page_title: LGBT culture in the Philippines
section_title: Politics
hierarchical_section_title: LGBT culture in the Philippines / Politics
caption_attribution_description: English: LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) advocates gather at the EDSA People Power Monument on Saturday (March 17, 2018) to support the passage of the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE) equality bill
context_page_description: The lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people in the Philippines have a distinctive culture in society and also have limited legal rights. Gays and lesbians are generally tolerated in Filipino society. Despite recent events that have promoted the rights, general acceptance, and empowerment of the Filipino LGBT community, discrimination remains. Homosexuals in the Philippines are known as "bakla", though there exist other terms to describe them. Similarly, Filipino Lesbians are generally known as Alfa.
  According to the 2002 Young Adult Fertility and Sexuality Survey, 11 percent of sexually active Filipinos between the ages of 15 and 24 have had sex with someone of the same sex. According to Filipino poet and critic Lilia Quindoza Santiago, Filipino culture may have a more flexible concept of gender; kasarian is defined in less binary terms than the English word; kasarian means "kind, species, or genus".
context_section_description: While there are no laws pertaining to same-sex marriage or unions, Open Table MCC Church, a local church (Mandaluyong City, Philippines) of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches (UFMCC), cites freedom of religion in sanctioning what it calls holy unions. These ceremonies are conducted solely for the purpose of celebrating love and are not legally recognized. The Filipino Ang Ladlad party, whose founders, leaders, and core constituency belong to the LGBT community, was recognized by the government and participated in party elections in 2013.
  Transnational networks such as LGBT non-government organizations allow connected brokers in the Philippines to widely adopt goals and strategies that are cross-culturally recognizable. Efforts to pass an anti-discrimination bill that prohibits using sexual orientation and gender identity as a basis for discrimination is an example. Goals and tactics used in the Philippines such as emphasis on "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" as a distinct part of the self, the idea of being "out", and pursuit of rights-based remedies are hallmarks of transnational LGBT politics.
  The diffusion of LGBT subjectivities affected by the shifts in the global system allow studies exploring links between LGBT advocacy and hegemonic geopolitics to increase. An example is through the non-relational diffusion though media, technology, and shifts in democracy and neoliberalism. According to Oscar Atadero, one of the organizers of the 1994 Pride in Manila, the decline of interest in a style of mobilization that is public and militant and the failure of mass movement in the Philippines can be attributed to "the sudden appearance of the Internet at the same time gays and lesbians were forming political movements".
  There are, however, notable movements as well. One mobilization was Ladlad’s "immoRALLY" in front of the COMELEC office in Manila, two weeks after the rejection of their petition for party-list accreditation in the 2010 elections. The protest rally was held after COMELEC rejected the petition based on moral grounds, claiming that the LGBT people are not immoral. The event brought together national organizations such as Babaylan, Task Force Pride, and the Akbayan party-list to protest the charge against the LGBTs.
  Geraldine Roman is the first transgender person to be elected to the Philippine congress. She has been a staunch advocate of an anti-discrimination bill. Entertainers Aiza Seguerra and Arnell Ignacio are the first LGBT-community members appointed as government officials; they were appointed by President Rodrigo Duterte chair of the National Youth Commission and vice-chair of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation, respectively.
  In December 2019, Duterte appointed trans activist Dindi Tan as director of the Department of Agrarian Reform.
  The Communist Party of the Philippines, a Maxist-Leninist-Maoist political organization, states that it has recognized same-sex relationships within its membership since 1998.
caption: March 2018 rally at the People Power Monument by supporters of the SOGIE Equality Bill, a proposed legislation tackling LGBT rights in the country.
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