we live in a dog-eat-dog world — a savage land deceptively hidden beneath the exterior of a pleasant world. but sometimes, owing to the superficiality of this consensually-constructed facade, the surface gets ruptured, as glimpses of the truth betray the discomforting truth that we live in a land where neither civility nor respect for human dignity abound — for what we merely have is a semblance of order, an attempt at tempering man’s incivility by willed and orchestrated optimism.

this morning, i received a text message from paul, a forwarded message from an NGO worker who was scouring for moral and financial support to the most recent victim of child abuse in our province — a four year old girl who was, after being raped by a still unidentified man, thrown off a cliff and was left to die.

she however, managed to survive, and after wandering for six days in the forest with neither food nor water to sustain her, she was seen by locals who took her to the hospital to have her treated. reunited with her parents, she is presently in the negros oriental provincial hospital where she is being diagnosed for post-abuse trauma, that is, after she had undergone rectal vaginal repair in the fourth degree.

worse, her wounds, because they were untreated, had maggots and she would be needing a special kind of medicine which will prevent the infection from spreading to other parts of her body.

in an instant, text messages were sent and resent, asking sympathetic hearts for any kind of donation or support that they may extend to the young girl who was, in an instant, robbed of her innocence and was viciously abused. a budding life that was ripped just as it had started to open up to the world.

to anyone willing, let us help her. let us make her feel that amid the proliferation of evil in this world, there are those who still care; there are still those who have hearts that throb; deeds that are selfless; and kindred souls who will continue to resist evil and reinstate goodness in a desolate world that is ours.