REASONS WHY PHILIPPINES CANNOT HAVE SAME SEX MARRIAGE
When the United
States of America announced the legalization of same sex marriage in all states,
this made the social media a battle ground between anti and pro with the
matrimonial type. Well, This has served as the light in a dark tunnel to the
LGBT community in conservative countries like the Philippines.
Philippines is one of the few surviving catholic countries in Asia and for that
it is not a wonder to have over 50% of the Filipinos do not like the idea of
same sex matrimony. So, here are the possible reasons on why Filipino LGBT
community cannot acquire such equality currently enjoyed by some in the States.
RELIGION
Catholicism dominated the
Philippines since the Spanish conquistadors came on the early 1500s.
Aside from Catholicism, Christianism and Islam are also booming in the country.
Sadly, these religions will never agree on same sex relationships and even
consider this as sodomy. Sodomy is a very lethal sin, during the early times in
the west. If people will happen to know “odd” sexual preference or even just
accused of being such, you will be tortured or executed. That is how dangerous
being labelled as sodomite before. The word sodomy and sodomite was rooted from
Sodom and Gomorrah, a story in the bible and Qur’an(according to some sources) that
talks about two cities consumed by fire and brimstone for their people already
have incontrollable sins. The Bible, Qur’an and other religious sources had
been guides to salvation for centuries and so whatever is written in these
sources are believed to be true for they contain the word of God. Yes the Law
of the State and the Law of the Church must be separate, oh well, what can you expect
from a conservative country? People seem to do the other way.
ECONOMY
Yes this may also cause the
delay, our law makers have more important things to do than same sex marriage
approval. This does not mean that the equality that the LGBTs has been fighting
for is not important but if you will try to weigh things, our economy really
needs intensive recovery. A first world country like US no longer needs any
economic recovery; they will just worry on how to maintain it. So we cannot
really compare our law makers from the US. Let us just be patient. Imagine,
would you want your marriage to be a mess-up for the reason of not having good
jobs and not earning well for your daily consumption? Or would you rather wait
for the right time?
BANGSAMORO AND TERRITORIAL FIGHTS
One of the noisiest issues this 2015 is the Bangsamoro Basic Law. On July 27,2013, Nur Misuare the chairperson of
MNLF(Moro National Liberation Front) issued the
Bangsamoro Independence and considered
Davao City as the center of trade. Many people say that this has been the
narcissistic proclamation of independence had ever done by a leader. Bangsamoro
is a proof that Filipinos are not really united. How can we fight for equality
if our fellow men are not even cooperating? But we cannot blame them for asking
such independence for we have to admit that most people in our government are
corrupts that the funds will no longer reach to their proper designation and Mindanao
has been a constant victim for quite some time now.
Another is the never ending "Spratley Islands" issue. This issue must be considered a ticking bomb, one wrong move from the Philippines, and China will be preparing for war. Yes, this territorial argument has a great potential to create a war knowing that China is a very powerful country compared to ours especially with the military resources. And would you still consider Legalization of same sex marriage more important than this?
GRAFT AND CORRUPTION
This time you might agree on this article for saying 90%
of our government leaders ran for their positions for personal gain. Becoming a
public servant is not an easy task and does not offer high salary. But you
might be wondering on why there are still many people who want to acquire any
political position. There are even families who have established a dynasty in
the government and most of these families are not really genetically rich. The
bottomline is, some law makers are very busy stealing from our treasury that
they could not even stand on their job description. As most have observed, congressmen
are too focused on building infrastructures where their real job is to propose,
study and approve laws.
INEXPERIENCED POLITICAL LEADERS
In the Philippines, the only requirement for you to run a
position is to certify yourself that you are a true Filipino citizen; there is
no educational attainment requirement or experience. And we have already
reached to the point that we have these inexperienced political leaders which
surely you are already starting to make a list in your mind. Unfortunately, we
have a few number of experienced leaders but most of them had already been part
of our previous agendum. The inexperienced politicians are causing troubles in the government and some of these troubles are as follows:
·
Proposing silly house bills
·
Proposing nonsensical projects
·
Delays on Projects and Law approvals
·
INTENSE ABSENTEEISM <they’re not doing their
job>
Now, are you still hoping to get
any marriage approval with your partner with all these issues? Well probably
yes but soon, probably not now, probably after few decades, centuries, millennia?
We can still fix this. Election is fast approaching so please use your right to
vote wisely. And let us just be patient for when we get that legalization of same sex marriage, we will all be
happy and you cannot appreciate happiness without a struggle. For the meantime,
let us just enjoy what we have.