Pride Marchers: For the mocked, for the bullied

Saturday’s event was the third Metro Manila Pride March, held as part of the global celebration of the LGBT community.—RICHARD A. REYES

Being gay made them a magnet for insults. Being deaf as well made them a bigger target of ridicule.

Yet the likes of Reymond Ilagan, 36, are making their statement loud and clear by joining the annual Metro Manila Pride March held on Saturday in Marikina City. Now on its third year, the march is both a celebration and a call to action for LGBTs (lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders) in the country.

Ilagan heads the Pinoy Deaf Rainbow Community Inc., an association of deaf LGBTs who count around 70 members nationwide — a circle within a circle that is slowly, often painfully, making headway in the fight for equality and respect in the rigid squares of Philippine society.

The Quezon City resident recalled being employed once in the government agency Tesda (Technical Education and Skills Development Authority), where not a few coworkers often reminded him that being bisexual was a “sin.”

“I was hurt, obviously. I got depressed because it,” Ilagan told the Inquirer through sign language. “That’s why we need a law to protect LGBTs from discrimination. Please help us push for that legislation.”

Ilagan eventually left Tesda and later earned a degree in multimedia arts, acquiring skills which he now uses to promote the rights both of LGBTs and PWDs (persons with disabilities).

Among those in attendance are Reymond Ilagan (left) and Erika Allosa, president and vice president, respectively, of Pinoy Deaf Rainbow Community Inc.—JODEE AGONCILLO

Slapped by father

Joining him in Saturday’s parade was Pinoy Deaf Rainbow vice president Erika Allosa, who addressed the cheery crowd gathered at Marikina City Hall grounds.

“I was in elementary school and around 5 years old when I realized that I loved going with female friends,” Allosa said. “I realized that I was like them, except that I didn’t have a vagina.

“When my father saw me wearing a dress, he slapped me in the face. He was so angry,” Allosa added. “‘Why are you gay? You cannot be gay! Play basketball!’”

But Erika chose another sport and continued to wear dresses. At school in Pasay, Erika was often reprimanded and seen as a rebel for wearing earrings while in a boy’s uniform.

“Discrimination,” she said, kept her out of the honor roll despite her excellence in the classroom.

She left her family for three years and worked as household helper in an Antipolo neighborhood that also proved hostile.

“They mocked me for being deaf and gay and thought I was dumb, abnormal. But people do not know I am empowered.”

Her father eventually apologized to Allosa and asked her to come back, finally accepting her for who she is.

Finding a community

Today, Erika is about to finish a course at the Philippine School for the Deaf, also in Pasay, and has supplemented her education with some training on human rights advocacy.

Finding a community of LGBTs was a crucial help in her journey, she added. It was around this time that she and Ilagan cofounded Pinoy Deaf Rainbow, whose initiatives include finding and coming to the aid of young LGBTs who are bullied, harassed or, worse, raped.

“For those kids who are still looking for their identity, like those aged 12 and younger, I would let them be so they can decide for themselves. (But) we have an organization that can support and empower them,” she added.

Also speaking at the march, Sen. Risa Hontiveros said discrimination and violence directed at LGBTs remain a reality in the Philippines.

Hontiveros cited a report by the United Nations Development Programme saying 28 LGBT-related deaths were recorded in the country in the first quarter of 2011.

“The Commission on Human Rights led by (then chair) Etta Rosales pushed for the first (gender-)specific antidiscrimination bill in Congress. Seventeen years after, we are still here to march for equality, for our right to decide and become who we are, for our right to love,” the senator said.

‘For Jennifer…’

“We march to show that the same rights we have pushed before are the same rights we are pushing for now. We assert the space of the LGBT community. We march for Jennifer Laude (a transgender woman murdered in Olongapo in 2014). We march for our kids bullied in school. We march for those who cannot.”

“For a country that is considered by many as liberal and tolerant of different views, Philippines has a long way to go to ensure the lives and the rights of the LGBT people. Even the attitude of the government is disturbing,” she said.

Around 5,000 LGBTs showed up for Saturday’s event, according to Nikki Castillo, organizer of the Metro Manila Pride March.

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