By Dennis Gorecho
Social media has recently been flooded with the dehumanizing term “corned beef,” used to mock the deaths of activists.
On April 19, 2026, a military operation in Barangay Salamanca, Toboso, Negros Occidental, left 19 people dead.
Among the casualties were student leader Alyssa Alano and land rights activist Maureen Keil Santuyo, both from the University of the Philippines (UP); community journalist RJ Ledesma; land rights activist Errol Wendel; and Filipino-American activists Lyle Prijoles and Kai Sorem.
Also identified were Roel Sabillo, a 19-year-old resident of Toboso, and two minors whose names were withheld. The remaining 10 fatalities were identified as armed New People’s Army (NPA) members.
Since then, the public has been confronted with conflicting accounts of what transpired, who the 19 individuals were, and whether the operation was lawful.
The military maintains that all 19 fatalities were armed NPA members and that firearms were recovered from the encounter site.
It insists that the operation was legitimate, intelligence-driven and directed against armed insurgents, emphasizing that those killed were combatants and that rules of engagement were followed.
On the other hand, civil society groups and UP organizations claim that the victims were civilians engaged in community immersion work. They said the group was documenting peasant activities alongside farmers facing long-standing land-grabbing issues and systemic oppression. They added that the fatalities were not combatants but bystanders and collateral damage in an armed encounter.
Familiar lines resurfaced on social media: “Corned beef,” “NPA” and “That’s what activists deserve” often accompanied by laugh reactions or graphic commentary.
Despite lingering questions about whether the deceased were indeed NPA members, the term “corned beef” continues to be used online to describe the bodies of suspected rebels killed in armed encounters.
The term is a form of “dark slang,” referring to the reddish, shredded or mutilated appearance of severely damaged human remains — something some claim resembles canned corned beef.
Reducing a person to a “processed and disposable” food item, “corned beef” is often used by pro-military or anti-insurgency users to mock fallen alleged rebels by stripping away their humanity.
Activists are frequently framed as threats to social order — labeled as “troublemakers,” “anti-development” or “enemies of peace.”
The use of “corned beef” is also linked to long-running counterinsurgency narratives, including the red-tagging of UP as a breeding ground for communists, downplaying its role as a bastion of academic freedom and independence.
“No UP student is limited to lessons learned within the classroom. We stand by the right of all students to lawfully and peacefully exercise their constitutionally protected freedoms, especially in furtherance of raising their social consciousness. The university shall remain a beacon of critical thinking, conscience and courage,” UP said in a statement.
UP appealed to the public to withhold judgment on the students amid reports that they were engaged in community activities for their respective organizations and not in university-sanctioned programs.
Former UP student leader Gigo Alampay said that until the truth emerges after a thorough investigation, Alano had done nothing wrong.
“She was young. She was idealistic. She was a leftist involved in advocacy work — spending time in farming communities, participating in immersions, and engaging in campaigns on land and labor issues. None of that is a crime. If anything, it is something we should want more young people to do,” Alampay said.
“You can disagree with their politics. You can question their methods. That’s part of any healthy democracy. But to suggest that they deserve what happened to them because they chose to step outside the lines — that’s something else entirely. That’s not critique. That’s indifference, even ignorance,” he added.
“Corned beef” appears to be a disturbing extension of narratives that normalize extrajudicial killings — where certain lives are deemed expendable, as seen in the anti-drug campaign’s nightly body counts, jokes about “nanlaban,” and rhetoric that openly promised death.
It is not merely a descriptor but a tool of psychological warfare used to dehumanize dissenters and desensitize the public by turning violence into memes or jokes.
Such language is often amplified through coordinated messaging, sometimes attributed to troll networks, to drown out progressive voices and reinforce the perception that activists are legitimate targets.
Dehumanizing language becomes normalized through repetition — when words that strip individuals or groups of their humanity are accepted and eventually embedded in everyday discourse.
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“Peyups” is the moniker of the University of the Philippines.
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Atty. Dennis R. Gorecho heads the Seafarers’ Division of the Sapalo Velez Bundang Bulilan Law Offices. For comments, e-mail info@sapalovelez.com, or call 0908-8665786./WDJ