OP-ED | Let them speak

The controversy surrounding the Memoirs of a Teenage Rebel exhibit at the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Valenzuela is only the latest instance in which the testimony of former rebels has been denounced as “red-tagging,” “indoctrination” or an attack on academic freedom.

Kabataan Partylist Valenzuela has called the exhibit one-sided and counterinsurgency-oriented. It claims the activity vilifies critical students and progressive organizations, creates fear on campus and opens the door to militarization.

These are serious accusations. Red-tagging is dangerous. Activists, students and lawful organizations should never be accused of belonging to an armed group without sufficient and verifiable evidence. Peaceful activism is not terrorism. Criticism of government is not rebellion. Student organizing is not a crime.

But neither should the term “red-tagging” be used as a blanket response whenever former rebels speak about how they were recruited, what they experienced inside the movement and why they eventually left.

That is not academic freedom. That is another form of silencing.

A pattern of opposition

On October 26, 2025, former New People’s Army leader and UP Mindanao graduate Arian Jane Ramos spoke during TAGBO 2025, a gathering of student leaders and alumni. Ramos, formerly known as Ka Marikit, discussed her journey from student activism to the underground movement and eventually to armed rebellion.

The circumstances of her appearance raised valid procedural questions. Student leaders said they had not been properly informed that she would be part of the panel. Some participants also alleged that members of the security sector photographed them during the activity. Such complaints deserved a transparent response from the organizers.

But the reaction went further. Ramos’ nearly two-hour account was characterized as a “red-tagging spree” and an exercise in indoctrination. Some students walked out instead of engaging with the substance of her story. Her participation itself was treated as a threat to the campus.

UNWANTED. Posts like this hounded Arian Jane Ramos' appearance in a UP Mindanao activity in October 2025. From UP Mindanao University Student Council Facebook page.

Less than two weeks later, on November 6, Ramos spoke at the University of Santo Tomas during the research colloquium Preventing Terror Grooming: The Philippine Experience.

Ramos was not speaking from an abstract government script. She was recounting a journey she said she had personally lived. Yet the forum was again branded as state propaganda. A Kabataan Partylist member walked out after challenging the speakers, while an audience member reportedly called her a communist.

Former rebel Arian Jane Ramos discusses youth recruitment at UST’s November 6, 2025 forum on terror grooming, which drew opposition from student activists. (Art by Jed William V. Gocatek/ The Varsitarian)

Then, on June 22, 2026, the Memoirs of a Teenage Rebel exhibit was launched at the Senate. The project is based on a documentary following Ivy Lyn Corpin, a former NPA member who recounts her recruitment, her rise within the organization and the experiences that led her to abandon it.

The exhibit was later brought to PLV. Its scheduled opening and forum on August 14 were postponed because of inclement weather, although the exhibit itself remained open at the university lobby into early September.

Once again, opposition groups described the activity as red-tagging and black propaganda. They demanded that it be stopped, its organizers held accountable and the funds redirected to other educational needs.

Across these incidents, the pattern is difficult to ignore. When former rebels describe recruitment in schools, their accounts are dismissed as militarization. When they describe the transition from legal activism to underground activity, they are accused of vilifying all activists. When they speak about abuse, manipulation and violence inside the movement, their testimony is called black propaganda.

The label changes. The objective appears to remain the same: discredit the speaker before students can seriously examine what the speaker is saying.

The exhibit was an offshoot of a 2020 video documentary featuring former rebel Ivy Lyn Corpin. From CinemaBravo

What are these activities really about?

Are these activities intended to criminalize activism?

They should not be. Any organizer who carelessly equates legitimate activism with rebellion must be challenged. Any speaker who makes accusations against named individuals or organizations must be prepared to present evidence. Any campus activity discussing political violence should permit questions, criticism and meaningful dialogue.

But that is different from claiming that the very presence of a former rebel constitutes red-tagging.

Ramos did not merely study the insurgency from a classroom. She joined it. Corpin’s story was not invented by an outsider who had never experienced underground life. She lived through the organization she now criticizes.

For many former rebels, sharing these experiences is also part of their reintegration and continuing recovery. After years of living under assumed names, suppressing painful memories and subordinating their identities to an armed organization, telling their own stories allows them to reclaim ownership of their lives. Their advocacy can transform experiences of violence, loss and disillusionment into warnings that may prevent other young people from suffering the same fate.

Psychological research describes a related process as narrative processing or organizing distressing or fragmented memories into a coherent trauma narrative and examining what those experiences mean. Structured trauma-focused approaches such as Narrative Exposure Therapy and Written Exposure Therapy have been found to reduce trauma-related symptoms, including in studies involving former child and adult soldiers. 

Public testimony is not the same as clinical therapy, and speaking should always be voluntary, survivor-centered and supported. But for some former rebels, choosing to tell their stories can help restore agency, rebuild a civilian identity and establish a new social purpose—all important dimensions of reintegration and healing. To immediately brand their advocacy as propaganda can reproduce the very silencing and loss of agency they are trying to overcome.

Academic freedom cannot mean that students are free to hear only testimonies that affirm the beliefs of particular political organizations. A university is not made less free by exposing students to an uncomfortable account. It becomes less free when intimidation, political pressure or ideological gatekeeping determines whose experiences may be heard.

If activists have the right to discuss state violence, former rebels have the right to discuss violence committed and the methods employed by the revolutionary movement. If students may hear why some people joined the struggle, they should also hear why others abandoned it. If campuses can accommodate speakers who defend the continuing relevance of revolution, they can also accommodate people who experienced that revolution and concluded that it had betrayed its promises.

That is not indoctrination. That is intellectual pluralism, and, for the former rebels telling their stories, it can also be an act of recovery and reintegration.

These are lives, not talking points

Crucially, at the heart of these exhibits and forums are not simply government programs, political slogans or counterinsurgency terminology. They are human lives.

They are the lives of young people who believed they were joining a struggle for justice. Some left their studies and families. Some entered the underground. Some eventually carried weapons. Others lost friends, relationships and years of their youth before realizing that the promised liberation had been replaced by fear, exhaustion, violence and unquestioning obedience to an organization.

They survived, left and returned with warnings for the next generation.

Their message is not that young people should stop caring about poverty, corruption, inequality, landlessness or injustice. These conditions are real and must be confronted. The message is that legitimate grievances should not be exploited to lead young people toward an armed struggle that has consumed generations without delivering the social transformation it promised.

After more than half a century, the communist armed movement has not liberated the Filipino people. It has instead left dead combatants, grieving families and communities trapped between armed forces. The burden has repeatedly fallen upon young people asked to sacrifice their education, safety, relationships and, ultimately, their lives on the altar of an ideology.

No organization should have exclusive ownership over how that history is told. Former rebels have earned the right to speak about the choices they made, the consequences they endured and the lessons they learned. Listening to them does not require uncritical acceptance. It requires only the intellectual honesty to admit that their experiences are part of the national story.

Let activists answer them. Let scholars examine their claims. Let students ask difficult questions. Let organizers improve transparency and ensure that forums remain respectful and safe.

But let former rebels speak.