Questionable timing of Ateneo’s decision

I belong to the minority who are for
giving the so-called Ateneo bully a
second chance, and join Ramon Lopez
in his stand (“When a bully gets
bullied,” Letters, 12/27/18).

I was disturbed that Ateneo could not have waited until the year would have turned before heeding the
throng hooting “Crucify him! Crucify him!” at the climax at Yuletide. Wouldn’t it have been kinder and gentler to have just said that the serious matter was under advisement and being seriously probed, with the result to be announced right after the year would have turned?

From where I sit, Ateneo was bullied, and panicked to announce the right thing at the wrong time. Even the Allies and the Germans observed a truce on Christmas Eve and even sang carols and played football in World War I.

I sympathize with the bullied student and his parents, but I also commiserate with the 14-year-old boy, who should be saved and given a second chance. He abused his martial arts skills. But, in the early ’70s, San Beda law senior Digong Duterte even used a gun to shoot classmate and frat brod Octavio Goco who had taunted him as a “promdi.”

No wonder the President, usually quick to comment on most anything and condemn, has not been heard to join the mob thirsting for blood at Christmastime.

He had attended Ateneo de Davao. If the boy becomes president someday, he will be the third Atenean, with Digong and Erap, in conflict with the law or school norms, to attain the country’s highest elective position.

What Ateneo has done may have satisfied the high feelings of the moment, but in the sober afterglow may come the realization that its timing was questionable, to paraphrase Catholic Justice Frank Murphy, a staunch human rights advocate.

R. A. V. SAGUISAG,
Palanan, Makati City