What Rights?

Gender Bender
By Kiki Mura

Writing in Transgender Rights Are Human Rights (tsphilippines.com), Tonette Lopez quotes a Latin maxim used in the Philippine Constitution – “SALUS POPULI EST SUPREMA LEX.”  Meaning, “THE WELFARE OF THE PEOPLE IS THE SUPREME LAW.”

Unfortunately, this is really nothing but a generalization now, as the laws of the land fail to uphold – really uphold – the rights of the people.  Case in point: Our rights as TGs, with the treatment of us so devious, as if animals have better rights than we do (sorry Pooch…).

What we’re pushing for here is not the coming up of special rights for TGs.  Oh no, not at all.  Because TG rights are actually nothing different from basic human rights – e.g. no kicking out of schools because we wear skirts like Sister Mary; no dismissal from employment because we put on better, if not thicker, make-up than the boss’s wife; no banning from restaurants because of stupid, stupid rules that dictate for men to wear manly clothes and woman to wear womanly clothes, whatever the hell this means.

Different instances continue to prove how hard it is to be a TG.

Lopez herself was discriminated against, when her employment in the business process outsourcing industry was terminated.  The reason given: her sexuality and gender.  A case filed against her former employer, Lopez is taking a big step for herself, and a leap for the TG community since, usually, “TGs would opt silence rather than to seek justice thinking that they are unworthy,” she says.

LONG WAY AWAY
Transgender people continue to be disadvantaged - already struggling with their bodies, and struggling even more with society's unaccepting behavior towards them.

Then there’s the Inday Garutay-like case of Sass Rogando Sasot, one of the founding members of the Society of Transsexual Women of the Philippines (STRAP, tsphilippines.com – contact at srsasot@gmail.com, strapmanila@gmail.com, or +639276257010), the first transsexual women’s support group and transgender rights advocacy organization in the Philippines.  On the 24 May 2008, Sasot and the other members of STRAP decided to celebrate the association’s anniversary in Ice Vodka Bar, which is in Greenbelt 3 at the third level of Ayala Center, Makati City.  Before they could enter the venue, “the bouncer stopped us. I asked why. His reason was we were dressed ‘inappropriately,’” Sasot recalls, stressing that they were dressed up “just like any other human being who lives her life as female 24 hours a day.”

When Sasot spoke with the manager, Belle Castro, she was told that:

• There’s an agreement between all the bars in Greenbelt (including Absinthe and Café Havana, aside from Ice Vodka Bar) and Ayala Corporation, which owns the Greenbelt complex, to disallow TGs because, Sasot quotes Castro to have said: “Marami kasing foreigner na nag-kocomplain at napepeke daw sila sa mga katulad nila (A lot of foreigners complain that they are tricked into believing TGs are real women);” and
•  “People like them” aren’t allowed in the bar every Friday and Saturday due to the implementation of the “choice” of the company to implement Ayala’s policy.

While further talks with between STRAP and Ice Vodka Bar, and then Ayala Corporation show promise, it is unfortunate all the same to note that:

• Companies come up with stupid, stupid policies to favor foreigners in our country (?).  But then again, this perverse continued application of colonial mentality (that they’re better than us, so we give in to what they want, no matter how stupid it may be) is also common in, say, Café Havana, which won’t allow male Filipinos to enter if they are wearing sleeveless shirt (even if that shirt is an P8,000 A|X), but they allow male non-Filipinos (especially if they are White) in even if they are wearing Spartan slippers.  Go figure the business sense…
• Aren’t the laws of private establishments subject to the laws of the land they are in?  If the Philippine Constitution disallows discrimination, how can these companies implement discriminatory rules without sanction?  No wonder the widespread belief that without the Ayala Zobels, PGMA wouldn’t have been able to replace Erap…

“You know the civilized and ethical thing to do: Stop discrimination in your establishments.  Bigotry is never ethical nor a sound business strategy,” Sasot says.

And then there are those TGs forced into prostituting themselves for their very survival.  I know of TGs who, unable to finish their education (a few got kicked out of Roman Catholic schools, too, for wanting to be like Mother Mary), who are in sex work.  Not that there’s anything shameful about that, if you ask me – it just becomes erroneous when you don’t have a choice so you end up becoming a sex worker.

We truly still have far to go.

TGs in prison are still merged with male prisoners, who often turn them into sexual objects.  And don’t get me started on the legality of changing names – from male to female, or vice versa (let’s wait until PGMA pays her debt to Raul Gonzales and remove him from the Department of Injustice).  And then there’s the complete absence of support services for TGs.  The list of what still needs to be achieved goes on and on and on and on…

But we’re starting somehow (Hey, talk to me – write me or anything on your TG concerns!).

And we’ll get there soon enough.

Just you watch.

Kiki Mura is a “budding” transgender who makes the rounds and is in the know of the five Wives (in newsmen terminology, the important Ws to ask when interviewing, i.e. Who, What, When, Where and Why) and one Husband (for the one H, i.e. How) for everything transgender in the Philippines . “Besides,” she said, “even if I didn't know, my dear, my circle is wide enough to fill in the rest of those that I missed or simply don't know!”