If the military is to be respected by one and all, they should behave in a manner deserving of respect.

We’re all up in arms again over yet another case of death arising from hazing. Cadet Fourth Class Darwin Dormitorio, 18, apparently died as a result of repeated physical maltreatment perpetrated allegedly by mere sophomores at the Philippine Military Academy. Simply put, death because of hazing is plain and simple murder. There can be no justification for it. Neither can there be a way to rationalize it.

Hazing is even more reprehensible when it happens at the Philippine Military Academy. Our cadets are conscripted into the Armed Forces to personify the state’s monopoly of the use of force.

They are state agents intended to enable the state to exercise its sovereign powers. On day one, a cadet becomes part of the Armed Forces and takes an oath to defend the Constitution and the laws of the land. You make a mockery of this oath when you commit murder in the process.

And what makes it even more disturbing is that despite this oath, the crime of physical injury and/or murder are justified as necessary to “toughen” our men in uniform. Sen. Roland “Bato” de la Rosa believes so. My problem here is that while I concede that future officers of our Armed Forces dealing with actual insurgents must be tough, why should cadets at PMA subject their own to cruelties and inhumanities which they can’t even commit against the insurgents themselves? Under the law applicable in armed conflicts, military necessity is defined as the complete subjugation of the enemy with minimal collateral damage. It is not to kill all the enemy, neither is it to subject them to cruelties and inhumanities. Why then should they kill one of your own?

The only way to stop this barbaric practice of hazing at the PMA is to change its culture that the fourth-class cadets must be subjected to the toughest challenges with the end view of coaxing them to quit. I see the rationale in a hierarchy giving a premium to seniority. But this must be because those with seniority have more experience that their juniors could learn from in order to better serve the country. It cannot be because of a tyrannical and barbaric desire to engage in power tripping with no further noble purpose than just that — power tripping.

The military as an institution should shape up. It does not speak well that Guinness already identifies the longest running insurgency in the world as taking place in the Philippines. If the military is to be respected by one and all, they should behave in a manner deserving of respect. The death of Dormitorio is a painful reminder that much has to be done for our military institution to earn the respect of our people.

Condolences to the Dormitorio family, and may the perpetrators of this heinous crime be subjected to the same kind of cruelty they perpetrated on their victim in the four walls of Muntinlupa for the rest of their lives.