Agramos, Angelica Nicole S.

August 29, 2019

Section BAB

Reaction Paper on the Raiders of the Sulu Sea Film

The movie is a historiography documentary film focused in Zamboanga

City depicting how the Sulu raiders attacked the bastion of defense of the
Spaniards which is the Fort Pilar. It shows the flourishing Southeast Asian free
trading in the area and the unintentional consequences that occurred when
the Europeans especially the Spaniards wanted to control and dominate the
trading system happening that time, as well as to colonize and Christianize
the Filipino natives. It also depicted the slave raiding as retaliations on the
colonizers - the ships and the tools the raiders used. Despite the negative
reaction on the Muslim raiders, even called as pirates or bandits, I still believe
on them. I believe on what they are fighting for.

The raiders were known as fearless, skillful, and expert sailors of the Sulu
Sea. I commend them for having the courage to fight for our country,
knowing how powerful the Spaniard forces are. Even with the use of swords,
they sacrificed their lives to make the colonizers disappear from their island. I
also admire how strategic they are in designing their weapons to kill their
foes. For instance, the barong, which is a black thick sword that was
designed to have “curvings” in its blade to easily withdraw from the targeted
person and to easily cut the firearms of the Spaniards, as told by one of the
direct Tausug descendant in the movie. They also gathered hundreds of ships
and around 3000 men in raiding the Fort Pilar. To protect themselves from the
opponent’s firearms, they had armors. With that, I can say that Filipinos were
naturally tactical when it comes to protecting their lands, even before the
coming of foreign colonizers. They are wise in planning everything before
having an attack. I am just saddened by the Spaniards who are feeding us
with another belief displacing Islam and indigenous tribal beliefs. They took us
by force, taking advantage of our weaknesses – our people’s weaknesses.
They know that they are more powerful than us.

Although it was hard for the raiders to resist the Spaniards, they still
insisted on going against the Spanish rule. Even if their ships were destroyed,
they still go on fighting for freedom from oppression and from losing their own
identity. I am happy now that through their influence, our country became
free, free from slavery of colonizers.