Let the LGBTQ ‘live their truth’

“We just want to use the bathroom” is how Ice Seguerra, a transgender celebrity, boils down the issue of LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) rights, in his comments pertaining to the ordeal that Gretchen Diez went through recently.

Diez, a transgender woman, tried to enter the ladies’ room of a mall last Tuesday but was prevented from doing so by a woman restroom attendant. When she argued with the woman and demanded to know on what grounds she was being barred, Diez was brought to the mall’s security office where, in the words of a supporter on Facebook, she was “pushed, slapped and handcuffed.” Diez was then marched in full view of the public and transported to the Camp Karingal police station, facing charges of unjust vexation.

It would seem, though, that all’s well that ends well, with Diez eventually freed from detention and the attendant writing a note of apology. Diez’s legal team, however, is said to be still mulling charges against the mall management.

But the case then took on a life of its own, with public officials jumping into the roiled waters of LGBTQ rights and the debate over the pending Sogie (sexual orientation and gender identity and expression) Equality Bill.

The Sogie bill, also known as the Anti-Discrimination Bill, is intended by its champions “to prevent various economic and public accommodation-related acts of discrimination against people based on their sexual orientation, gender identity or expression.” The bill has undergone many iterations since it was first filed in 2000 (19 years ago!); the closest it got to being enacted was in the last Congress when the House passed it on third reading in 2017, before it was shot down by the Senate. Champions in the present Congress, though, are still working to get it passed, and the case of Gretchen Diez has certainly pushed it back to the spotlight.

Sen. Risa Hontiveros, who sponsored the Sogie bill in the last Congress, has refiled the same legislation, explaining that the Diez case proves how “LGBTQ persons face harassment and discrimination every day.”

Seguerra, speaking to reporters, testified how he, a local celebrity and the former chair of the National Youth Commission (NYC), has had to think twice whenever he needed to use a public restroom, especially abroad and especially if there were other Filipinos who would recognize him. It had gotten so bad, he shared, that whenever he traveled as NYC chair, he would simply avoid drinking liquids the whole day.

The incident between Diez and the restroom attendant comes at an ironic time in the history of Filipino public awareness and acceptance of LGBTQ rights. The confrontation came after Pride Month was observed last June, with parades in many places around the country. The most prominent of these was Metro Manila Pride, celebrated in Marikina, the longest-running public observance of gay pride and the struggle for full gender equality in Southeast Asia. Suddenly, it seemed, rainbow-themed pedestrian lanes were all over the metropolitan area—including one, ironically enough, just outside Farmers Plaza where Diez was forbidden from using the restroom of her choice.

This is the stark reality facing the Gretchens and Ices of the world. No matter how much public demonstrations of support are galvanized, petty, ignorant and egregious acts like banning a transgender from using the “wrong” restroom will still take place—unless the Quezon City government, for instance, seriously implements the very ordinance it has passed prohibiting such acts of discrimination in the city (thankfully, Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte has chastised the mall for its action and thrown her support behind Diez). Nor will they fully ease the fears and unease that LGBTQ members feel in public whenever they “live their truth,” as Hontiveros put it, while others refuse to acknowledge, or will even challenge or punish, this truth.

But the Sogie law, if it ever comes to pass, will be a powerful tool to educate the public and generations to come about what it means to be human, to be imbued with inherent rights and dignity, and to respect those same rights irrespective of sexual identity or gender orientation, or even the way one chooses to dress. Members of Congress need to use this moment to think hard about the need to make the country a safer, more inclusive place for ALL Filipino citizens (including, they should be reminded, LGBTQ sons and daughters, siblings and other loved ones in their own families). “We just want to use the bathroom” is, above all, an issue of basic human rights.