(Still) Following the flag of advocacy for 2012

Last December 8, 2011, I participated in a group photo exhibit entitled Grounded at the University of the Philippines Diliman. I was part of the junior faculty group of the College of Mass Communication who contributed photos that intersect our respective lives in terms of academic, artistic, and advocacy endeavors.

For my part, I dubbed my photo series as “Following The Flag” where I featured three prominent LGBT Pride Marches that I have participated in: one in Baguio, one in Malate, and one in our very own campus, with the symbolic rainbow flag in each of them. I wanted to show that LGBTQ pride advocacy is not left on the streets but it is also integrated in the different “beats” I occupy in life, especially in the academic beat. In fact, I put up a special page of “unlearning discrimination” in my academic blog for my students.

Just the other day in class, I noticed how this kind of life lesson still needed to be learned by upcoming responsible citizens of this nation. A class conversation in writing went like this:

Me: So what was your question again, Student1?

Student1: Um, it’s okay, ma’am. Never mind po.

Student2: (pointing at Student1) Wahahaha nabakla magtanong!

Me: (pointing at Student2) Maybe nagbago isip niyang magtanong, hindi nabaklang magtanong. (stating calmly) Please don’t use bakla in a derogatory manner.

Student2: (sporting a sheepish grin) Yes, ma’am. Sorry po.

Me: Hm. Ten points from Gryffindor.

While I try to put some fun and humor into my style of teaching, sometimes it’s hard for me to balance things whenever I encounter such negativity from kids who have promise and talent. But as teachers, we try to teach them lessons they need to learn outside of our given modules of learning. So thus, the queer advocate in me takes over the classroom, but not in a grim-and-determined activist rah-rah way. I also make it light because I want everyone to understand where I’m coming from and how I frame things without imposing my principles on others. I want to teach students what’s out there, and rather than forcing them to accept it, I encourage them to think for themselves and see why advocates fight for the rights they espouse, and I want my students to find out where they stand on such issues, and how such issues affect their own lives. But more importantly, I want to challenge them to look at things in their daily lives and see where pockets of advocacies could exist, small nuances where the chance of enhancing them could ultimately lead to a more harmonious existence for all of us. Critical thinking, but with compassion; this is what I hope they would learn in my classroom, not homophobia.

And I also would like our own society to learn that as well. The year 2011 was full of exciting and intriguing stories that featured the LGBTQ community, and it was also full of issues that hounded or affected the community as well, issues and stories that took place within the larger society we live in, a society that also has its own say about us. We can only guess where this new year of 2012 will head, and what it will bring us in terms of good developments or bad ones. But I think no matter where we are heading this new year, we still have to follow our flag, so to speak, especially since this early, we have already been bombarded by a lot of negativity, especially from places where love is enacted in rituals on a regular basis, and negativity from people who are supposed to spread the love of a divine being to all humanity, affecting how our society in general perceives people like us.

It’s just so ironic to note how those who preach about humanity are the ones who don’t have an ounce of it in their DNA. I’m talking about the recent uproar when the pope said very strong statements against homosexual marriage in a very important world gathering. I mean, why do that? But given the history of this person, it’s not only the LGBTQs of the world that he had incensed in recent history. He and his minion have also incensed people who worship other kinds of divine beings, be it far from their own or just near their neighborhood. I’m really sorry but if “God is love” as they always say, why hate? This baffles me to no end, really.

Aside from incensing such populations, another population that the Catholic hierarchy has had longstanding wars on is the population who are female-bodied. Tell me just how many No To RH Bill signs have you seen driving around Metro Manila, announced in huge banners and tarpaulins at the side or in front of churches, sometimes in small signs in front of houses or establishments, even as bumper stickers. Ask them if they have read the bill and they say no, but they oppose it nonetheless. Again, why do that? If education is the key, I wonder why they keep their minds locked. Unhinge, people, unhinge.

So is it any wonder if we see these kinds of fear and loathing in/from the Vatican trickle down to our everyday realities as postcolonial recipients of ancient rhetoric? In a country with some sort of heritage for hate, it’s just plain sad to see and hear that persons who choose to love and care for people labeled as “different and deviant” get ostracized for enacting positivity. Just this month alone, a guy gets killed by fellow guys just because he defended a bullied queer person he doesn’t even know, because perhaps it was the right thing to do. And then a father decides to throw hot water on one of his children because he is gay. And then our spiritual advisors have the gall to ask what kinds of values we have today as citizens? Maybe it’s time to check where we get such influences in the first place, eh. Just saying.

So thus, as LGBTQ advocates, as Filipinos, as human beings, we still need to follow the flag of advocacy, wave it high for our own kind to see, so that we could inspire others like us to stand up and contribute to the waving. But more importantly, we still wave this flag because we need others who are not like us to see that we, too, are people who are just like them, who deserve the societal access they have, and that we shouldn’t be relegated to the sidelines of society just because we chose to define love differently.

And so, we wave, with pride.

Libay Linsangan Cantor is a Manila-based writer, film school professor and queer advocate. You can email her at leaflens@gmail.com. She blogs at leaflenspopmedia.wordpress.com.

Photos by the author, courtesy of Culture Popper Leaflens. Some rights reserved.

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