Western imperialism has a long history in the Philippines. Hundreds of years of Spanish colonisation, beginning in the 1500s, culminated in the Spanish-American War in 1897. The first attempt to declare the Philippine Republic in 1899 was followed by the Philippine-American War (1899-1902), then American control, Japanese occupation during World War II, and eventual independence in 1946.
This history of subjugation, and the subversion and trauma it elicits, is so complex that any linear narrative sanitises and abstracts it to the point that it becomes meaningless.
