POSITION PAPER OF COURAGE PHILIPPINES ON HOUSE BILL 956 and SENATE BILL 11 and other similar bills

POSITION PAPER OF COURAGE PHILIPPINES ON HOUSE BILL 956 and SENATE BILL 11 and other similar bills
“An Act Prohibiting Discrimination
On the Basis of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity
And Providing Penalties Therefore”



1. Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity as Classification is Unreasonable and Against the “Equal Protection” clause

a. Unreasonable
In classifying persons or things, there should be a clear and distinct difference between two categories. This is because in legal terms, classification is defined as the grouping of persons or things similar to each other in certain particulars and different from all others in these same particulars (Constitutional Law by Justice Isagani Cruz, supra). There has to be what is called substantial distinction, as contrary to superficial difference. This is the reason why we could distinctively classify men from women (difference in reproductive roles), minors from adults (difference in age of consent), citizens from aliens (difference in nationality) etc. This distinction can be described with relative permanency in the characteristics of the distinction being made.

However when a person uses colors for vehicles or emotions and/or lifestyles for persons, they convey superficial differences in as much as these differences can change relatively in time – there exists no permanency in the distinctions being established.

That is why it is important to understand that sexual orientation is such a superficial difference since the attraction of a person to the same sex varies in degrees, and there are recorded cases of persons with diminished same-sex attractions, if not totally re-oriented into heterosexuals. In fact, there are a number of “ex-gay ministries” available for persons struggling with same-sex attractions, such as our group Courage, and Bagong Pag-Asa, who assist the individual in understanding the struggle and living a chaste life. So to classify individuals according to their sexual orientation (homosexuals and heterosexuals) is unreasonable.

It is also equally important to understand that gender identity is also a superficial difference. As defined, it refers to a personal sense of identity (making it a subjective concept) based on manners of clothing, inclinations and behavior in relation to masculine or feminine conventions. Notwithstanding the argument that sexual orientation can be changed, the indicators of gender identity – manners of clothing, inclinations and behavior – are also undeniably factors in social science that can change relatively in time. The subjectivity of the definition (“personal”) makes it so general that it is difficult for it to be considered as a substantial distinction.


b. Against the “Equal Protection” clause
HB956, SB11 was authored to address anti-discriminatory practices. However, by doing so it unjustly favors a group of individuals over the rest despite basic natural gender similarities. As the senate bill strikingly is the same in content with House Bill 956, it was also made in favor of gays and lesbians, as it is written in HB 956’s explanatory note.

In the earlier position paper of Courage Philippines (2005), there was an example of two factory workers who were both due for promotions – one a homosexual, while the other a “straight” person. Given two case illustrations of employer-bias, the homosexual can use HB956, SB11 against a homophobic employer, but the “straight” person cannot use HB956, SB11 against a biased homosexual employer. This proposed bill ironically permits and allows discrimination and inequality. And the inequality lies in the behavior and/or sexual lifestyle chosen by a person – through HB956, SB11 more protection will be given to individuals who embrace the active homosexual lifestyle, as oppose to those who reject or fight against it.

For the “straight” person may also be having same-sex attractions but chooses not to act upon it, and furthermore chooses to conceal his or her struggles from the public. Yet because of HB956, SB11, he or she is discriminated against in favor of individuals who choose to be openly in the active homosexual lifestyle – not unless he or she will also openly embrace the same lifestyle. And so we can see that HB956, SB11 may be used to trigger an influence upon people who are genuinely struggling against same-sex attractions to consider taking on the gay lifestyle, so as not to be discriminated against.

We then see that HB956, SB11 is gravely in violation of the constitutional guaranty of equal protection – requiring that all persons or things similarly situated should be treated alike, both as rights conferred and responsibilities imposed. Similar subjects, in other words, should not be treated differently, so as to give undue favor to some and unjustly discriminate against others (Constitutional Law by Justice Isagani Cruz, p.120, 1991 ed.)


2. The Danger of “Discrimination”

Section 3 (c) of HB956, SB11 defines “discrimination” on grounds that are either “actual or perceived”. Section 4 then lists down the different discriminatory practices that may be incurred under the said bill. Categorizing a discriminatory act as perceived is something relative – to the person being accused, to the person accusing and to the circumstances and other persons that surround the act itself. Therefore, defining “discrimination” with this phrase allows the law to be manipulated by scheming individuals, to which the law does not define protection over their possible victims.

A scheming individual may or may not be a homosexual. Upon slight provocation, this individual may just simply sue anyone through this bill whom he or she feels is discriminating him or her. This person may also be just pretending to be a homosexual (although his or her gender identity – as it is defined also in the bill – is heterosexual). Yet, in the like manner, he or she may use this bill to sue anyone whom he or she pleases – convinced that he or she was discriminated against.

It can also be used by individuals, who may perceive, by mere suspicion that he or she is being discriminated against.

Also, because gender identity is defined in terms of the individual’s inclinations or behavior, it is shortchanging the legitimacy of the behavior action being done. By virtue of this definition, a person may use the bill to incriminate individuals or institutions, even if his or her behavior is illegitimate – such as talking or laughing boisterously in places of worship, or making sexual advances to a person he or she is attracted to.

The following are some scenarios that may occur following the approval and implementation of this bill:
a. Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of the Philippines will be apprehended if they will not admit individuals with active homosexual orientation as scout masters (Section 4 (b))
b. The parishes of the Catholic Church, despite of its moral stand on homosexual activities under the right to religious freedom, will be apprehended if they will not recognize gay militant organizations that would like to enter as parish-based organizations (Section 4(d))
c. Hospitals and clinics may be apprehended if they are not able to prioritize homosexual persons in admission to their facilities (Section 4(e))
d. Establishments, despite of their right to draw policies of dress code and conduct in their premises, will be apprehended if they will deny entrance to a homosexual person who exhibits dress code and/or behavior contrary to the policies of the establishment (Section 4(g))
e. The responsibility of parents over their minor children under the Family Code of the Philippines will be undermined (Section 4 (h))
f. Law enforcers who arrest persons caught in illicit behavior (such as sexual activity in a public place) will be apprehended for harassment (Section 4 (i))
g. Government officials who are tasked to prosecute because of this bill will be apprehended even if he judges that the discriminatory case at hand is irrelevant or invalid based on his or her own moral judgment. (Section 5)

The provision on Section 4 (j) on other analogous circumstances present a dangerous and vague concept, which can be used by ill-meaning individuals who wants to pursue their own selfish interests. Individuals with perversions, such as pedophiles and sadomasochists, can also use this provision to justify their actions and behavior as something in relation to their gender identity and sexual orientation.


3. Superceding Other Criminal Laws

Due to the repealing clause (Section 8) of the bill, it is not unlikely that it will undermine and consider useless the other criminal laws that are “inconsistent” with the provisions laid in the bill. It means it will supercede any law that is working contrary to the needs of homosexual persons.

For example, this bill may undermine the anti-harassment laws by allowing persons with homosexual inclinations and behavior to pursue other persons by making sexual advances to them, as it is warranted by their gender identity to do it because of their sexual orientation.


4. HB956, SB11 is Redundant of Existing Laws recognized in the Philippines

There are sufficient laws recognized in the Philippines: civil, administrative, criminal and political, that can be invoked for the protection of the rights anyone – including persons with same-sex attractions.

(The following are taken from the position paper of Courage Philippines on HB 634 (same content as HB956 and SB 11), dated and submitted to the House of Representatives, Committee on Civil, Political and Human Rights on May 19, 2005)


a. Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 1 – All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights

Article 7 – All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination


b. The 1987 Philippine Constitution

Section 11, Article II (State Policies) – The State values the dignity of every human person and guarantees full respect for human rights

Section 15, Article II – The State shall protect and promote the right to health of the people and instill health consciousness among them

Section 18, Article II – The State affirms labor as a primary social economic force. It shall protect the rights of workers and promote their welfare.

Section 26, Article II – The State shall guarantee equal access to opportunities for public service

Section 2 (2), Article IX-B (Civil Service Commission) – Appointments in the civil service shall be made only according to merit and fitness to be determined, as far as practicable, X X X, by competitive examinations

Section 3, Article XII (Labor) – The State shall afford full protection to labor, local and overseas, organized and unorganized, and promote full employment and equality of employment opportunities for all. It shall guarantee the rights of all workers to self-organization, collective bargaining and negotiations. X X X They shall be entitled to security of tenure, humane conditions of work, and a living wage. They shall also participate in policy and decision-making processes affecting their rights and benefits as may be provided by law.

Section 11, Article XII (Health) – The State shall adopt an integrated and comprehensive approach to health development which shall endeavor to make essential goods, health and other social services available to all the people at affordable costs.

Section 1, Article XIV (Education) – The State shall protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality education at all levels and shall take appropriate steps to make such education accessible to all.

Section 4, Article XVI (Military Service) – The Armed Forces of the Philippines shall be composed of a citizen armed force which shall undergo military training


c. The Labor Code of the Philippines

Article 3 – The State shall afford protection to labor, promote full employment, ensure equal work opportunities regardless of sex, race or creed

Article 6 – All rights and benefits granted to workers under this Code shall X X X apply alike to all workers X X X

(These provisions specially address Section 4b of HB956, SB11)


d. The Civil Code of the Philippines

Article 19 – Every person must, in the exercise of his rights and in the performance of his duties, act with justice, give everyone his due, and observe honesty and good faith.

Article 20 – Every person who, contrary to law, willfully or negligently causes damage to another, shall indemnify the latter for the same

Article 21 – Every person who willfully causes loss or injury to another in a manner that is contrary to morals, good customs, or public policy shall compensate the latter for the damage

Article 26 – Every person shall respect the dignity, personality, privacy and peace of mind of his neighbors and other persons. The following and similar acts X X X shall produce a cause of action for damages
(2) Meddling with or disturbing the private life or family relations of another
(4) Vexing or humiliating another on account of his religious beliefs, lowly station in life, place of birth, physical defect or other personal condition

Article 27 – Any person suffering material or moral loss because a public servant or employee refuses or neglects, without just cause, to perform his official duty may file an action for damages and other relief against the latter, without prejudice to any disciplinary administrative action that may be taken

Article 32 – Any public officer or employee, or any private individual, who directly or indirectly obstructs, defeats, violates or in any manner impedes or impairs any of the following rights and liberties of another shall be liable for damages:
(8) The right to equal protection of the laws

These Civil Code provisions alone can practically and sufficiently cover the entire concerns of HB956, SB11, specifically Section 4, paragraphs (a) to (i) of said bill


e. The Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act

Section 3 (e) – Causing any undue injury to any party, including the Government, or giving any private party any unwarranted benefits, advantage, or preference in the discharge of his official, administrative or judicial functions through manifest partiality, evident bad faith or gross inexcusable negligence.

This single special penal law practically covers the public sector applications of Section 4, paragraphs a to g of HB956, SB11, and provides a more stiffer penalty of six (6) years and one (1) month to fifteen (15) years imprisonment, as compared to the merely one (1) year imprisonment prescribed by HB956, SB11 in case of a second offense.


f. Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees (RA No. 6713)

Section 4 (c) Justness and Sincerity – Public officials and employees shall remain true to the people at all times. They must act with justness and sincerity and shall not discriminate against anyone X X X. They shall at all times respect the rights of others, and shall refrain from doing acts contrary to law, good morals, good customs, public policy, public order, public safety and public interest.

The violation of the foregoing provision, proven in a proper administrative proceeding, may cause the removal or dismissal of the offending public official or employee concerned. And this law sufficiently addresses the concerns covered by the above-mentioned RA No. 3019 vis-à-vis HB956, SB11

g. The Revised Penal Code

Article 287 on Unjust Vexation sufficiently covers the concerns of Section 4, paragraphs a, f, g and h.

Articles 282-287 on Threats and Coercion and Articles 353-362 on Libel and Slander and Article 364 on Intriguing Against Honor sufficiently cover the concerns Section 4 (h) of HB956, SB11 and provide for a stiffer penalty to as much as twelve (12) years imprisonment in the case of grave threats involving one’s sexual orientation.

h. The Anti-Sexual Harassment Act of 1995 (RA No. 7877)

Section 2 – The State shall value the dignity of every individual, enhance the development of its human resources, guarantee full respect for human rights, and uphold the dignity of workers, employees, applicants for employment, students or those undergoing training, instruction or education. Toward this end, all forms of sexual harassment in the employment, education or training environment are hereby declared unlawful.

Over and above the foregoing survey of pertinent constitutional, labor, civil and criminal law provisions, persons discriminated against due to sexual orientation by public officials and/or employees have the option of commencing administrative proceedings for the removal or dismissal of such erring public servants on the ground of grave misconduct, oppression or conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service (Civil Service Commission Memorandum Circular No 19 series of 1998). This sufficiently covers the entire length and breadth of HB956, SB11’s concerns.



5. Causes versus Effects with Discriminatory Practices

The bill supposedly addresses discriminatory practices made on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. The introduction made by Hon. Rosales in then HB 634 recognizes that it is “because of misconceptions and ignorance” that discriminatory practices are committed. After the bill enumerates the different practices that may be incurred, which is discriminatory of individuals with homosexual orientation, it forthrightly states the sanctions and penalties for such actions. But does it really address the issue?

Why are there discriminatory practices? The bill itself suggests – misconceptions and ignorance. When this same bill penalizes those who discriminate – whether actual or perceived (predisposed to vague judgment), does it help correct the misconceptions and remove the ignorance? It only helps people not to discriminate because of blind fear and greater ignorance of the homosexual condition.

Misconceptions and ignorance are answered by education – that provides truth. When people are educated on what really is going on within a homosexual, then they begin to understand, and in understanding they begin to love, and in loving they begin to abandon their misconceptions and in effect, their discriminatory practices.

Nonetheless, we must evaluate which misconceptions are in fact misconceptions, and which ones are labeled only as such but are actually “myths”.

The following are the issues often raised on the topic of homosexuality and homosexual persons

Fact 1: There are a number of persons experiencing sexual attractions towards the same sex

It is known that there are persons that are attracted sexually towards the same sex. Even the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) recognizes this: “The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible.” (CCC, 2358) This number, which for some may be growing exponentially due to unexplainable causes, may be attributed as a product of a culture of individualism and moral relativism. Gay activists may view the increasing number of homosexuals as an effect of a society that is becoming more “open” to accepting the gay culture. Yet we can see that it is the gay culture that influences society to conform in its relativist ways – messages like “It’s ok being gay”, or “Gay is happy” inundates mass media and subconsciously enters the minds of people. This ever active advocacy to promote the gay lifestyle slowly seeps into society’s very moral fiber. This explains why more and more individuals experiment with a new found “alternative” lifestyle, and gets caught up by the gay culture. The Catholic Church maintains its stand that homosexual acts is “intrinsically disordered”. By this it does not mean a “mental disorder” but a “sexual identity disorder” – that stems from the fact that a person is only either a man or a woman, and any deviation from one’s identity with the same sex and one’s attraction to the opposite sex constitutes a disorder. This disorder is a product of a person’s total experience – with family, friends, institutions and society as a whole, and can be corrected with appropriate actions and therapy. The dynamics of persons with same-sex attractions is discussed further in this paper.

Fact 2: Persons with same-sex attractions experience discrimination

Because of a limited understanding of the nature and dynamics of homosexuality, persons who experience same-sex attractions experience discrimination from different institutions of society. Families may disown their members who have same-sex attractions. Friends may reject them. Employment, career and business opportunities may be closed to them. The academe, the government and the military may disdain them. Even church members may condemn them. Notwithstanding these, the Catholic Church remains sympathetic to them as a mother. As it states in the Catechism “They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.” (CCC, 2358)

Myth 1: There is such a class of persons termed as “third sex”

If there is a “third sex”, then there should be a “first” and a “second”. It is an inaccurate term, because the sexes should always be treated equal. And there are only two classifications of sex – based on one’s dominant physiological and reproductive make-up – either male or female. There are no other classifications that will qualify. And the male should not be seen as the dominant sex, and neither should the female. Both are complementary of each other, with specific roles that should be played in society, and in the building of its basic unit – which is the family. And the family is bounded by natural laws – especially that of union and procreation. The Catholic Church recognizes these laws and sees that sexual acts between persons of the same sex are disordered based on grounds against union and procreation – “They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. (Union) They close the sexual act to the gift of life. (Procreation)” (CCC, 2357). Therefore “under no circumstances can they be approved”. What is being condemned here is the sexual act, not the person having same-sex attraction. Homosexuals are not to be termed as the “third sex”, because their condition is a matter of personal conviction of their identity – which is not a sufficient ground to make them a separate class of persons. Discussion on this is found in the next section of this paper.

Myth 2: All homosexuals are alike

Homosexuals are stereotyped. Based on what is seen on the television, heard on the radio, read in the newspapers and magazines, modeled by gay persons either as personalities or someone from one’s neighborhood – people paint an image of what a homosexual is. They give them positive traits – creative and artistic, fashion trendsetters, life of the party, friendly. They give them negative traits – vulgar, attention-seeker, flirt, prissy, tactless, too loud, too touchy, too vocal. Some people love them, some people hate them – the way they dress up, the way they talk, the way they walk, the way they behave. And this image that people have of a homosexual is translated to every person with same-sex attractions that they come in contact with. But this should not be done. This practice of stereotyping, typecasting people based on a certain trait that they have bring about misunderstanding, conflict and yes – discrimination. Homosexuals are not alike in many ways. In fact, the only thing that they have in common is their experience of same-sex attractions, nothing else! The discussion of the differences of homosexuals is given at a latter part of this paper.

Myth 3: Homosexuals go to hell

The Church has been accused of condemning homosexuals to hell. But the Catholic Church has always seen the homosexual condition as a sharing of a person with the sufferings of Jesus, as the Catechism states – “this inclination… constitutes for most of them a trial… These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.” (CCC, 2358). The Catholic Church considers the condition of the homosexual as an instrument for them to attain salvation! How is that possible? The Catechism also provides us the answer.

“Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.” (CCC, 2359) Persons with same-sex attractions are called to holiness!

For it is not the person that experience same-sex attraction that the Church condemns but the sexual activity between persons of the same-sex. It is the action, not the person; it is the sin, not the sinner. And people inside and outside the Church should be able to understand how to distinguish them. The practice of loving the sinner and hating the sin should always be emphasized to the clergy and even to the lay persons.


Myth 4: Persons with same-sex attractions are born

The origin of homosexuality is a struggle between nature and nurture, between genetics and environmental factors. Several researches have been made to prove both sides. To prove that it is genetic means that persons with same-sex attractions are born – and thus they could be recognized as a separate class of persons, and it would just be logical to give them all the rights to fit their condition as a class of persons.

However, advocates of genetic-origin of homosexuality have yet to prove that it is so. From Alfred Kinsey’s studies that concluded “10 percent of males in the study are homosexual for at least three years during a portion of their lives”, to Bailey and Pillard’s twin studies, to Le Vay’s hypothalamus studies, to Hamer et al’s chromosome studies – they have committed one or more research flaws: 1) its researcher was biased if not qualified, 2) cases were taken from samples that were non-representative of the population being studied, and 3) cases from different studies are unable to replicate the results to make generalizations on the population being studied. Efforts of proving that there exists a gay gene are all non-conclusive.

Conversely, a type of psychotherapy, along with its proponents and advocates like Joseph Nicolosi and Gerard Van Den Aardweg, called Reparative Therapy, reveals that a person with same sex attractions is a product of intrinsic gender identity deficits that one has incurred in early childhood. And because gender identification happens as early as 0 to 3 years old, one may think that he or she was “born” that way, but was in fact just too young to remember it. The role of the same-sex parent and same-sex peers are crucial to the origins of one’s homosexual orientation. Several research studies (such as that of John Thorp, 1992 and John Boswell, 1989) support these views that homosexual attraction is due to the environment. An organization of psychologists called NARTH (National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality) strongly supports and practices this and similar therapeutic processes that enable a person to return to heterosexuality.

In fact, most recent studies cannot detect genetic factors in same sex attractions, and supports instead the importance of social factors (Hershberger, SL (1997): A twin registry study of male and female sexual orientation. Journal of Sex Research 34, 212-222.; Bailey, JM; Dunne, MP; Martin, NG (2000): Genetic and Environmental influences on sexual orientation and its correlates in an Australian twin sample. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 78, 524-536.). In 2002, a study by Peter Bearman found out that the genetic contribution to same-sex attraction was zero; and that parental influence plays a more critical role in SSA (Bearman, PS; Bruckner, H (2002): Opposite-sex twins and adolescent same-sex attraction. American Journal of Sociology 107, 1179-1205.).


Myth 5: Once a homosexual, always a homosexual

If people think that homosexuals are born, then naturally they will think that homosexuals will not and cannot change. Once a person has been hooked into the homosexual lifestyle, it cannot get out of it. It is much like saying that alcoholics and drug addicts cannot change, but with a greater weight since the homosexual condition is considered permanent as it is seen as an “inborn” trait.

However, several groups and programs challenge these beliefs. The existence of support groups such as Courage, Bagong Pag-asa, Exodus International, In His Likeness and Freedom Ministry make a statement that says “Change is possible!” Online self-help and mentoring websites such as Door of Hope of Setting Captives Free and People Can Change testify to the truth that there is hope for the person with same-sex attraction to change, and become the true men and true women that they are called to be. A number of these groups are not purely spiritual in their approach to homosexuality, but combines psychology, sociology and spirituality in understanding and addressing the homosexual condition. Using addiction counseling and reparative therapy, psychotherapists have helped a significant number of persons with same-sex attractions either to embrace a purely chaste life or to seek re-orientation and move on to a happy heterosexual married life.

More importantly, a very recent development just occurred with the American Psychological Association (APA), the professional organization that, in 1973, removed homosexuality from the list of psychological disorders. On an e-news posted by Focus on the Family (http://www.family.org/cforum/extras/a0041796.cfm) dated August 25, 2006, it featured APA’s President Gerald P. Koocher stating “APA has no conflict with psychologists who help those distressed by unwanted homosexual attraction.” This recent stand by APA was supported by a research by Dr. Robert Spitzer, a New York-based psychiatrist who helped to convince the APA in 1973 to remove homosexuality from the list of psychological disorders. In this study he found that some people who are highly motivated to leave homosexuality could return to heterosexuality.


If these international organizations are now re-thinking their idea about homosexuality and the possibility of change, why should our society, with our strong family values and spiritual convictions, deny these facts to our public? Why should we let the gay political agenda rule our legislature? Because of these facts and the legal/moral impediments outlined in SB 11, HB 956 and similar bills, we enjoin you not to support them and do every legal act possible to prevent these bills from being enacted into law. For if these bills become the law of the land, the effects to our society will be irreversible.

COUNTER-PROPOSAL OF COURAGE PHILIPPINES ON HOUSE BILL 956, SENATE BILL 11 and other similar bills

COUNTER-PROPOSAL OF COURAGE PHILIPPINES ON HOUSE BILL 956, SENATE BILL 11 and other similar bills. “An Act Prohibiting Discrimination On the Basis of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity And Providing Penalties Therefore”


Our group has already submitted our position paper on this bill (and similar such bills), yet due to a deliberation during the Senate committee hearing last February 28, 2007 we have come up with a counter-proposal that will more effectively answer the issue of discrimination of homosexual persons, without the dangers and ambiguity of the current bills.


1. The Anti-Discrimination bills (HB956, SB11 and similar bills) is not the answer to discrimination

As we have outlined in our position paper, there are several reasons why HB956, SB11 and similar such bills do not answer the problem of discrimination. Such reasons are the following (details of which are found in the position paper)

a. Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity as Classification is Unreasonable and Against the “Equal Protection” clause
Classification of individuals according to law must have a clear and distinct difference between categories. It must go beyond a superficial difference to a substantial distinction. The terms “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” does not pass this criterion. Moreover, a law that is passed for persons using these classifications unjustly favors a group of individuals over the rest of similar nature, and therefore violates the constitutional guaranty of equal protection.

b. The Danger of “Discrimination”
As this bill defines “discrimination” as actual or perceived draws it into a relativistic point – depending upon the perception of an individual that cries for discrimination. Among many other “dangers” that this definition and its accompanying provisions bring, there can be four (4) major points:
- Scheming individuals, whether or not they are homosexuals, may manipulate the law and use “discrimination” to extort from persons and/or institutions that are not protected by this bill
- By mere suspicion and without any substantial evidence, any homosexual person may use “discrimination” against anyone whom he or she pleases
- The definition of sexual orientation and gender identity in this bill includes inclinations and behavior, to which the bill does not account for the legitimacy of the behavior done – such as public scandals & sexual activities
- Discrimination under other analogous circumstances may pave the way for other groups, such as pedophiles, sadomasochists, and exhibitionists, to justify their actions and behavior as being part of their sexuality.

c. Superceding Other Criminal Laws
The repealing clause of the bill will consider useless and numb all other criminal laws that are “inconsistent” to the agenda of the bill – that is protection of persons with a different sexual orientation. It will warranty any kind of behavior of homosexual persons – whether or not it is legal or moral in nature, or whether or not it undermines the rights of another human person.

d. Redundant of Existing Laws recognized in the Philippines
There are sufficient laws recognized in the Philippines that can be invoked for the protection of the rights of anyone – including homosexual persons. The common problem of these laws being practiced and conferred upon persons in the current situation of Philippine society is NOT a matter of the person’s sexual orientation or gender identity, but a matter of the person’s popularity, riches and/or power.

e. Causes versus Effects with Discriminatory Practices
Hon. Loreta Ann Rosales, in her introductory cover of HB 634, mentions that discrimination is caused primarily by “misconceptions and ignorance”. With this being said, is it justifiable to confer punishment to anyone who does not fully understand, much less define, sexual orientation and gender identity? Is it right to impose penalty on someone who is brought up by a society that misunderstands, makes fun of, and scoffs at homosexual persons? It is like training a dog to bite a person in red pants, and kills the dog when it does bite a person in red pants. It is best to properly educate the general public first, let this new learned concept be practiced, before imposing a law.


2. Learning about Homosexuality

We must ask ourselves – where does the Filipino public get their idea/s about homosexuality? There is a wide genre of information available about homosexuality, but let us examine those sources that are immediately available and are popularly presented in Philippine society:

a. Immediate environment – in the home, in the neighborhood, in school or in the office, are there self-confessed homosexual persons? How do they conduct themselves? What is their lifestyle? How are they perceived by family, friends and immediate environment? Are there issues of gossiping, extortions, falsehood or immoral acts such as public sexual acts attached to the homosexual person? Or is the news about being a good provider and defender of the family, or being a creative and responsible student or worker?

b. Direct experience with a homosexual – how does one describe his or her experience being with a homosexual person? What are the products of these experiences? Are they fond of homosexual persons, just because they are funny but because they are worth of friendship? Or are they despising of them because of experiences of sexual advances or betrayal of friendship?

c. Mass Communications – though it may be indirect information, one cannot deny the effects that media imposes upon its subscribers; particularly gay literature that presents an agenda to its recipients

- Books such as Skin, Voices, Faces (1991) by Danton Remoto, Closet Quivers (1992) by Neil Garcia, Cubao 1980 at iba pang Katha (1992) by Tony Perez, A Different Love: Being Gay in the Philippines (1993) by Margarity Go-Singco, Ang Lunes na Mahirap Bunuin (1993) by Nicolas B. Pichay, Ladlad: An Anthology of Philippine Gay Writing (1994) edited by Remoto and Garcia, Ladlad 2 (1995) edited by Remoto and Garcia, Woman to Woman: A Collection of Lesbian Reflections (1995) edited by Aida F. Santos and Ginay Villar, Seduction and Solitude (1995) by Remoto; mostly published by Anvil Publishers.

- Magazines such as Icon, L, Valentino and Generation Pink

- Television shows such as GMA-7’s OUT and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy

- Movies such as (international) Philadelphia, Broke Back Mountain and (local) Pusong Mamon, Ang Pagdadalaga ni Maximo Oliveros, Markova and movies with sex themes such as Macho Dancers, Twilight Dancers, Sibak, Bathhouse, Duda, Bilog, Masahista, Ang Lalaki sa Parola, Day Break, Lihim ni Antonio

- Stage Plays such as ZsaZsa Zaturnah and M Butterfly

- Gay Icons such as Boy Abunda, John Lapus, IC Mendoza, Ricky Reyes, and Inday Garutay

Collectively, what do these sources tell us about homosexuality? Let us examine only those points that aim to provide a foundation for the gay agenda (see attached speech of Michael Swift, 1987).

• Homosexuality is a gift of nature
Gays are born, not made. It is a gift that must be celebrated and flaunted for everyone to see.

• Homosexual behavior cannot be controlled
Dressing up and having mannerisms of the opposite sex, desiring and engaging in sexual activities with persons of the same-sex, and other similar behaviors are innate with the homosexual person; if you are homosexual, then you behave as such

• Homosexuals are preoccupied seeking sexual relationships with the same-sex
Gay literature and websites would most often feature items which are sexual by nature – nude pictures, erotic stories, sex toys, cruising places, bars and meeting up places etc.

• The Church is homophobic and propagate a culture of hate against homosexual persons
Conservative (anti-liberal) movements such as the Church condemn homosexual persons as sinners and sick people, and thus contribute to hate crimes and acts of discrimination against gays.

• Homosexuals who are accepted for what they are AND for what they do live happy lives
If only people will accept homosexuals for who they are (including what they do like same-sex sexual activities and same-sex partnerships/marriages), they will be happy

• Once a homosexual, always a homosexual
This is a finality statement – that no matter what a homosexual do (having heterosexual marriage, being in therapy etc.), he or she will always remain a homosexual.


3. These ideas about homosexuality contribute to “misconceptions and ignorance” that leads to discrimination

Let us ask another question: are these ideas presenting the whole picture about homosexuality? Or are they contributing to the misconceptions and ignorance about homosexuality?

For a typical Filipino, if asked to describe a “bakla”, terms that will probably be enlisted are: “mukhang babae”, “malandi”, “maharot”, “kikay”, “nakikipag-sex sa kapwa lalaki”, “parlorista”, “chismosa”, “madaldal”, “maingay” – and if asked to describe a “tomboy”, terms that will probably come out are: “mukhang lalaki”, “brusko”, “matapang”, “security guard”, “bouncer”, “possessive”, “nakikipag-sex sa kapwa babae”…

One may say these are all stereotypical descriptions of homosexuals – but where do they get these descriptions? Where do homosexuals get information on the character and behavior of homosexuals? We have answered this already. Yet, despite of all the gay literature available, these notions about homosexuals still abound, and homosexuals still behave the same. And these ideas directly or indirectly contribute to discrimination of homosexuals.

For the homosexual: knowing that he or she is born gay, is pre-occupied with sex, his/her behavior cannot be controlled, and that he or she will forever be gay – this person will engage himself or herself into a lifestyle that seeks to integrate behaviors into the person, such that he or she will not be able to see himself or herself apart from the dressing up or the mannerisms or the sexual activities or the same-sex partnerships that he or she has.

For the person who is not homosexual: knowing that homosexuals are born, are pre-occupied with sex, with behaviors that cannot be controlled, and that they will never change – this person will relate with a homosexual as if the behavior is integrated with the person, and so if news reach him through media or through experiences of other persons (sometimes even his/her personal experience) that a homosexual behaved badly (e.g. involved in a financial scam or caught in sexual activities in public or harassing young men into having sex with him for a price or for fame), he or she will label this behavior upon all homosexuals, and thus develop a discriminating mindset against homosexuals.

The cases of discrimination or “hate crimes” against homosexuals are a by-product of the behaviors that homosexuals exhibit in either public or private affairs. People who have bad experiences with homosexual persons (e.g. molested or scammed or abused) tend to relate with hatred towards any homosexual. But people who have had good experiences with homosexual persons tend to relate with love towards any homosexual.

Yet, gay activists have always accused the Church of propagating a culture of hate. However, difficult as it may seem, the Church has always distinguished the person from the behavior – and continued to protect the dignity of the human person, whether homosexual or heterosexual, while disapproving of the behavior of sexual activity outside marriage, whether homosexual or heterosexual.


4. Better understanding of homosexuality leads to a better treatment of homosexual persons

In spite the proliferation of gay literature, gay films, gay lingo and ultimately the gay culture in Philippine society, homosexuals still cry out as being victims of discrimination. Why is this so?

Gay culture only presents WHAT homosexuals DO, and play down, if not totally avoid, the discussions on WHY.

It is one thing to present what gay people do, yet if we want people to understand homosexuality, we must go beyond definitions and behaviors and start answering the question: why does a person become gay?

To dismiss this question and state that society must just accept homosexuals for who they are AND what they do undermines the intelligence of the Filipino people – unless it is really part of the gay agenda to dismiss discussions on the origins of homosexuality.

If people will understand why a person becomes a homosexual, and what factors contribute to homosexuality; as well as the painful road that a homosexual undergoes in his or her growing up years, there will be no room for discrimination, only much room for love and affirmation.

Our group can testify as to how our family and friends have better understood and loved us knowing this.


5. Education is the answer to Discrimination!

There are hard facts that must be given to the Filipino public, and this is to be given through continuous education. We hope that our legislative bodies, instead of approving bills that are deceptive and are ultimately cloaked with the gay agenda, will develop and approve measures that will re-educate our people on the truths about homosexuality. Some of these truths are as follows:

a. A homosexual is a person with same-sex attractions
There are homosexuals in all walks of life – whether or not they fit into the stereotypes presented in society. They may be fashion designers or showbiz personalities or corporate managers or teachers or persons in high authority – the common characteristic is that they are sexually attracted to persons of the same-sex.

b. There is a difference between homosexual attraction and homosexual behavior
Being attracted to persons of the same-sex is something that one doesn’t have control – initially. But how do we respond to such attractions, and how do we conduct ourselves as a result of these attractions – our behavior, this is where we have control

c. Homosexuality is not all of genetics but more of environment
Gay research has for years been searching for a gay gene but has found no concrete, repeatable and reliable study to prove one. Though it may be uncertain that genetics may play a part in the development of homosexuality in a person, many studies (see those published in www.narth.com) suggest that it is more of environmental factors (family, peers, school, religion, media, society etc.) that determines the homosexual inclination of an individual.

d. Homosexuals have choices
Since behavior is a matter of choice, the homosexual can choose whether to dress and act like the same-sex or the opposite sex, whether to flaunt their homosexuality or to hide it “in the closet” or to deny it, whether to engage in same-sex activities or not, whether to look for a partner or not and similar such other choices

e. Change is difficult but possible for the homosexual
Since the homosexual has choices, then ultimately he or she has a choice whether or not to continue living in the homosexual lifestyle, or to break free from this lifestyle and live a chaste life, and furthermore to rediscover his manhood or her womanhood and be happily heterosexually married and bring up a family. Countless individuals can testify to the hope of change, and as such ministries have been developed and continue to reach our to persons with same-sex attractions who are now open to change (see www.peoplecanchange, www.gaytostraight.org, www.pureintimacy.org and Door of Hope ministry of www.settingcaptivesfree.com)

f. There are groups available to help homosexuals who decide to change
Individuals who were formerly gay are less known today – but they exist. Yet we could name some famous names such as Ansel Beluso (who was a screaming gay personality in the 1980’s, and who is now a loving husband and a father to three kids) and Vins Santiago (who is a transsexual under the classic statement “woman trapped in a man’s body”, and who is now a man dressing and acting like a man).

These individuals have decided to proclaim the message of hope that homosexuals can change, and have formed groups that help other men and women find their own unique roads to change. Such groups are:
- Bagong Pag-asa under the leadership of John Zulueta (www.bagongpagasa.org )
- Called to be Free Ministries under the leadership of Vins Santiago (www.called2bfree.com )
- Gentlemen of the Lord (Couples for Christ) under the leadership of Ansel Beluso and Myke Perfecto
- Courage under the leadership of Rollie delos Reyes II (www.couragerc.net )
- Ichtus Community under the leadership of Joe Garcia

g. God, through the Church, loves the homosexual person
The Catechism of the Catholic Church clearly states that homosexuals “…must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.” If only every Catholic know this teaching of the Church, as well as its other teachings on homosexuality such as Cardinal Ratzinger’s (now Pope Benedict XVI) Letter to the Bishops On the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons (1986), we would understand how much the Church cares for its flock – even the homosexual person.

Through these hard truths we may educate our people on homosexuality, and thus end the discrimination that emanates from the incomplete and sometimes twisted ideas presented by the gay agenda to our society.
THE HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA
By Michael Swift,
"Gay Revolutionary." Reprinted from The Congressional Record. First printed in Gay Community News, February 15-21 1987

"We shall sodomize your sons, emblems of your feeble masculinity, of your shallow dreams and vulgar lies. We shall seduce them in your schools, in your dormitories, in your gymnasiums, in your locker rooms, in your sports arenas, in your seminaries, in your youth groups, in your movie theater bathrooms, in your army bunkhouses, in your truck stops, in your all male clubs, in your houses of Congress, wherever men are with men together. Your sons shall become our minions and do our bidding. They will be recast in our image. They will come to crave and adore us.

Women, you cry for freedom. You say you are no longer satisfied with men; they make you unhappy. We, connoisseurs of the masculine face, the masculine physique, shall take your men from you then. We will amuse them; we will instruct them; we will embrace them when they weep. Women, you say you wish to live with each other instead of with men. Then go and be with each other. We shall give your men pleasures they have never known because we are foremost men too, and only one man knows how to truly please another man; only one man can understand the depth and feeling, the mind and body of another man.

All laws banning homosexual activity will be revoked. Instead, legislation shall be passed which engenders love between men. All homosexuals must stand together as brothers; we must be united artistically, philosophically, socially, politically and financially. We will triumph only when we present a common face to the vicious heterosexual enemy.

If you dare to cry faggot, fairy, queer, at us, we will stab you in your cowardly hearts and defile your dead, puny bodies.

We shall write poems of the love between men; we shall stage plays in which man openly caresses man; we shall make films about the love between heroic men which will replace the cheap, superficial, sentimental, insipid, juvenile, heterosexual infatuations presently dominating your cinema screens. We shall sculpt statues of beautiful young men, of bold athletes which will be placed in your parks, your squares, your plazas. The museums of the world will be filled only with paintings of graceful, naked lads.
Our writers and artists will make love between men fashionable and de rigueur, and we will succeed because we are adept at setting styles. We will eliminate heterosexual liaisons through usage of the devices of wit and ridicule, devices which we are skilled in employing.

We will unmask the powerful homosexuals who masquerade as heterosexuals. You will be shocked and frightened when you find that your presidents and their sons, your industrialists, your senators, your mayors, your generals, your athletes, your film stars, your television personalities, your civic leaders, your priests are not the safe, familiar, bourgeois, heterosexual figures you assumed them to be. We are everywhere; we have infiltrated your ranks. Be careful when you speak of homosexuals because we are always among you; we may be sitting across the desk from you; we may be sleeping in the same bed with you.

There will be no compromises. We are not middle-class weaklings. Highly intelligent, we are the natural aristocrats of the human race, and steely-minded aristocrats never settle for less. Those who oppose us will be exiled. We shall raise vast private armies, as Mishima did, to defeat you. We shall conquer the world because warriors inspired by and banded together by homosexual love and honor are invincible as were the ancient Greek soldiers.

The family unit-spawning ground of lies, betrayals, mediocrity, hypocrisy and violence--will be abolished. The family unit, which only dampens imagination and curbs free will, must be eliminated. Perfect boys will be conceived and grown in the genetic laboratory. They will be bonded together in communal setting, under the control and instruction of homosexual savants.

All churches who condemn us will be closed. Our only gods are handsome young men. We adhere to a cult of beauty, moral and esthetic. All that is ugly and vulgar and banal will be annihilated. Since we are alienated from middle-class heterosexual conventions, we are free to live our lives according to the dictates of the pure imagination. For us too much is not enough.

The exquisite society to emerge will be governed by an elite comprised of gay poets. One of the major requirements for a position of power in the new society of homoeroticism will be indulgence in the Greek passion. Any man contaminated with heterosexual lust will be automatically barred from a position of influence. All males who insist on remaining stupidly heterosexual will be tried in homosexual courts of justice and will become invisible men.

We shall rewrite history, history filled and debased with your heterosexual lies and distortions. We shall portray the homosexuality of the great leaders and thinkers who have shaped the world. We will demonstrate that homosexuality and intelligence and imagination are inextricably linked, and that homosexuality is a requirement for true nobility, true beauty in a man.

We shall be victorious because we are fueled with the ferocious bitterness of the oppressed who have been forced to play seemingly bit parts in your dumb, heterosexual shows throughout the ages. We too are capable of firing guns and manning the barricades of the ultimate revolution.
Tremble, hetero swine, when we appear before you without our masks."

HOUSE BILL No. 956, Anti-Gay Discrimination Act

Republic of the Philippines
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Quezon City, Metro Manila



FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
First Regular Session


HOUSE BILL No. 956





Introduced by: AKBAYAN Representative Ana Theresia Hontiveros-Baraquel


EXPLANATORY NOTE

The equal protection clause in this Bill of Rights proscribes discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or any other status in the enjoyment of rights. The equal protection clause, according to an eminent constitutionalist, “is the specific constitutional guarantee of the Equality of the Person.” (J. Bernas, S.J., Constitutional Rights & Social Demands: Notes and Cases, Vol.II 1991], p.48) This clause requires that “laws operate equally and uniformly on all persons under similar circumstances or that all persons must be treated in the same manner, the conditions not being different, both in the privileges conferred and the liabilities imposed.” (J.M. Tuason and Co. vs. The Land Tenure Administration, 31 SCRA 413)

The fundamental law also declares that the State values the dignity of every human person and guarantees full respect for human rights (Section 11, Article 11, 1987 Constitution). It also imposes on the State the duty to ensure the fundamental equality before the law of women and men (Sec.14, Id.).

In addition, the Philippines is a signatory to numerous international agreements that seek to ensure respect for the human rights of all persons regardless of sex, sexual orientation or any other condition. These international human rights instruments have consistently been interpreted by international institutions, such as the UN Human Rights Committee and the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, to include protection against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. In Toonen v. Australia, the Human Rights Committee interpreted Article 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which obliges States to “guarantee to all persons equal and effective protection against discrimination on any ground such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status,” to include a protection against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has also interpreted Article 2 of the ICESCR to include sexual orientation in the Covenant’s non-discrimination provisions.







Unfortunately, reality has still to catch up with the noble intentions of these numerous laws and international agreements. Lesbians and gays continue to be oppressed by the iniquitous treatment of society at large, primarily because of misconceptions and ignorance. Sadly for our democracy, gays and lesbians are still considered second class citizens when they try to exercise the rights to which they are rightfully entitled.

In schools, workplaces, commercial establishments, public service, police and military, prejudicial practices and policies based on sexual orientation and gender identity limit the exercise and enjoyment of basic human rights and fundamental freedoms. Lesbian or gay students, for instance, are refused admission or expelled from schools due to their sexual orientation or gender identity. Companies block the promotion of lesbian and gay employees due to the deeply embedded notion that homosexuality is an indication of weakness. Laws such as the anti-vagrancy law are also abused by the law enforcement agencies to harass gay men.

There is, therefore, an urgent need to define and penalize practices that unjustly discriminate against lesbians and gays. It should be emphasized that the list contained herein is not exhaustive as it focuses only on the most blatant instances of discrimination. Similar instances of discrimination should be deemed included among the prohibited practices by analogy.

In view of the foregoing, and of the need to correct the long-standing discrimination against lesbians and gats in Philippine society, the early passage of this bill is earnestly urged.








HON. ANA THERESIA HONTIVEROS-BARAQUEL
Akbayan Party-list Representative



































Republic of the Philippines
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Quezon City, Metro Manila


FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
First Regular Session



HOUSE BILL No. 956


Introduced by: AKBAYAN Representative Ana Theresia Hontiveros-Baraquel


AN ACT PROHIBITING DISCRIMINATION ON THE BASIS OF SEXUAL ORIENTATION AND GENDER IDENTITY AND PROVIDING PENALTIES THEREFOR



Be it enacted by the Senate and the House of Representatives of the Philippines of the Congress assembled:


SECTION 1. Title. – This Act shall be known and cited as the “Anti-Discrimination Act.”

SEC. 2. Declaration of Policy .- It is the policy of the state to work actively for the elimination of all forms of discrimination that offends the equal protection clause of the Bill of Rights and the State obligations under human rights instruments acceded to by the Republic of the Philippines, particularly those discriminatory practices based on sex or sexual orientation. Towards this end, discriminatory practices as defined herein shall be proscribed and penalized.


SEC. 3. Definition of Terms. – For purposes of this act, the following terms shall be defined as follows:

a. Sexual Orientation refers to the direction of emotional sexual attraction or conduct. This
can be towards people of the same sex (homosexual orientation) or towards people of both
sexes (bisexual orientation) or towards people of the opposite sex (heterosexual
orientation)

b. Gender Identity refers to the personal sense of identity as characterized, among others, by
manners of clothing, inclinations, and behavior in relation to masculine or feminine
conventions. A person may have a male or female identity with the physiological
characteristics of the opposite sex.

c. Discrimination shall be understood to imply any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or
preference which is based on any ground such as sex, sexual orientation, gender identity,
whether actual or perceived and which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or
impairing the recognition, enjoyment, or exercise by all persons of an equal footing of all
rights and freedoms.








SEC. 4. Discriminatory Practices. - It shall be unlawful for any person, natural or juridical, to:

(a) Deny access to public service, including military service, to any person on the basis of sexual
orientation and/or gender identity;

(b) Include sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as the disclosure of sexual orientation,
in the criteria for hiring, promotion and dismissal of workers, and in the determination of
employee compensation, training, incentives, privileges, benefits or allowances, and other
terms and conditions of employment;

This prohibition on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity shall also include the
contracting and engaging of services of juridical persons.

(c) Refuse admission or expel a person from educational institutions on the basis of sexual
orientation and gender identity, without prejudice to the right of educational institutions to
determine the academic qualifications of their students;

This prohibition shall include the imposition of (i) disciplinary sanctions solely on the basis
of sexual orientation and gender identity; (ii) penalties harsher that customary primarily due
to sexual orientation and gender identity; or (iii) similar punishments and prohibitions.

(d) Refuse or revoke the accreditation, formal recognition, and/or registration of any
organization, group, political party, institution or establishment, in educational institutions,
workplaces, communities, and other settings, solely on the basis of the sexual orientation or
gender identity of their members or of their target constituencies;

This prohibition shall also include the prevention of and prohibitions on attempts to
organize;

(e) Deny a person access to medical and other health services open to the general public on the
basis of such person’s sexual orientation or gender identity;

(f) Deny an application for or revoke a professional license issued by the government due to
the applicant’s sexual orientation or gender identity;

(g) Deny a person access to or the use of establishments, facilities, utilities or services, including
housing, open to the general public on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity;
There is a denial when a person is given inferior accommodations or services;

This prohibition includes the discrimination of juridical persons solely on the basis of the
sexual orientation or gender identity of their members or of their target constituencies;

(h) Subject or force any person to any medical or psychological examination to determine and/or
alter the person’s sexual orientation or gender identity without the expressed approval of the
person involved, except in cases where the person involved is a minor under the age of
discernment in which case prior approval of the appropriate Family Court shall be required.
In the latter case, the child shall be represented in the proceeding by the Solicitor General or
the latter’s authorized representative;

(i) Harassment by members of institutions involved in the enforcement of law and the
protection of rights, such as the Philippine National Police and the Armed Forces of the
Philippines, of any person on the basis of his or her sexual orientation or gender identity.
Among other cases, harassment occurs when a person is arrested or otherwise placed in the












custody and extortion, physical or verbal abuse takes place, regardless of whether such arrest
has legal or factual basis. Harassment of juridical persons on the basis of the sexual
orientation or gender identity of their members, stockholders, benefactors, clients, or
patrons is likewise covered by this provision.

(j) Other analogous circumstances.

SEC. 5. Administrative sanctions. – Refusal of a government official whose duty is to investigate, prosecute or otherwise act on a complaint for a violation of this Act to perform such a duty without a valid ground shall constitute gross negligence on the part of such official who shall suffer the appropriate penalty under civil service laws, rules, and regulations.

SEC. 6. Penalties. – (a) Persons found guilty of any of the discriminatory practices enumerated in the preceding Section shall be penalized with a fine of not less than One Hundred Thousand Pesos (P100,000) but not to exceed Five Hundred Thousand Pesos (P500,000) or imprisonment of not less than one (1) year but not more than six (6) years, or both at the discretion of the court. In addition, community service in terms of human rights education to the perpetrator and exposure to the plight of the victims can be imposed at the discretion of the court.

(b) The officials directly involved shall be liable for violations committed by corporations, organizations or similar entities.

SEC. 7. Separability clause. – If any provision of this Act is declared unconstitutional or otherwise invalid, the validity of the other provisions shall not be affected thereby.

SEC. 8. Repealing clause. – All laws, decrees, orders, rules and regulations or parts thereof inconsistent with this Act are hereby repealed or modified accordingly.

SEC. 9. Effectivity. – This Act shall take effect fifteen (15) days after its publication in the Official Gazette or in at least two (2) newspapers of general circulation.


Approved,

Richard Cohen's Outline of "After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 90’s"

After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 90’s
By Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen, Plume Books, 1989

Marshall Kirk (researcher in neuropsychiatry, logician, poet, graduated Harvard in 1980) Hunter Madsen (expert in public persuasion tactics and social marketing, designed commercial advertising on Madison Avenue, Ph.D. in Politics, graduated Harvard 1985)

This outline was compiled by Richard Cohen, MA,
International Healing Foundation, www.comingoutstraight.com

Codes:
( ) = page numbers
H = homosexual or homosexuality
Underline and bold are my emphasis
SSA = Same-Sex Attractions

1. This is a campaign of unabashed propaganda, firmly grounded in long-established principles of psychology and advertising. (xxviii)

2. Address hostile public opinion about homosexuality. (xxviii)

3. List of prejudice and harmful actions is the specific agenda for change. (4)

4. Distinguish between the causes and symptoms of homo-hatred. Essential for agenda and strategies. (4)

5. What straights think about homosexuals?

a. Know very little about homosexuality and would prefer to know less. (5)
b. Info from myths, rumors, jokes, stories, Bible. (6)
c. Avoidance of events with homosexuals. (6)
d. Reluctance to discuss the issue in public.(7)
e. Willful perpetuation of ignorance about homosexuality. (7)
f. Don’t care to read serious treatment of homosexual life. (8)
g. Neglect H in mass culture. Change attitude from problem to condition to be tolerated and permanently accepted. (9-10)
h. There are no H heroes. (11)
i. There aren’t many H in America—spread the 10% myth. If we must draw the line somewhere and pick a specific percentage for propaganda purposes, we may well stick with the solidly conservative figure suggested by Kinsey decades ago; taking men and women together, at least 10% of the populace has demonstrated its homosexual proclivities so extensively that that proportion may reasonably be called ‘gay.’ This means that 25 million are H and 50 million parents, plus siblings, relatives, etc. (14-16)
j. When it comes to fighting the charge that H is statistically abnormal hence immoral, there is strength in numbers. (17)
k. Easy to recognize H, stereotype images, effeminate males, masculine females (fags and dykes). (18)
l. Signs of being H: Unusual intelligence, speaks certain way, dress a particular way, move specific ways, fail designated tests of manly courage, artistic (21)
m. Why are they H? Promote the innate, immutable theory. (26-27)
n. Behind theories of H is hatred and fear (black heart). Willful ignorance that is mean spirited. (28)
1. Caused by sinfulness – against natural law, voluntary and deliberate, unnatural, social contrariness
2. Caused by mental illness – confusion over one’s gender identity, fear of opposite sex, result of masturbation, pathological, against culture norms, traced to Dr. Richard von Krafft-Ebing, 1886, “Psychopathia Sexualis,” case histories of H. Karl Ulrichs, Edward Carpenter and other sexologists in late 1800s that H due to gender confusion. Due to parental influence (33-38)
3. Caused by recruitment – older H recruit innocent young straights, like vampires or werewolves. Rev. Falwell said, “H do not reproduce, they recruit.” Sexually depraved, mentally unstable, not to be trusted with our kids, disproportionately involved in child molestation, H and pederast interchangeable. (42) Parents beware, if recruitment is true, your kids might turn out H. Protect your kids from shameful contagion, avoid H.(44)
o. Debunk theories of the causes of H, even if they are true. Purpose is to debunk such theories so straights cannot blame H as sexually deviant. (45)
p. H are kinky, loathsome sex addicts. (48)
q. H are unproductive and untrustworthy members of society. Suicidal, sick, unhappy. (52)

6. Homosexuality portrayed as either 1) a permanent condition, or 2) a temporary problem that can be fixed. This distinction between problem and condition is crucial to the way straights think about homosexuality. A problem has a solution. A condition doesn’t need to be fixed. It is simply an aspect of life that must be accommodated. It requires permanent tolerance and you must come to terms with it psychologically, practically, and morally. We must therefore change public opinion, from problem to condition. (10-11)

7. How straights treat H: (64)

a. Actions that prevent H behavior
b. Actions which deny H their fundamental civil rights (not allowed to speak on TV, radio, newsprint). (77)
c. Actions which vent public disapproval of H “Though your tissues gel, and you rot in hell, don’t feel gloomy friend, it will never end, happy death, faggot fool.” From death threat Christmas cards sent to H in 1987 by Iron Fist, hate group at Univ of Chicago. (98)
8. Our Field Trip Concludes: An Agenda for Change (107-109)

1. H don’t warrant or deserve much attention from straights.
Preferred: H are valuable part of American society; we should be familiar with their nature, culture, news and heroes.
2. H are few in number; I don’t know any H.
Preferred: H constitute a large minority of our society; and some of my friends/family are H.
3. H are easy to spot.
Preferred: They are not: most of them look just like anyone else.
4. H become H because of sin, insanity, seduction.
Preferred: Sexual feelings are not really chosen by anybody; H is just as healthy and natural for some persons as heterosexuality is for others.
5. H are kinky sex addicts.
Preferred: The sex and love lives of most H and straights today are both similar and conventional.
6 – H are unproductive, untrustworthy members of society.
Preferred: H are hardworking, patriotic Americans.
7 – H are suicidally unhappy.
Preferred: H would be as happy as anyone else, if we’d just treat them fairly.
8 – H acts, and intimate public contact, are outlawed across roughly one half of the nation.
Preferred: All sex acts among consenting adults are decriminalized; no discrimination is permitted between straights and H in content and application of laws.
9 – Freedoms of speech and assembly by H are impeded by public intolerance.
Preferred: H are provided, by special law if necessary, the same opportunity to speak (including access to mass media) and gather as straights currently enjoy.
10 – Rights of H to work, shelter, and public accommodations are limited by public intolerance.
Preferred: H are assured, by affirmative action if necessary, equal opportunity in these regards.
11 – H couples cannot legally marry (nor enjoy property rights there from): nor are their rights to parent natural or adoptive children secure.
Preferred: H are permitted all the standard rights of marriage and parenthood.
12 – H are often taunted, harassed and brutalized.
Preferred: The public no longer sanctions this behavior, which becomes as socially incorrect, discreditable, and repugnant as overt racism or anti-Semitism.

9. Understanding Prejudice: (112)

a. Prejudice is not logical. Cannot be overcome by facts and logic.
b. Prejudice is deep, automatic, prelogical, product of emotional conditioning unassailable by any appeal to the intellect. And so is homohatred impervious to argument.
c. To solve the problem, you must first understand it through and through.
10. Tactics that won’t work to overcome prejudice:

a. You can’t inform or argue it away
b. It’s not “evil”’ so burning our enemies at the stake won’t work
c. Not illness so it can’t be cured by therapy
d. Not a conspiracy by sick or wicked people
e. Conscious raising won’t work
f. H parades where H looks extreme won’t work
g. Learning to love and respect others won’t work
h. Storming the barricades or picketing won’t work
i. Having sex in public won’t work (113-114)

11. How prejudice works:

a. Seat of emotion is in the limbic system, a set of six or eight organs located in the center of the brain. (115)
b. Three specific and unmixed emotions: 1) septal region causes pure pleasure, 2) locus ceruleus causes fear, and 3) amygdala causes anger.
c. Emotions serve as internal drive states that motivate a mammal to do the right thing, at the right time, in order to survive and reproduce. Appropriate emotions, appropriately timed, motivate appropriate behavior. (115)
d. Emotions fall into two major categories: 1) trophic emotions—which are pleasant, feel good, induce an animal to approach that which elicitis them; driven by dopamine-containing nerve fibers, pleasure circuits of the mid-brain, which activate the septal region, feels good, and 2) countertrophic emotions, which are unpleasant, feel bad and induce an animal to avoid that which elicits them; driven by norepinephrine-containing nerve fibers, pain circuits of mid-brain, subdivide into two categories (located in separate brain-organs) and motivate two separate behavioral functions (both feel bad):
1. Anxiety/Fear: activated in the locus ceruleus and causes flight response. Caused by situations that are dangerous (discretion is better than valor).
2. Anger/Rage/Hate: activated in the amygdala and induces fight response, attempt to kill enemy. It is solicited by other creatures, rather than situations, that are dangerous or weaker, and more feasibly dealt with by aggression than flight. (116)
e. Evolutionary function of Prejudice—for survival and reproduction. Agnatic selection: “survival of the fittest.” This means that strong, clever animals survive and reproduce passing on their offspring the genes for strength and cleverness, thus, over time, making their species as a whole stronger and more clever. And so it goes with the strongest, cleverest tribes and societies. All baboon tribes are hostile to one another, and fight viciously upon contact; the best tribe wins, gains greater land-space and food, and so reproduces in greater numbers. This process concentrates successful genes. (118)
f. In order for agnatic selection to work, individual baboons come equipped with the ability to discriminate at a glance, or perhaps sniff, between members of their own tribe and members of other tribes. Make snap judgments on the basis of superficial characteristics—nee-jerk reactions—without thinking. Here we see prejudice unfolding!
g. Having discerned the stranger at a glance, the baboon must react immediately, so as to jump the gun on his enemy. This automatic response has two stages: 1) unpleasant emotion—countertrophic fear and/or anger, which motivates 2) a behavior, either fight or flight: “see the stranger, fear the stranger; hate the stranger, kill the stranger.” (119)
h. Humans feel similar to baboons when they experience prejudice: rewarding a sense of fear and anger when they avoid or destroy outsiders, and an equally rewarding sense of pride and self-righteousness, and the respect and approval of their own tribe (parents, family, neighbors, their “set,” class, nation, race). (119)

12. How homohatred arises in men:

a. Prejudice with humans: How homohatred arises in man—have added intellectual abilities than other primates. Two highly developed abilities: 1) learn patterns of behavior, instead of being limited to those instinctive patterns with which one is born; and 2) form mental patterns, or concepts—like little models of things inside the head. (120)
b. Therefore, what was learned can be unlearned. Connections made in the brain can be broken and new connections can be learned that will counteract and nullify the effects of the old. It’s comparatively easy to train a relatively flexible human being if not to like then to feel and react neutrally to previously hated minority groups, like H! (121)
c. How mechanism of prejudice develops in children: 1) learn to hate, 2) learn anger/fear toward H, 3) learn emotional reactions towards H by
1. Associative Conditioning: link between two things so one evokes the other (homosexuals and hatred)
2. Direct Emotional Modeling: learn to hate/love/fear as our parents/others do. Not through reasoning, but by example we learn to hate or fear others. (122)
d. Emotions motivate biologically necessary behaviors, including fight or flight; when social mammals, living in herds, are confronted by enemies of their own or other species. A child has learned, as a conditioned emotional reaction, to hate the things his parents hate. (124)
e. Kinsey said one in three males have homosexual tendencies [this is a mischaracterization of Kinsey’s findings]. So, many will experience H feelings. (125) He will learn to hate in others what he denies in himself:
1. Pattern One: Rage—repression and reaction formation—horrified by his SSA, represses them immediately. Has a subconscious need to seek out and destroy in others (through violence, murder, hurtful behaviors), what he cannot tolerate in himself. Ex., Roy Cohn, Joe McCarthy
2. Pattern Two: Terror—strives to appear straight (acting and appearance). Lifelong self-hatred, avoidance of H.
3. Pattern Three: Wretched Excess—go overboard with exaggerated effeminate behaviors, shock tactics, etc. (126-127)
f. Picture-Label Pair: group images and labels together in the mind, e.g., fag and specific behaviors. (129)

13. How homohatred works in adults: (130)

Step 1: Bigot either sees or hears, or thinks about, an instance of the picture/label pair.
Step 2: His sighting, or thinking about, the instance evokes, from his limbic system, a conditioned response or countertrophic emotion—that is, fear and/or hate. If the emotion is sufficiently intense, he may
Step 3: Run away (by trying to ignore the instance, or by crossing the street), or attack (verbally or physically)—which discharges the fear and/or hate, and thus
Step 4: Rewards the behavior.
Step 5: Steps 2 and, if present, Step 3 are interpreted (perhaps automatically and unconsciously) by the rest of the brain as ‘being like Mom and Dad’—meaning, ‘those from whom I get my love and respect.’ This notion evokes
Step 6: A conditioned response of trophic emotions—felt subjectively as ‘being loved,’ and labeled ‘pride and solidarity.’ This once again
Step 7: Rewards the whole sequence.
Step 8: Rationalization: Rationalization is learned after hatred, so you cannot persuade someone to stop being prejudice by reason!!! (131)

Rationalization is the last in the above sequence, which is why rationalization doesn’t work to change bigotry. Therefore, rationalization isn’t fruitful in the war on homohatred / not useful in the campaign of propaganda to change opinions. (131)

14. Three tactics that don’t work:

1. Conscious raising:
a. Trying to argue people out of their homohatred doesn’t work. Prejudice is not a belief, it’s a feeling. Arguments cannot change feelings, only beliefs. It’s not useful in the treatment of homohatred. Arguments with facts is a waste of time. (136)
b. Actions/behavior help us outgrow/overcome fear/hatred. Experience the feared thing in small increments over time, then the fear peters out. Reason won’t persuade. Emotional appeal works. [Perfect love casts out fear / Love covers a multitude of sins] (137)
c. 90% of people have low intelligence. 10% fairly/highly intelligent. Can never alter the 90% through beliefs or arguments, only through emotions. Highly intelligent can step outside themselves and analyze their feelings, the causes of their feelings, and modulate them. Sometimes, arguments directed at the 10% can trickle down to the 90%. (138)
d. Argument creates negative reaction and reinforces their prejudice (negative emotion when feel threatened). (139)
e. Cannot disprove the Bible, validity of the Bible, or other authoritative sources of moral judgment. (139)
2. Storming the Barricades
a. Fighting won’t/doesn’t work. (140)
b. Solving problems with fists is ill advised.
c. Acts of violence reinforce prejudice. (141)
3. Gender Bending
a. We’ve been shut out of the majority culture; made to feel worthless and wicked.
b. By demonstrating differences, it strengthens prejudice with picture/label pairing, creating hostility and anxiety. (144-145)

15. “First you get your foot in the door, by being as similar as possible; then, and only then—when your one little difference is finally accepted—can you start dragging in your other peculiarities, one by one. You hammer in the wedge narrow end first. As the saying goes, ‘Allow the camel’s nose beneath your tent, and his whole body will soon follow.’” (146)

16. How to Halt, Derail and/or Reverse the Engine of Prejudice:

1. Desensitization:
a. Prejudice = Alerting Signal. Warns tribal mammals that a potential alien mammal is in the vicinity and should be fought or fled. Two things can happen: 1) Strong or Weak Stimulus: fight it or flee from it; and 2) Low Grade Stimulus: don’t take action against it, irrelevancy, get used to it. (148)
b. If H present themselves as different and threatening, then straights go on alert and fight against them.
c. To desensitize straights, H inundate them with conscious flood of H related advertising, presented in the least offensive fashion. If straights can’t shut the shower off, they may at least eventually get used to being wet. (149)

2. Jamming:
a. Insertion of incompatible emotion into the pre-existing system. Like sprinkling sand into a pocket watch.
b. Jamming is more active and aggressive than desensitization.
c. Jamming uses the rules of Associative Conditioning (when two things are repeatedly juxtaposed, one’s feelings about one thing are transferred to the other) and Direct Emotional Modeling (the inborn tendency of human beings to feel what they perceive others to be feelings). (150)
d. Consequent internal confusion has two effects: Unpleasant/Emotional Dissonance will tend to result in an alteration of previous beliefs and feelings so as to resolve the internal conflict. And second, the Internal Dissonance will tend to inhibit over expression of the prejudicial emotion—which is, in itself, useful and relieving. (151)
e. All normal people feel shame when they perceive that they are not thinking, feeling, or acting like one of the pack. The trick is to get the bigot into the position of feeling a conflicting twinge of shame, along with his reward, whenever his homohatred surfaces, so that his reward will be diluted or spoiled. (151)
f. Propagandistic advertising can depict homophobic and homohating bigots as crude loudmouths and assholes—people who say not only “faggot” but “nigger,” “kike,” and other shameful epithets—who are “not Christian.” It can show them being criticized, hated, shunned. It can depict H experiencing horrific suffering as the direct result of homohatred—suffering of which even most bigots would be ashamed to be the cause. It can, in short, link homohating bigotry with all sorts of attributes the bigot would be ashamed to possess, and with social consequences he would find unpleasant and scary. The attack, therefore, is on self-image and on the pleasure in hating. (151-152)
g. When our ads show a bigot—just like the members of the target audience—being criticized, hated, and shunned, we make use of Direct Emotional Modeling as well. Remember, a bigot seeks approval and liking from ‘his crowd.’ When he sees someone like himself being disapproved of and disliked by ordinary Joes, Direct Emotional Modeling ensures that he will feel just what they feel—and transfer it to himself. This wrinkle effectively elicits shame and doubt; Jamming any pleasure he might normally feel. In a very real sense, every time a bigot sees such a thing, he is unlearning a little bit of the lesson of prejudice taught him by his parents and peers. (152)
h. Effect of Jamming, is achieved without reference to facts, logic or proof. Through repeated infralogical emotional conditioning, his bigotry can be alloyed in exactly the same way, whether he is conscious of the attack or not. Indeed, the more he is distracted by any incidental, even specious, surface arguments, the less conscious he’ll be of the true nature of the process – which is all to the good. (153)
i. In short, Jamming succeeds insofar as it inserts even a slight frisson of doubt and shame into the previously unalloyed, self-righteous pleasure. Need massive public exposure of the message to succeed. (153)

3. Conversion
a. Desensitization aims at lowering the intensity of antiH emotional reactions to a level approximating sheer indifference. Jamming attempts to blockade or counteract the rewarding ‘pride in prejudice’ by attaching to homohaterd a pre-existing, and punishing, sense of shame in being a bigot, a horse’s ass, and a beater and murderer. Both of these techniques are preludes to our highest—though necessarily very long-range—goal, which is conversion. (153)
b. Conversion of the average American’s emotions, mind, and will, through a planned psychological attack, in the form of propaganda fed to the nation via the media. We mean ‘subverting’ the mechanism of prejudice to our own ends—using the very process that made America hate us to turn their hatred into warm regard—whether they like it or not. (153-154)
c. If Desensitization lets the watch run down, and Jamming throws sand in the works, Conversion reverses the spring so that the hands run backward. (154)
d. In conversion, the bigot, who holds a very negative stereotypic picture, is repeatedly exposed to literal picture/label pairs, in magazines, and on billboards and TV, of H—explicitly labeled as such – who not only don’t look like his picture of H, but are carefully selected to look either like the bigot and his friends, or like any one of his other stereotypes of all-right guys—the kind of people he already likes and admires. This image must, of necessity, be carefully tailored to be free of absolutely every element of the widely held stereotypes of how ‘faggots’ look, dress, and sound. He or she must not be too well or fashionably dressed; must not be too handsome, that is mustn’t look like a model, or well groomed. The image must be that of an icon or normality—a good beginning would be to take a long look at Coors beer and Three Musketeers candy commercials. Subsequent ads can branch out from that solid basis to include really adorable, athletic teenagers, kindly grandmothers, avuncular policemen, ad infinitem. (154)
e. But it makes no difference that the ads are lies; not to us, because we’re using them to ethically good effect, to counter negative stereotypes that are every bit as much lies, and far more wicked ones; not be bigots, because the ads will have their effect on them whether they believe them or not. (154)
f. When a bigot is presented with an image of the sort of person of whom he already has a positive stereotype, he experiences an involuntary rush of positive emotion, of good feeling; he’s been conditioned to experience it. But, here, the good picture has the bad label—H! (The ad may say something rather like ‘Beauregard Smith-beer drinker, Good Ole Boy, pillar of the community, 100% American, and H as a mongoose.’) The bigot will feel two incompatible emotions: a good response to the picture, a bad response to the label. At worst, the two will cancel one another, and we will have successfully Jammed, as above. At best, Associative Conditioning will, to however small an extent, transfer the positive emotion associated with the picture to the label itself, not immediately replacing the negative response, but definitely weakening it. (155)
g. You may wonder why the transfer wouldn’t proceed in the opposite direction. The reason is simple: pictures are stronger than words and evoke emotional responses more powerfully. The bigot is presented with an actual picture, its label will evoke in his mind his own stereotypic picture, but what he sees in his mind’s eye will be weaker than what he actually sees in front of him with the eyes in his face. The more carefully selected the advertised image is to reflect his ideal of the sort of person who just couldn’t be H, the more effective it will be. Moreover, he will, by virtue of logical necessity, see the positive picture in the ad before it can arouse his negative picture, and first impressions have an advantage over second. (155)
h. In Conversion, we mimic the natural process of stereotype-learning, with the following effect: we take the bigot’s good feelings about all-right guys, and attach them to the label ‘gay,’ either weakening or, eventually, replacing his bad feelings toward the label and the prior stereotype. (155)
i. Understanding Direct Emotional Modeling, you’ll readily foresee its application to Conversion; whereas in Jamming the target is shown a bigot being rejected by his crowd for his prejudice against H, in Conversion the target is shown his crowd actually associating with H in good fellowship. Once again, it’s very difficult for the average person, who, by nature and training, almost invariably feels what he sees his fellows feeling, not to respond in this knee-jerk fashion to a sufficiently calculated advertisement. In a way, most advertisement is founded upon an answer of Yes, definitely! To Mother’s sarcastic question: I suppose if all the other kids jumped off a bridge and killed themselves, you would too? (155-156)

17. Success depends on flooding the media, and that, in turn means money, man hours, and unifying the H community for a concerted effort. (157)

18. Learn from Madison Avenue, to roll out the big guns! H must launch a large-scale campaign—we’ve called it the Waging Peace Campaign—to reach straights through the mainstream media. We’re talking about propaganda. (161)

19. The term propaganda applies to any deliberate attempt to persuade the masses via public communications media. Its function is not to perpetrate, but to propagate; to propagate, that is, to spread new ideas and feelings (or reinforce old ones) which may themselves be either evil or good depending on their purpose and effect. The purpose and effect of progay propaganda is to promote a climate of increased tolerance for H. (162)

20. Three characteristics distinguish propaganda from other modes of communication and contribute to its sinister reputation: 1) Relies on emotional manipulation—through desensitization, jamming and conversion; 2) Use lies, and 3) Subjective and one-sided. Tell our side of the story as movingly as possible. In the battle for hearts and minds, effective propaganda knows enough to put its best foot forward. This is what our own media campaign must do. (162-163)
21. Must train leaders, national workshops for full acceptance in America. Begin a national “Positive Images Campaign.” Recognition is dawning that antigay discrimination begins, like war, in the minds of men, and must be stopped there with the help of propaganda. (163)
22. Principle goal of the campaign is to gain tolerance and acceptance by straight community. (165)
23. Show, in the media, that H community lives by an ethical code in order to achieve our goal of tolerance and acceptance. (166)
24. Publicly “Come Out” to desensitize, jam and convert straight America. Jamming means interrupting the smooth workings of bigotry by inducing inconsistent feelings in the bigot. Extreme bigots become less confident that their incitements will generate applause and are further inhibited by the majority of ‘mild bigots, who now become uneasy that a fag slur might provoke an unpleasant scene. Once these dynamics get going, displays of homohatred suddenly become off-color and boorish. Thus, when H come out, they help transform the social climate from one that support prejudice to one that shuts homohaters up. Coming out is critical catalyst for the all-important ‘conversion’ process. To make straights actually like and accept H as a group, enabling straights to identify with them. Coming out is the key to sociopolitical empowerment, the ability of the gay community to control its own destiny. (167-168)
25. Coming out process is too slow so we also need a national media campaign. After meeting enough likeable H on TV, Jane Doe may begin to feel she knows H as a group, even if none has ever introduced himself to her personally. Thwart bigotry. (169)
26. Carefully crafted, repeatedly displayed mass-media images of H could conceivably do even more to reverse negative stereotypes than could the incremental coming out of one person to another. (169)
27. The wide range of favorably sanitized images that might be shown in the media could eventually have a more positive impact on the H stereotype than could exposure to H friends, since straights will otherwise generalize a suboptimal impression of gays from the idiosyncratic admixture of good and bad traits possessed by their one or two H acquaintances. Portray only the most favorable side of gays, thereby counterbalancing the already unfairly negative stereotype in the public’s mind. (170)
28. The media campaign will work well in tandem with the Everyone Comes Out strategy because it is actually a catalyst to coming out. (170)
29. Two different avenues to gay liberation: Education (i.e., propaganda) and Politics. (170) Politicians must be responsive to public sentiment on sensational issues if they value their careers. (171) But this often happens in politics, especially on the H issue where, as Yeasts would say, “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Our political success could be greatly advanced by media campaign conducted prior to, or simultaneously with, political initiatives. (172)
30. WAGING PEACE CAMPAIGN: 8 Practical Principles For The Persuasion Of Straights:
a. “Those who have supreme skill use Strategy to bond others without coming to conflict.” Sun Tzu, The Art of War
b. Three points of effective propaganda:
1) Employ images that desensitize, jam and/or convert bigots on an emotional level. This is, by far, the most important task;
2) Challenge homohating beliefs and actions on a (not too) intellectual level. Remember, the rational message serves to camouflage our underlying emotional appeal, even as it pares away the surrounding latticework of beliefs that rationalize bigotry; and
3) Gain access to the kinds of public media that would automatically confer legitimacy upon these messages and, therefore, upon their gay sponsors. To be accepted by the most prestigious media, such as network TV, or messages themselves will have to be—at least initially—both subtle in purpose and crafty in construction. (173)

Principle 1: Don’t’ just express yourself, communicate!

a. Genuine public outreach requires careful communication. Key: Put yourself in the listeners shoes. “If I were straight and felt the hostility most straights feel towards gays, what would it take to get me to change my antigay feelings?” (174)
b. Don’t start by deciding what you most ardently wish to tell straights: start by determining what they most need to hear from you. (174)
c. Straights must be helped to believe that you and they speak the same language. (174)
d. Dress and speak like them. (175)

Principle 2: Seek ye not the saved nor the damned: Appeal to the skeptics

a. Intransigents (Core) 30-35% / Ambivalent Skeptics (Swing) 35-45% / Friends (Pansexual) 25-30% (175)
b. Silence those that oppose homosexuality (Intransigents) because of their religious beliefs.
c. Ambivalent skeptics are our most promising targets (176).
d. Ambivalent skeptics are more or less passively negative toward H (176).
e. Focus the media campaign on the ambivalent skeptics: Desensitize/Jam/Convert them.
f. Silence the Intransigents (Core).
g. Mobilize the Friends (Pansexuals). (177)

Principle 3: Keep Talking

a. Help straights view homosexuality with neutrality rather than keen hostility. In the beginning, seek desensitization and nothing more. (177)
b. “You can forget about trying right up front to persuade folks that homosexuality is a good thing. But if you can get them to think it is just another thing—meriting no more than a shrug of the shoulders – then your battle for legal and social rights is virtually won.” (177)
c. “Application of the keep-talking principle can get people to the shoulder-shrug stage. The free and frequent discussion of gay rights by a variety of persons in a variety of places gives the impression that homosexuality is commonplace. That impression is essential, because, as noted in the previous chapter, the acceptability of any new behavior ultimately hinges on the proportion of one’s fellow accepting or doing it.” (177)
d. “The fastest way to convince straights that homosexuality is commonplace is to get a lot of people taking about the subject in a neutral or supportive way.” (178)
e. “Talk about gayness until the issue becomes thoroughly tiresome.” (178)
f. “In the early stages of the campaign, the public should not be shocked and repelled by premature exposure to homosexual behavior itself. Instead, the imagery of sex per se should be downplayed, and the issue of gay rights reduced, as far as possible, to an abstract social question.” (178)
g. “As it happens, the AIDS epidemic—ever a course and boon for the gay movement—provides ample opportunity to emphasize the civil rights/discrimination side of things, but unfortunately it also permits our enemies to draw attention to gay sex habits that provoke revulsion.” (178)
h. Accuse religious people: “Gays can use talk to muddy the moral waters, that is, to undercut the rationalizations that ‘justify’ religious bigotry and to jam some of its psychic rewards.” “Portray such institutions as antiquated backwaters, badly out of step with the times and with the latest findings of psychology.” (179)
i. “Where we talk is critical.” TV, films, magazines—most powerful image makers in the Western civilization. (179) Marshall McLuhan said, “Where desensitization is concerned, the medium is the message…of normalcy.” (179)

Principle 4: Keep the message focused: You’re a homosexual, not a whale.

a. Talk about gay rights issues and nothing more: be single minded. (180)
b. Michael Denneny said, “We have no natural allies and therefore cannot rely on the assistance of any group; we have only tactical allies—people who do not want barbarous things done to us because they fear the same thing may someday be done to them.” (181)
c. Be focused in your efforts to reach the public via mass media. Talk, talk, talk about gay rights, and leave it at that. (182)

Principle 5: Portray gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers.

a. “Gays must be portrayed as victims in need of protection so that straights will be inclined by reflex to adopt the role of protector. If gays present themselves instead, as a strong and arrogant tribe promoting a defiantly nonconformist lifestyle, they are most likely to be seen as a public menace that warrants resistance and oppression.” (183)
b. KEY: “The purpose of victim imagery is to make straights feel very uncomfortable; that is, to jam with shame the self-righteous pride that would ordinarily accompany and reward their antigay belligerence, and to lay groundwork for the process of conversion by helping straights identify with gays and sympathize with their underdog status.” (183)
c. “Persons featured in the media campaign should be wholesome and admirable by straight standards, and completely unexceptional in appearance; in a word, they should be indistinguishable from the straights we’d like to reach.” (183)
d. “Conventional young people, middle-aged women, and older folks of all races would be featured, not to mention the parents and straight friends of gays. One could also argue that lesbians should be featured more prominently than gay men in the early stages of the media campaign.” (183-184)
e. Two different messages about gay victims:
1. Public persuaded that gays are victims of circumstance, that they no more chose their sexual orientation than they did, say, their height, skin color, talents, or limitations. “To suggest in public that homosexuality might be chosen is to open the can of worms labeled ‘moral choice’ and ‘sin’ and give the religious intransigents a stick to beat us with. Straights must be taught that it is as natural for some persons to be homosexual as it is for others to be heterosexual: wickedness and seduction have nothing to do with it. And since no choice is involved, gayness can be no more blameworthy than straightness. In fact, it is simply a matter of the odds—one in ten—as to who turns out gay, and who straight. Each heterosexual must be led to realize that he might easily have been born homosexual himself.” (184)
2. Gays should be portrayed as VICTIMS OF PREJUDICE. Straights don’t fully realize the suffering they bring upon gays, and must be shown: graphic pictures of brutalized gays, dramatizations of job and housing insecurity, loss of child custody, public humiliation, etc. (184)
f. Help straights become homosexual protectors. (185)
g. Play for sympathy and tolerance. (186)
h. March if you must, but don’t parade (look good for the camera/newspaper). Look ordinary, not disenfranchised drag queens, bull dykes, exotic elements of the gay community. (186)
i. Desensitization works gradually or not at all. (186)

Principle 6: Give potential protectors a just cause.

a. Use anti-discrimination as the campaign, not homosexual behavior. (187)
b. “Our campaign should not demand explicit support for homosexual practices, but should instead take antidiscrimination as its theme. Fundamental freedoms, constitutional rights, due process and equal protection of laws, basic fairness and decency toward all of humanity – these should be the concerns brought to mind by our campaign.” (187)

Principle 7: Make gays look good.

a. In order to make a gay victim sympathetic to straights, you have to portray him as Everyman. (187)
b. Paint gay men and lesbians as superior, veritable pillars of society. (188)
c. Use famous historical homosexual figures
d. Use celebrity endorsements of homosexuals because people like celebrities so they will like homosexuals. (188-189)

Principle 8: Make victimizers look bad.

a. “The objective is to make homohating beliefs and actions look so nasty that average Americans will want to dissociate themselves from them.” (189)
b. “The best way to make homohatred look bad is to vilify those, who victimize gays. The public should be shown images of ranting homohaters whose associated traits and attitudes appall and anger Middle America.” (189)
c. In TV and print, images of victimizers can be combined with those of their gay victims by a method propagandists call the ‘bracket technique’, e.g. Rev. Fred Phelps picketing at Matthew Shepards funeral saying “God hates gays.” Then people are disgusted by him, so they dissociate from him and his hateful attitude. (189)
d. “Every time a viewer runs through this comparative self-appraisal, he reinforces a self-definition that consciously rejects homohatred and validates sympathy for gay victims. Exactly what we want.” (190)

31. Tactics for eating the media alive:

A. Three main ways: 1. Public Relations, 2. News Reporting, and 3. Advertising. (193)
B. Make a big noise. People love scandals, gossip. Cultivate liaisons with broadcast companies and newsrooms in hope of seeing issues important to the gay community receive some coverage. (194)
C. Public disturbances: 1. Look light a mass event, 2. Behavior must be nonviolent, 3. Disobedient acts must be portrayed as a last resort, 4. Viewing public must be helped to understand that gay protestors accept and expect arrest, they’re not just out to break laws, 5. Public must understand the logical connection between the gay rights issue and the particular act of civil disobedience adopted. (196-197)
D. Public relations tactics:
1) Creative formatting: need fresh angle, way to make gay rights argument more topical,
2) Use news to make news—gay persons can respond to a new law, court case, death, or scandal,
3) Human interest—people more interested in the human personal side of your story,
4) Celebrity spokespersons—a celebrity does not simply make news—she is news—she can get on the air and tout the gay cause relatively easily, without further pretext. (198)
E. TV is OK, but advertising campaign is necessary to be successful, in order to desensitize, jam and convert people. (199)
F. Advertising tactics / five big media outlets:
1. TV best because it teaches the widest amount of people. It’s the most intrusive medium. Change picture/label pair, best on TV.
2. Radio: reaches millions daily, intimate medium.
3. Magazines: good vehicle for the gay message. More affordable than TV blitz, less intrusive and packs less punch.
4. Newspapers: do even less to build legitimacy than magazines.
5. Outdoors: billboards, display ads in public areas, subway placards, etc. Excellent job of reaching a broad audience over and over again. Message must be simple and benefit from being seen over and over again.
Goal is to desensitize straights to homosexuality. (204)
G. Over long term, TV and Magazines are probably the two media of choice. TV is more persuasive and magazines are the most affordable. (204)
H. Fairness doctrine by FCC to get on shows, etc. Personal Attack Rule by FCC, get on shows. Equal Time Rule of FCC—equal time for each office. (206)
I. How to get on TV, radio, newsprint:
1. Make ads like white bread, completely unobjectionable. go after middlebrow or upper-middlebrow publications and then work your way down.
2. Use free access—Public Service Announcements (PSA).
3. Run symbolic gay candidates for every high political office. (212) Through such political campaigns, mainstream America would get over the initial shock of seeing gay ads.
4. Waging Peace Campaign: Launch media messages of open support for the civil rights of gay people in ads that work directly to jam homohatred and convert straight to feelings of greater tolerance. (213)

32. Create One Unified National Gay Organization for tactical purposes. (249)

A. “We’re more willing to attack one another than to go after our common enemy.” Jeff Levi, Executive director of NGLTF.
B. AFL-CIO learned many years ago there is tremendous strength in unification under a single run organization. (249)
C. Fund Raising: two phases:

PHASE ONE: Name, mission, tax-deductibility, good ladder (continue all tactics after campaign is launched):
1. Trademark name of the campaign
2. Statement of mission: prioritize objectives, make measurable milestone goals, working plan
3. Funding: Government grants, foundation grants, business contributions, individual contributions. (265)
4. The more directly personal your contact with donors, the more funds your will raise. (266) Fundraisers ladder chart.
5. Lion’s share of individual donations usually come from a few wealthy individuals and business executives who must be wooed in person. (267)
6. List of fundraising ideas for phase one (268-269):
a. Cultivate gay upper class
b. Conduct direct mail appeals
c. Place fundraising ads in the gay press
d. Develop dedicated fundraising events
e. Introduce an affinity credit card for the campaign.
7. Exposed-root appeals (269):
1. Let other gay organizations contribute directly to the campaign
2. Persuade gay bars and other gay-patronized businesses to donate regularly to the campaign.

PHASE TWO: Solicit additional funds from gays and straights via straight media, through ads themselves.

33. Motivation over the long haul is to sustain emotional steam which comes from rage, not love:

“You may discount what the pious tell you, because it is actually rage, not love, that lay behind all those progressive events.”

“Like all emotions, rage has its purpose. And its time and place. When a situation becomes intolerable, an oppression unbearable, when millions do not even dare to cry out beneath the heel of injustice, rage is the appropriate response.” (382)

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Endnote:

For a solution to this present situation, please contact the International Healing Foundation. See the Special Projects page on our web site:
www.ComingOutStraight.com