What's in a Name?

Gender Bender
By Kiki Mura

My friend Joanne doesn’t like the name given her by her parents – Nemecio Dioso Jr.  “Lalaki kaayo uy!” she says in Cebuano, lamenting how the name is “so, so butch” and she couldn’t identify with it.  Thus, since she was young, when friends gave her the moniker Joanne [“Ambot asa nila gikuha na (I don’t know where they got that)!], she hasn’t been addressed in any other name but that.  “Maayo na lang puwede pulihan ang ngalan (At least names can be changed),” she smiles, satisfied.  “Labi na nga dili man lalaki ang akong kinabuhi – babaye gyud ko uy (Especially since I don’t live like a man – I’m a woman).”

Joanne isn’t the first to change her name.  In fact, in Joanne’s immediate circle of friends itself, they only use their “real” names when officially needed, e.g. enrolment in schools, applying for jobs, opening bank accounts, et cetera.  But as Danica (“real” name: Danilo), Joanne’s friend, says in Tagalog: “Kung puwede nga lang palitan ang pangalan (If only you can change your name) for good.”

	KEEP FIGHTING Left with not a lot of choices, keeping on fighting seems to be the only way for TGs to go.

Changing names is, of course, possible – BUT, APPARENTLY, NOT IF YOU’RE A MALE TO FEMALE, OR FEMALE TO MALE TRANSGENDER.

This doesn’t make good sense, if you ask me.

Get this: When transsexual Rommel Jacinto Dantes Silverio filed a petition to change her name to Mely, and her gender from male to female in all the entries in the Office of the Civil Registrar, in order for her to marry her American fiancé, the Supreme Court (SC) decided to deny the request for “lack of legal basis and merit, respectively.”

The 22-page decision penned by Justice Renato Corona upheld the decision released on February 23, 2006 by the Court of Appeals, which upset the earlier ruling of the Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 8 that granted Silverio’s petition to make the necessary changes “in consonance with the principles of justice and equity.” 

RTC Judge Felixberto Olalia earlier said that no harm could be done by granting the petition – Mely just wants to be happy, and between her and that happiness is a name change, nothing more.

But the SC’s First Division unanimously found as fatal the petition “in the absence of any law authorizing the change of entry as to sex in the civil registry.”  Thus, “considering that there is no law recognizing sex reassignment, the determination of a person’s sex at the time of birth, if not attended by error, is immutable.  While petitioner may have succeeded in altering his body and appearance through the intervention of modern surgery, no law authorizes the change of entry as to sex in the civil registry for that reason. There is no special law in the country governing sex reassignment and its effect. This is fatal to petitioner’s cause,” the SC stated.

Acquiescing with Justice Corona were Division Chair Chief Justice Reynato Puno, and Justices Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez, Adolfo Azcuna, and Cancio Garcia, who all agreed that “in our system of government, it is for the legislature, should it choose to do so, to determine what guidelines should govern the recognition of the effects of sex reassignment.”   And while the SC understand that "the unfortunates are also entitled to a life of happiness, contentment and the realization of their dreams," public policy must be considered before allowing these individuals to realize their dreams.

The SC also noted how granting the petition could affect the country’s marriage and family laws, and part of the labor law.  “(The) words 'male' and 'female' in everyday understanding do not include persons who have undergone sex reassignment... Since the statutory language of the Civil Register Law was enacted in the early 1900s and remains unchanged, it cannot be alterable through surgery or something that allows a post-operative male-to-female transsexual to be included in the category 'female'," SC further stated.

Names, apparently, can only be legally changed if, as stated in Republic Act 9048 or the Clerical Error Law, if: (1) the first name or nickname (is) ridiculous, tainted with dishonor or extremely difficult to write or pronounce; (2) the new first name or nickname has been habitually and continuously used by the petitioner and he has been publicly known by that first name or nickname in the community; and (3) the change will avoid confusion.

That transgendered people like Mely will, because of her keeping her name Rommel, wil be: (1) ridiculed, tainted with dishonour; (2) has already been habitually using Mely for her name; and (3) not changing the name will exacerbate confusion, exactly.

But that’s legality for you...

Now how to remedy the situation?

“The need for legislative guidelines becomes particularly important in this case where the claims asserted are statute-based,” the SC stated.  Meaning, the lawmakers should be left to decide on how people can be happy – the same people advertising whitening lotions and cosmetic surgery and alcohol consumption, while the Anti-Discrimination Bill gathers cobwebs.

There’s the option to move where it’s possible to legally change names, of course, though the likes of Joanne, a beautician earning less than P500 per day, would most definitely not be able to do.  “Wala gani kuwarta mag-biyahe, mubalhin pa kaha sa laing nasod (I don’t even have money to travel, much more move to another country),” she says.

Meaning, we’re left with not much, but wait and wait and wait...

Or fight.

Bug your supposed representatives in both Houses by writing and writing and writing to them.  Forward the same letters to international bodies supposed to spread humanity, too (e.g. the United Nations, International Human Rights Commission, et cetera).  Write blogs. 

Support those that support us (e.g. Akbayan, et cetera).

Sooner or later, our outrage will be heard.

And then we can have whatever names we want for ourselves.

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!”