J U S T I F I E D: Unbroken

(This piece by the author, a part-time writer and whose essays have appeared in the Philippine Star, The Philippine Daily Inquirer and the Manila Bulletin, was written a year ago. He found it in his compilations and decided to put it in his blog.) 

Movies dealing with the sporadically talked-about subject of homosexuality are getting more numerous: “Ang Pagdadalaga ni (The Blossoming of) Maximo Oliveros,” “Beautiful Boxer,” “Brokeback Mountain.” I have seen them all.

These movies are all multi-awarded and, based on news reports, are making good money at the box-office.

By all accounts, this development seems to augur positively for a highly discriminated segment of the population (the LGBTs) since a more expansive group of audience are learning to appreciate and look into their lives and stories.

Having watched all those movies, I still haven’t come to the conclusion that gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgenders are already accepted with open arms in society; tolerated, yes but accepted, not yet. They still would have a long way to go before they could ostentatiously wave their boa feathers.

Instead, my epiphany is that all these films about the third sex would seem to be a higher manifestation of how many people and society traditionally view people of the third gender; that is, for “entertainment value.”

This manifestation could be summed up by a Woody Allen line. When Allen was asked what fame had brought him, his retort was: “I get to be rejected by a higher class of women. Just the same with these gay movies, the “for entertainment value” is still there, but only in a more sophisticated way.

Whereas before pedestrians would ogle at transgenders and transsexuals catwalking in the streets and be amused in the process, they (the pedestrians) need not go out in the streets to see these human spectacles. They could now see these very same people in CDs and DVDs. Whereas gay beauty contests used to amuse a majority of the population, the latter could now also go to the movies and be amused and fascinated but not necessarily be changed in terms of shaking off their prejudices and bigotry.

I had a first-hand experience of the above assertion (that is, that the films dealing on homosexuality are still “for entertainment”) while watching “Brokeback Mountain” at a theater. In those particularly squeamish scenes where the two protagonists had anal sex, viewers at my back and front would either giggle or hoot. In one particular scene where the two protagonists kiss each other hungrily, a woman in the audience shouted “Yikes!” while the rest of the audience reacted in laughter.

Even Hollywood, after the 78th Oscars, was not above the suspicion of homophobia when it awarded the Best Director trophy to Ang Lee but rejected his movie for the Best Picture plum. Talk about approving of the creator but not his work or creation.

Of course, no one should fault these filmmakers who tackle gay themes. At least they made this once-taboo subject fodder for discussion, whether intellectual or otherwise.

But unless the movies are specifically aimed at promoting acceptance of the third sex and not just to chronicle their lives or to tell their stories, the GLBTs would still be occasionally viewed for their “entertainment value,” to amuse and fascinate. Unless and until there would be a paradigm-shift in the majority of the population, the third sex would still continue to experience bigotry, marginalization, and discrimination. Most importantly, unless and until there are laws (such as HB 643, the Anti-Discrimination Law) and a system in place to protect them, people of the third sex would still have a long, long way to go in terms of being totally accepted in society.

All this is not so gloomy though. At least, something has got to start somewhere.