be executed by firing squad." girl I sin. we all sin.

[redknight07]

One of my favorite scenes from my fic, A Moral Gray-Area. Leshy's farming methods are unorthodox, but effective nonetheless.

Just Leshy \/

From before I drew his friends and his tail, which I remembered halfway through.

[jonquilspool]

daemon and aegon ii have very similar attitudes and beliefs the only difference in outcome is aegon was primarily raised by an overbearing mother trapped in the feudal dystopia that is being female in westeros while daemon was primarily raised by a distant father trapped in the feudal incestual dystopia that was the targaryens under jaehaerys. in this i will--

[asukiess]

Emilie hugging Adrien with the amok in her fingers ….

yes, and?

though this ask did just remind me that she probably felt his sadness all the time about gabriel's absence. I bet she'd use the last of her strength to scoop him up and make him laugh and nuzzle into his cheek and tell him jokes. I bet it hurt to know that he'd smile at her, and she'd briefly feel him happy before she knew he was sad again, even though he kept a smile painted on.

[utilitycaster]

Sort of a distant tangent off my post about Ashton, but I'm growing more and more suspicious of the fandom claim that there's no time for small RP moments in Campaign 3. I do think that it's been challenging to get deeper party bonding or serious conversations that aren't about the big philosophical questions they're facing, since those do take much more time; but then I think about Calamity, or Candela Obscura. I can genuinely give you at least a couple paragraphs about pretty much every relationship in the two Circles, or in the Ring of Brass. I can also point to no shortage of small moments between characters in the Mighty Nein Aeor or Vox Machina Vecna endgame episodes, which were all extremely plot-heavy and fast-paced, and D20 consistently nails character relationships in a fraction of the time.

I think it really does come down to, as Brennan Lee Mulligan always says, the character creation phase. Laying down a solid groundwork in which everyone has a detailed, rich backstory and sense of personality and relationship history (in the case of characters who knew each other prior to the start of the series) is absolutely crucial, and even in the case of characters who don't know each other before going in, a good amount of time spent in character creation ensures that it's easier for them to develop those interpersonal relationships on the fly. I know in actual play there's some degree of finding the character as you play, but there are games for which there is a very short runway, and I don't think it ever hurts to do more extensive character prep than the bare minimum. And if there are gaps, I think it also helps to go back and fill those in mid-way, away from the table - Travis clarifying Chetney's backstory being a great example that allowed the history of Chetney and Deanna to feel realized and full, despite only a few episodes.

I'll also be blunt: most of the time when people complain that there aren't moments because the plot keeps moving...they're mad about shipping. Which has always rung hollow to me. It was a common complaint in C2, that no time was taken for character relationships, despite them taking an entire half of an episode for the Beauyasha date and despite no shortage of moments for all three of the other couples (and plenty of platonic moments between friends). The issue was never a lack of time; it was that the characters they wanted to talk to each other didn't actually have the relationship in canon that the fans had dreamed up, and so, when the chips were down, they went to other people.

It takes two seconds to say something like "I hold their hand", even in the middle of plot-heavy adventuring. If someone doesn't say it, it's rarely the GM rushing them; it's the player either choosing not to do so, or not remembering to do so, and either of those is quite revealing regarding how the player feels about that relationship and where it stands in their priorities.

[jiangfamilytherapist]

Lissen, I don’t know where all these Jiang Cheng antis are that the rest of you seem to be making most righteous war with, but the algorithm seems to have sensed that I don’t have time for that nuance-allergic shit and has spared me. May you all be similarly blessed 🙏

For those still fighting in the critical reading trenches, thank you for your service to our purple anger boy 🫡

[turnaboutstar]

trucy!! but not in a necklace :D

[soullessjack]

tumblr is a cesspool of bad fandom opinions but spn tiktok is another ring of hell entirely because like. what do you mean “lucifer would’ve been a better father to jack than dean.” what do you mean “mary was just as bad if not worse than john.” why are you calling people pedophiles for wanting a grown man just because you think he’s mentally stunted because he wears Velcro shoes. do you understand what you are saying. are your brain cells active and functioning properly

[suffarustuffaru]

why otto is so pissed off at subaru (arc 8 ch 24)

hello im otto posting Again but im writing this in an attempt to understand this subject myself (and totally not as a reference for later…) and also bc some people in the fandom seemed to be confused on Why ottos so angry at the moment. but i really think the key reason why hes so mad at subaru right now comes from this: otto treasures the people he cares about far above anyone else—to the point where if he needs to make sacrifices, he absolutely will because the people he cares about (his friends in emilia camp) go First before everyone else in his mind.

like. thats ottos key reason for everything hes been doing in arc 8. all his other reasoning branches off from that—like him wanting to leave vollachia for dead and only take the people his camp cares about. otto sees the path that will keep his camp safest—ie just going into vollachia to rescue rem and subaru and then immediately getting out—and he chooses that rather than subaru and emilias more noble approach of refusing to leave vollachia and its population of 50 million people to die. otto himself is aware that his own strategy is Callous, especially after roswaal told him in chapter 24 that he agrees with ottos proposed strategy of just leaving vollachia. but otto thinks that its 1. entirely necessary and 2. he Knows that thats the optimal way to keep the emilia camp safe.

he knows that staying in vollachia and helping vincent is a massive risk to his whole camp. otto being a merchant values equivalent exchange and Hates too much cost, which is On Top of otto knowing that going out of their way to help vollachia is risking the entire emilia camp’s lives. but otto Knows subaru and emilia. and he knows that subaru and emilia are idealists at heart that will do everything they can to save Everyone, which is why despite being Extremely Unhappy about all of this, otto plays hard to get so vincent is the one who asks for their help. that way, at least the decision to help vollachia looks more like accepting the request of vollachias emperor and adding more accomplishments under their belt and Less Like just going out of their way to vollachia for no benefit at all.

otto valuing his camp above everything else is also why he creates distance between himself and julius and anastasia and emphasizes that theyre enemies. for otto, its Absolutely the emilia camp above everyone else.

then theres the whole louis situation. otto, of course, knows that subaru cares about louis Despite everything shes done.

so. essentially. i think ottos extremely pissed about subaru always going out of his way to try and be a hero because otto knows this comes at a Detriment to subaru (bc otto CARES about subaru!!! he knows subaru is WAY too selfless and forgiving and he cant agree with that!!!) and otto worries for the cost of subarus decisions, especially with the current conflict regarding louis. otto has accepted that, unlike the majority of his camp, that he has to be the Bad Guy. because in ottos mind, no one else in his camp is going to be bold enough to be the ruthless morally questionable one. he thinks its 100% necessary to play this role to minimize the costs and threats to his camp.

which is why he hasnt told anyone, despite knowing this from his dp, that louis/spica is innocent.

hes fully aware that—even though hes manipulating his own camp—louis will be more likely to be eliminated if he keeps quiet about the fact that she has Zero malice. louis being eliminated means one less threat to his camp. and otto KNOWS that subaru cares about louis and is upset at the idea of her dying (which is at least partly why otto snapped at julius in chapter 23!!), but ottos decided that killing louis comes at a far less cost than keeping her alive. because keeping her alive means dealing with the consequences of the emilia camp calling her an ally and rem and subaru recognizing her as their daughter when louis has affected So Many people. otto knows this and wants to prevent it at all costs.

otto wants her dead for these reasons. otto figures that he has to be the one walking in darkness bc he not only wants to help emilia and subaru and preserve their idealism (bc he Knows that its important to them!! its who they are at heart and he cares about them in turn bc of their kindness and goodness!!!), but otto also wants to help by being the necessary evil. because someone has to.

that, of course, wont stop otto from being pissed at subarus decisions. this also, of course, wont stop subaru from being pissed if he ever finds out otto withheld the fact that he knows louis is 100% innocent just so he can make sure that 1. the rest of emilia camp stays suspicious of louis and 2. louis gets killed. i really do think ottos questionable decisions will eventually catch up to him—because he stands in direct opposition to everything subaru stands for.

subaru wants to save everyone. he wants to have it all, even if it costs him. otto, meanwhile, chooses only who he cares about because hes not idealistic enough to believe he can have everything, and he believes that sacrifices have to be made even if its cruel. and he knows that subaru cant do that, but it still angers him because hes trying to keep subaru safe while subaru insists on trying to accomplish everything without sacrificing anyone. otto doesnt think its possible at all. but otto knows its not in subarus nature to be pragmatic.

which is why otto takes A Lot of the things subaru has been doing in arc 8 Extremely Personally. because its Very personal for otto.

[redknight07]

I drew this for my CotL fic, "A Moral Gray-Area" https://archiveofourown.org/works/59468266

Narinder is supposed to look kinder than that, as this fic centers around a universe where they're the good guys. However, I am bad at drawing faces.

[seokwoosmole]

Never has my opinion about a non-antagonist character changed so drastically than it has about Shigure ok there might have been some before but right now I can’t think of any.

I went from “Oh he’s just a silly lil guy” to “*sobs* silly *sobs again* DAD” to “ohhhh….silly….pervy😳lil guy” to “ohhhh….silly mysterious guy???” to “oh- oh….😬”

[noctilu-uca]

11:29 PM and im spending my night tweaking out over media misunderstandings. WHAT DO YOU MENA YOU AHEV NO MEDIA LITERACY HIW THE FUCK DO YOU MESS IT UO THATAT BADD UUUHGHHHHH WHATGFYHEFUCM ARE YOUU SAAYYIINNNNGGG

[wandercr]

lil plot wishlist:

parental relationship(s) / someone taking eliana under their wing, preferably in a (mostly) positive way

vault 101 threads, especially characters engaging with eliana as chaplain of the vault (let her be your awful confessional/therapist)

au where she grows up in vault 33

eliana as the courier, sole survivor or lucy's companion, going through canon plotlines. there might be room for her to be a companion to the ghoul, as well, if she knows he's looking for his family

eliana having a hefty bounty placed on her head. knowing previous mercenaries haven't been able to leave a scratch, the ghoul is hired for the job (anywhere in the fallout timeline)

eliana meeting max and learning about his version of the brotherhood of steel - bonus if she immediately adopts him like she does in her heart w/lucy

sibling au with other lone wanderers! let eliana be your muse's overbearing big sister

[what-is-love-babey-dont-hurt-me]

Unstoppable force (knowing Susie is a complex character with nuance who is done DIRTY by the fandom and genuinely deserves not to be just a villain with no redeeming qualities and instead have her other traits explored) meets immovable object (I REALLY love villains with no redeeming qualities I LOVE when characters can just be evil PLEASE let them twirl their mustaches and vivisect the hero it’s the best thing it’s enrichment. Evil is the highest compliment I can give a character I love you villains)