News of Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte’s “fist of fury” raining on a hapless court sheriff sent the social networking site Twitter abuzz Friday.
Links to several sites carrying the news and footage were quickly passed around on Twitter, eliciting strong and mixed reactions.
“Our lady mayor kicking the sheriff’s ass! EPIC!” Twitter user Bajauntouchable, said.
User rissareyes twitted, “Sometimes people deserve to be punished when they don’t know how to care and listen. I admire mayor.”
But user Hourglass0618 disagrees: “You don’t kill the messenger for the message … the sheriff is doing his job, carrying out the order of the court.”
“Seriously Mayor Duterte, were those punches necessary? A little control of emotions would have been more appropriate. IMO,” user carloborja shared.
User dnisdmenace said it was uncalled for: “Mayor Duterte’s manhandling a sheriff is a NO NO. Too harsh. She has no right doing that. She should be accountable for this barbaric act.”
Some acknowledged that Duterte’s action was wrong but lauded her nonetheless.
“No matter how rude, barbaric, and unbecoming of a mayor Mayor Duterte was today, u’re my July hero! Rockstar ka!,” user JaymeeDR wrote.
“I know I’m supposed to ‘tsk tsk’ Mayor Duterte for her pugilistic displays, but all I can blurt out is, you go, girl!!!,” wrote mistervader.
For user GabdeJuras, “…It must not have been the best move but it wasn’t the best situation either. She just showed how much she cared.”
Some posed probing questions.
“If Mayor Duterte were male, or her father, do you think people would make this big of a deal re: the punch?” RockEd founder Gang Badoy asks in her account.
The discussions catapulted “Mayor Duterte” and “Sheriff” to the fourth and eight spots respectively in the list of Twitter trending topics in the Philippines as of 5 p.m. on Friday. Lawrence de Guzman, Inquirer Research