PHILIPPINES
Male to Male relationships: Legal
Punishments for male to male relationships: No law
Female to Female Relationships: Legal
Age of consent: Equal for heterosexuals and homosexuals
Is it possible to change your gender on official documents?: No
Gay or lesbian able to serve in the armed forces: Yes
Gays ask City: ‘Make Cebu friendly to us’
Posted in SunStar Cebu, March 5, 2012.
LGBTs meet, tell City Hall to help end violence against them
The lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgender (LGBT) community in Cebu City is asking City officials to make the city LGBTfriendly.
This, after Niel Kintanar, of the Psychological Association of the Philippines (PAP), said the absence of LGBT protection and policies affects the well-being of the members of the LGBT in the city.
In his talk during the 1st LGBT Congress in Cebu at the Social Hall of Cebu City Hall yesterday, Kintanar said the LGBT community, aside from experiencing normal stressors, is experiencing anti-lgbt stigma.
Such stigma, he said, results to hate crimes, anti LGBT violence, and hate movements in social networking sites such as the “Patayin ang Kasaysayan ng mga Bading” among others.
Kintanar said there have been 144 deaths since 1996 in the country because of anti-lgbt violence, and 32 of them were “violently killed” last year.
To lessen hate crimes and erase stigma, Kintanar said policies, rules, and ordinances that protect the welfare of the LGBT community should be passed in the city. Mental health “The absence of LGBT protection and policies results in a significant link between being LGBT and poor mental health,” he said.
Councilor Margarita Osmeña asked the LGBT community to help and guide the City Council in drafting policies for them. “Show us the way on how to be with you and bring out the best in you. Look at us (City Council) not as enemies but as your friends,” she said.
Deliberation Councilor Alvin Dizon, for his part, said his office will make sure the LGBT community will be properly consulted on his proposed Anti-discrimination Ordinance before submitting it back to the council for final deliberation and approval.
Dizon’s proposed ordinance is co-authored by Osmeña and City Councilors Nida Cabrera, Lea Japson, Augustus Pe Jr. and John Philip Po II.
Meanwhile, the LGBT community will again try to gain a seat in the Congress in the 2013 national and local elections.
Mikay Dumabok, of the Akbayan Gays and Lesbians Collective-cebu, said Ang Ladlad Party-list will run again for party-list in next year’s polls and will be fielding their current chairman Bemz Benedito as their candidate.
During the 2010 elections, Ang Ladlad, which was given only three weeks to campaign because of their case against the Commission on Elections, garnered only 120,000 votes, 30,000 votes shy of a seat in Congress.