A Transgender Restroom Incident and Filipino LGBT Rights
/Watch the video here:
Here’s a follow-up interview with Gretchen:
The video eventually went viral on social media, creating a public outcry from members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community and their supporters. But the incident also renewed calls for the passage of a SOGIE — Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Expression — legislation, one that has proved elusive in a 21st-century Philippine Congress. The SOGIE bill seeks to protect members of the LGBT community from discriminatory acts.
The proposed legislation can be traced back to 1995 when Congressman Rey Calalay, who has since passed, filed a bill proposing to recognize the "third sex" as a sector. Thereafter, other lawmakers have followed suit. More than two decades later, however, a national law protecting the LGBTs from discrimination is non-existent.
Congressman Rey Calalay (Source: Yahoo)
In 2017, during the 17th Congress, SOGIE (House Bill 4982) came half-way through to becoming law when the House of Representatives voted unanimously in the affirmative on third and final reading. A member of the House and supporter of the bill, Geraldine Roman of the First District of Bataan, is a transgender woman, the first in the history of Philippine Congress. (She vowed to pursue a Congressional hearing on the incident.) The bill was then transmitted to the Senate for its own deliberations. The Senate failed to act and pass SOGIE before it ended its 17th Session.
Quickly reacting to the public outcry over the Diez incident, at least three senators of the current 18th Congressional Session have indicated their intentions to support and work for the passage of SOGIE. The three are Senators Bong Go, Risa Hontiveros and Sonny Angara.
Senator Bong Go (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Senator Risa Hontiveros (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Senator Sonny Angara (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Some Filipino netizens, however, were skeptical of the Senators’ sincerity in reviving SOGIE, saying that the legislators seemed to be reacting more to the outcry for self-promotion and publicity. As one Jake Aguado pointed out, it’s “sad but sometimes something bad has to happen before they do something about it.”
But Hontiveros, who is a known advocate for LGBT rights, in her Senate privilege speech a day after the mall incident explained why SOGIE is important:
“What this underscores, Mr. President, is that there is [a] grave and urgent need for a SOGIE Equality Bill. Panahon na para sabihin na hindi tayo papayag na may LGBTQI na poposasan, sasampalin, aalipustahin dahil sa kanilang kasarian. (It is time for us to say we will not allow LGBTQIs to be handcuffed, slapped, ridiculed because of their sex organ). It is time that we say we will stand by those who speak their truths.”
For his part, Angara filed Senate Bill No. 137, or the proposed Comprehensive Discrimination Act of 2019, last month, as the upper chamber prepared for the opening of the 18th Congress. The bill seeks to cover a wide range of discriminatory practices, not just those directed at LGBTs, but more comprehensively, also, those relating to age, racial or ethnic origin, religious belief or activity, political inclination or conviction, social class and even health status.
“Any form of discrimination threatens social stability and economic progress in the Philippines, making it imperative that discrimination—or any act that establishes, promotes and perpetuates standing inequalities and disregards the right to ‘equality of treatment’ afforded by the 1987 Constitution—be reduced,” Angara said in the explanatory note of the measure.
“As one Jake Aguado pointed out, it’s “sad but sometimes something bad has to happen before they do something about it.””
On the other hand, social media posts about the mall incident showed deep division among Filipinos on the transgender issue, with many expressing approval for what the janitress and security guard did to Diez. Some went to the extent of blatantly pointing out that the transgender woman had no business using the women’s restroom with her (assumed) male sex organ still intact.
Still, others, including the legislators supporting SOGIE, are confident that this anti-discrimination bill could finally pass, arguing that it is not as controversial and contentious as the legislative proposals to legalize same-sex marriage in the Philippines.
Ironically, there is an LGBT anti-discrimination ordinance that’s long been in place in Quezon City (where the shopping mall is located). The city is known to have one of the most progressive anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination ordinances, tracing its approval way back to 2003. Since then, several local government units have followed its lead and passed their own local versions of the ordinance.
So, even if and when a national SOGIE is finally approved, it may take more than just legislation to fully rid Philippine society of LGBT discrimination. It will be -- for a long time -- a (hard) work in progress.
Rene Astudillo
Rene Astudillo is a writer, book author and blogger and has recently retired from more than two decades of nonprofit community work in the Bay Area. He spends his time between California and the Philippines.
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