Negative Leadership

       First day of lecture class with HER as our teacher. Yeahbah!

       I thought she already had moved on from our last encounter during the Council Meeting about my so called “putting fire on my own house”. And I guess, I made a wrong presumption. Here I am again, wondering on how to stand up and defend oneself without making a fight. How will I stand up to the attack without escalating it?

       Leadership was our topic. Well at first, I’m interested to go with the discussion expecting that she would professionaly stand and talk in front without that put-down sarcastic statements about negative leadership - the description she had connected with activism.

        First, I asked myself what could be her understanding of the word negative. Does she call these things negative - advocating and fighting for the rights of the majority, sacrificing one’s time and energy for the welfare of those who are in need,  critical thinkers, people who assessess situations first before reacting,those who have forgotten the “I” for the sake of the “WE”, and those who had courageously lived their personal legends and are pursuing their collective vision of achieving a just and humane society for ALL?

       Secondly, does she mean that mediocrity is positive. Just go with the flow, be passive of your environment, be highly agreeable, forget your identity, let go of your visions and ideals in life, don’t keep a ground where you can stand, play safe to avoid failures and judgments, to become someone who would leave you alone on top of the peak of a crisis to save himself? 

        Negative and positive are just temporary terminologies. These are defined by the ruling class of today. This is held by the status quo.

        Challenging the status quo would then change the ruling class thereby affecting the meaning of negative and positive. Anyway, why is she indulging herself too much to the words without reflecting on their meanings first? Haaaayy…

       I don’t know what to do. Do I need to discuss what’s activism with her? Do I need to discuss Philippine political history to make her aware of the role of activism during her time, the Martial Law? It is as if, that negative leadership-activism has brought all those turmoil of these god forsaken country. Doesn’t she know that nurse activists do exist to protect their rights, one of which is the wage increase from which she and her sons would be benefiting?

         Dealing with the matter of fact, first, she doesn’t have the right to talk against activism because she only has little knowledge about it. Too little knowledge is dangerous. Is she unaware of it?

        I wanted to learn but is confused of how to have an open communication with her. I want to raise healthy arguments but is scared of subjectivism, I don’t want to gamble my grades.

        Could someone help me how to deal with the reactionary?