For Filipinos, the month of June means two things; Independence Day for all and Pride Month for some. Our countrymen commemorate the month they are liberated from their colonizers and look back to the time when they achieved freedom. On the other hand, the LGBTQ+ community celebrates their freedom and love, showcasing what it means to be loud and proud. More importantly, this is also the time LGBTQ+ couples get to revel in their love.
While most heterosexual couples can express their love in public, it is a different story for those in the LGBTQ+ community who must face struggle, hardship, and difficulty even when just wanting to be together on the streets. Strangers are quick to bat an eye when they see two people of the same sex hold hands. When you’re the object of this discriminating gaze, you get conscious, worried, and scared at the same time.
You start to feel like you do not have any right to be yourself—as if your preferences are invalid and your beliefs are taboo. People throw at you quotations from a book written thousands of years ago to justify their claim that your kind of love is wrong—using teachings and traditions to “prove” that love among LGBTQ+ couples is non-existent. But when did loving someone become wrong?
Such prejudice is all around, yet there is no national law protecting the queer community from it. In a research done by Philippine Corporate SOGIE Diversity and Inclusiveness Index, not one of the 100 Filipino companies surveyed had any anti-discriminatory policy for the LGBTQ+ community. Despite its other finding, there is a dominant attitude of harassment and discrimination toward members of the LGBTQ+ in the country’s professional scene.
Knowing these ought to make one think if there is a safe space here in this country—where we can be our true selves and feel that we are not an outcast from society. Members of the community are afraid to show their true colors because of the harsh consequences that they would likely face. In fact, there are cases of violence and abuse beyond simple discrimination; there are cases as deplorable as murder. The lack of protection explains why the LGBTQ+ hide in closets, wear masks, and live lives they do not want, pretending to be people they are not in fear that coming out might endanger them.
This is an issue that has been going on for decades, yet policymakers have continued to sit on it. Further inaction will only lead to more victims, more rights stepped on, and more unequal opportunities. While many Filipinos may be tolerant of the LGBTQ+ community, this sometimes comes with conditions: “Okay lang maging bading basta…”
(It is okay to be queer as long as…)
We do not want tolerance. We seek acceptance. We deserve nothing less than equal rights with everyone else, and with that, safe places and protection from heterosexist harm. Moreover, we want to celebrate love just like normal couples. We want to be able to hold hands on the streets without fear of judgment. We want to express ourselves free from all the societal norms hindering us to show who we are.
