In a recent exchange of diatribes, it appears that fellow TV5 reporters Ed Lingao and Erwin Tulfo are not seeing eye to eye over a few things. To wit, the argument hovers around the following:

• A recent diatribe by Erwin Tulfo on Facebook Live, with parts of it ending up on air during his program. It was directed against Senator Risa Hontiveros, who, while questioning the necessity of Martial Law, never shied away from labeling the Maute group what they really were: terrorists.
• Ed Lingao took notice of this and posted about it, pointing out that Erwin Tulfo cited a clearly fake meme that said the Senator was sympathizing with the terrorists, and that Erwin Tulfo merely said that the Senator “retracted” said fake statement, which is impossible, since she never made the statement to begin with.
• Naturally, Erwin Tulfo took umbrage to this, and went on a 39-minute rant against Ed Lingao, based on what appears to be more fake news, seeing as he insisted Mr. Lingao was trying to get him suspended from TV5 (hint: here’s the post. Lingao clearly didn’t.)
• Ed Lingao promptly owned him. Naturally, this meant not only would Erwin be even more angry than he already was (which is a feat in itself), and like a hyena dinner call, the other Tulfos inevitably crawled out of the woodwork, beginning with Ben Tulfo.
• Somewhere out there, Claudine Barretto is laughing her head off.

It might come as a shock to you, but being as famous as the Tulfo brothers are (and believe me, they’re normally a guilty pleasure of mine) does not make your arguments any better. The truth, after all, isn’t a popularity contest. If it were, Willie Revillame would have finally fulfilled his messianic dreams by now.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen: Ed Lingao has become the Tulfoe.

Having said that, based on observations made by several people, here are 8 signs you might be turning into a Tulfo brother. It’s not just about picking up a colorful vocabulary, riding motorcycles, and wearing shades indoors like a douchebag, y’know.

You pick up a colorful vocabulary, ride motorcycles, and wear sunglasses indoors.

It’s almost like they’re compensating for something.

Yes, it’s not just all this, but this is still part and parcel of being a Tulfo brother. After all, a Tulfo brother that doesn’t say a single cuss word is no fun, and the only way for you to stand out among all of them is to posture even more than any of them already do. It’s like having a midlife crisis mixed with teenage angst as one decides that wearing black like an emo hipster is the “manly” thing to do.

You let other people dogpile on your target because you clearly can’t do it yourself.

Remember that epic verbal beatdown Raymart Santiago got from the Tulfo brothers a few years back on the show T3? Did you realize that Mon Tulfo, the brother who was beaten down, is not even part of T3? Yeah, that might have slipped your notice.

You will also notice that aside from Erwin himself, Ed Lingao has been fending off attacks from his fans, and as of this writing, Ben Tulfo as well. It appears that being a Tulfo brother means, you will require your other brothers to help out, even just the figurative ones.

When they go low, you go lower.

Talking about someone’s dead daughter? Calling them “yellow” even if it has zip to do with the issue at hand? All in a day’s work! After all, if you can’t pound on the law and you can’t pound on the facts, you can always just pound on the table.

Go on a highway to hell.

Don’t ask.

Oh, we don’t know what this means. It just sounded poetic to say.

You conflate being popular with being right.

When you keep alluding to how many followers you have  instead of making sure that your arguments are airtight and not filled to the brim with irrelevant posturing, you’ve bought into your hype so much that you’ve already forgotten to make a point. Any point. Unless the point you wanted to prove is that you can’t read and just go off the rails without even realizing what you’re going up against.

These might help.

You shoot first, ask questions later.

This is exactly what got Erwin Tulfo into this mess in the first place. He went off on Senator Hontiveros before verifying the meme, then he went off on his colleague for asking him to get fired, even if said colleague did no such thing.

It seems that this brand of justice like lightning that the Tulfos love to dole out only applies to any wrongdoers who are not Tulfos. Unless you think resorting to death threats, making fun of a parent for losing a child, and wrong-headedly reacting to something before getting your facts straight aren’t wrong in any shape or form.

The first test the Tulfo brothers ever failed at.

You’re getting owned by people who are the last people to come to mind when you hear the word “macho.”

Claudine Barretto? Raymart Santiago? Some dude in a pink shirt? Ed Lingao? Not exactly the paragons of manliness, but all a bunch of people the Tulfos have ran into.

You pick up this weird call cenner accent when you suddenly shift to speaking in English.

Comedian Nace Cruz pointed this out years before Ed Lingao ever did, but it’s true: there’s something terrifying about a Tulfo brother cussing you out with the most colorful Tagalog words they can come up with, then suddenly breaking out the English guns, all in that delightful “slang” accent we know and love.

If more call center agents enunciated in the kind of menacing tone the Tulfo brothers employ, none of those callers would ever want to mess with ‘em, because then, they would be the epitome (epitowm? epitomee? #factganern) of courage and resilience.

What are your thoughts on this feud? Share with us your thoughts below!