At first glance, the deeply Catholic Philippines can seem surprisingly LGBT-friendly. Yet it still has no law against LGBT discrimination
And yet, for more than two decades, a bill that would criminalize discrimination based on one’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or sex characteristics has languished in the Philippines’ Congress. Year after year, it’s practically become an annual tradition for legislation on the matter to be reintroduced and rejected, leaving LGBT people in many parts of the country with no legal recourse when they’re discriminated against.
While many cities across the country have already instituted local ordinances to make SOGIESC-based discrimination illegal, Irish Inoceto, a Filipino LGBT activist and former employee of the Philippine Supreme Court, tells TIME that they have “no teeth at all” and that she has seen firsthand just how overdue and glaringly necessary such a nationwide law is.
Commuters look on from a bus at activists taking part in a protest to kick off Pride month in Quezon City on June 2.Last October, Inoceto received a message on Facebook from an 11th grader just weeks before students were to be required back in classrooms after. The student, a transgender woman in Iloilo City, some 280 miles southeast of Manila, had met Inoceto through one of the routine LGBT rights seminars Inoceto facilitated across Iloilo City, where she used to be based.
The situation prompted Inoceto to write to the school on both students’ behalfs. She cited Iloilo City’s own, but she says her letter was ignored. Only after visiting the principal in person did Inoceto ultimately prevail in getting the school to back down on its attempts to curb both students’ gender expression. Any relief for Inoceto, however, was short-lived.
Inoceto, who is now 46 years old, has spent half her life watching Philippine legislators fail to create a national anti-discrimination law for the LGBT community. Legislative
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