When did you choose to be straight?

“When did you choose to be straight?” This is actually a question that I keep in reserve in case somebody learns about my sexual orientation and reacts negatively by saying that being gay is a choice. Thankfully, I have never had the chance to use this question. So it was pretty awesome seeing the video above where this question was thrown back at people who believe that homosexuality is a choice. The video shows that you can actually disarm people by making them see your point of view.

Of course human psychology being what it is, I do think that for some people, being gay may have indeed been a conscious decision. But as you readers have long realized, sexual attraction is involuntary—you don’t have any say at all on whether you get physically attracted to men or women or both. Thus, I believe that for the vast majority of gay people, they’re born that way. Simply put, why on earth would many rational gay people choose to be gay when being gay would subject oneself to discrimination, bullying, and being ostracized? It makes no sense at all. Unfortunately, some bigots lack sense.

If there is any conscious decision, it is the one on self-acceptance. I had an inkling I was gay back in Grade 6 when I started becoming attracted to some of my male schoolmates. But it was only in my Junior year in high school that I finally accepted the fact that I was gay and that there was nothing I can do about it.

Another conscious decision is acting on our homosexual nature. Catholic teaching does acknowledge that gay people may be gay by nature, but the Church exhorts gay people to live a celibate life. I don’t think that makes any sense too. If you’re naturally gay, why suppress it? As long as you live a positive live and don’t hurt anyone, why does it matter that you kiss, enter into relationships, and marry people of the same sex?

So, when did you choose to be accept that you are gay?

Prayers for Bobby

I first came across the 2009 TV film Prayers for Bobby (IMDB, Wikipedia) in 2012 and resolved to watch it eventually. I finally got to do that late last year. I heartily recommend everybody to see it, especially those who are struggling with feelings of rejection due to their sexual orientation. There are a few uploads of the complete film on YouTube, such as this one.

Based on a book with the same title, Prayers for Bobby tells the true story of Bobby Griffith and his relationship with his mother, Mary Griffith, a very conservative Christian parent (portrayed very well by Sigourney Weaver). The year was 1979 and Bobby’s homosexuality was revealed to his family. This prompted Mary to help “cure” her son through religion and therapy. This proved unsuccessful and Bobby’s depression and feelings of rejection from his mother led him to commit suicide a few years later. Devastated by his death, Mary started questioning her religious stance against homosexuality and eventually came to terms with her son’s death. In doing so, she became an outspoken advocate for gay rights.

While that paragraph above pretty much tells the whole story, reading about it and actually seeing the film are two very different things. I secretly watched the movie on my laptop hoping that nobody else in the household sees or hears what I was watching. But it was very hard not getting teary-eyed at some scenes and dialogue in the film. The following line uttered by Mary while confiding to a gay-friendly pastor is pretty heart-wrenching, as is her wonderful speech towards the end of the movie.

“I know now why God didn’t heal Bobby. He didn’t heal him because … [breaks down in pained sobbing] … there was nothing wrong with him!”

While conditions nowadays is a far cry from the early eighties during Bobby’s time, there is still a lot more that can be improved. I pray that the day will come when there would be no more Bobbys, Tylers, and Jameys. I just hope that that day would come soon enough.

“Same Love” at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards

Last year, I blogged about Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ song “Same Love”, a pro-gay marriage song that has been getting some airtime in local radio stations. Well, the song got nominated for the Song of the Year Award at the recent Grammy Awards, but they lost to Lorde’s “Royals”. Still, the hip hop duo won a total of four Grammys, namely, Best New Artist, Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song (both for “Thrift Shop”), and Best Rap Album (The Heist).

What’s more notable is that “Same Love” was performed during the awards night with Mary Lambert (the featured vocalist on the song), Queen Latifah, and Madonna, who sang her song “Open Your Heart”. In the middle of the performance, Queen Latifah, who had been deputized by the Los Angeles County, officiated the weddings of 33 straight and gay couples standing in the audience, including Lewis’ sister who married her boyfriend. I guess it was the first ever mass wedding held in any awards show and one that featured same-sex couples!

You can watch the performance below:

2013 is a banner year for same-sex marriage

As we celebrate 2013 with a bang, I’d like to look back and see how same-sex marriage has been adopted all over the world during the past year. Back in July, I congratulated England and Wales for allowing same-sex marriage for its citizens starting on March 29, 2014. England and Wales joined Uruguay, New Zealand, and France in recognizing same-sex marriage this year bringing the total number of countries where same-sex marriage is allowed to 15.

But the greatest triumph is in the United States. Over the past 12 months, nine states either passed legislation, had court rulings, or had popular votes allowing same-sex marriage in their territories. These are Rhode Island, Delaware, Minnesota, California, New Jersey, Hawaii, Illinois, New Mexico, and Utah. These series of recognition has effectively doubled the number of states and territories in the United States where same-sex marriage is allowed. The other states and territories where same-sex marriage is already allowed are Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, New Hampshire, Washington, D.C., New York, Maine, Maryland, and Washington. In addition, the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was effectively struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013 thus allowing same-sex couples federal benefits such as insurance and social security.

The map below show the current state of same-sex laws in the United States with blue states for and red states against.

Among the states that started allowing same-sex marriage in 2013, the most notable are California and Utah. California’s Supreme Court previously ruled in 2008 that same-sex marriage is permitted in that state. However, Proposition 8 was narrowly passed by voters later that year which stated that marriage can only be heterosexual. Predictably, this set off a series of court cases resulting in the overturning of Prop 8 in 2010. This was appealed and the appellate court affirmed the decision. Finally, the case was brought to the U.S. Supreme Court which dismissed the case last June 26. After 5 years of wrangling, California finally joined the growing list of states where same-sex marriage is recognized.

The case of Utah is quite curious. Utah, where the very conservative Mormon Church (aka Latter-Day Saints) has considerable influence, had previously passed in 2004 a state constitution amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman. Due to a court case, a federal district judge ruled last December 20 that this amendment was unconstitutional with respect to the U.S. Constitution thus paving the way for same-sex marriages to be performed in Utah.

Pundits noted the irony of the situation because the Mormon Church had poured large amounts of money and resources into pushing for Proposition 8 in California. As mentioned earlier, Prop 8 was struck down earlier this year and now Utah itself allows same-sex marriage. The Republican Utah administration had already started the appeals process and we will see where the legal dance will take Utah in the years to come. Hopefully, like California, Utah will ultimately allow same-sex marriage with finality.

Wentworth Miller on suicide and coming out

You should know by now that Wentworth Miller, who played the leading character Michael Scofield in the popular TV series Prison Break, came out of the closet late last month. In a simple letter posted on the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation website, Miller declined an invitation to attend an international film festival in St. Petersburg, Russia as a form of protest against the anti-homosexual laws in that country. “It would make me happy to say yes, however, as a gay man, I must decline,” wrote Miller.

Having enjoyed watching the 1st season of Prison Break, I developed a small crush on Wentworth Miller as well as on his co-actor Dominic Purcell, who played Scofield’s half-brother Lincoln Burrows. At the height of his popularity, Miller was actually hounded by gay rumors and he emphatically said back in 2007, “I’m not gay.”

Now Miller, through an inspiring speech given at a recent dinner organized by the Human Rights Campaign, spoke about his struggles in coming to terms with his homosexuality. He revealed that he first tried to commit suicide at 15 by downing a bottle of pills while his family was away for the weekend. He survived and was asked if that was a cry for help. He said no because, “You only cry for help if you believe there’s help to cry for. And I didn't. I wanted out.” And on his decision to finally come out, Miller said, “let me be to someone else, what no one was to me.”

You can watch his full speech below. (Note: the audio is quite soft, so you should use earphones.)

Cheers to England and Wales!

With the Royal Assent given by Queen Elizabeth II yesterday, England and Wales have now joined a growing number of countries, states, and territories where same-sex marriage is legal.

This good news comes almost at the heels of developments in the United States where their Supreme Court struck down Section 3 of DOMA for being unconstitutional, paving the way for federal benefits for same-sex couples in the U.S. The same Supreme Court also dismissed an appeal against the overturning of Proposition 8 in California, making same-sex marriage again legal in the Golden State.

Going back to the United Kingdom, it’s not a yet a home run since Scotland has yet to follow suit (hopefully in 2014), and Northern Ireland, with its deeply religious population, is currently staunchly against same-sex marriage. Yet, I’m quite happy (and gay) as every bit of good news helps.

Now let’s see if the new Philippine Congress will be able to finally pass the full Anti-Discrimination Law, one that includes provisions against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. (I know it’s a bit sad that while other countries are already passing same-sex marriage laws, here in the Philippines, we have yet to criminalize LGBT discrimination. But baby steps....)

Would you vote for Ang Ladlad? (2013 edition)

Back in 2010, I asked you guys, “Would you vote for Ang Ladlad?” I then answered my own question: “I’m voting for Ang Ladlad and so should you.” After I voted for Ang Ladlad, I checked out the results from my precinct and was really surprised and glad that 17 other people voted for the LGBT party-list, which meant that Ang Ladlad won 3.42% of the votes in my precinct. If that result were reflected in the national results, then Ang Ladlad would have gotten 2 seats in the House of Representatives. Unfortunately, Ang Ladlad only got a little more than 100,000 votes from the whole country, around 50,000 votes short of the total that is guaranteed to get one seat.

This year, I am voting for Ang Ladlad again. Among the hundreds of party-lists on the ballot, I feel that only Ang Ladlad represents my interests more. While I am not expecting that same-sex marriage would be on the agenda anytime soon (I don’t feel our country is ready for that), the first step is the Anti-Discrimination Bill. Ang Ladlad has made passing this bill the cornerstone of their congressional agenda and I am all for that.

So if you’re still undecided on your party-list choice, please do consider Ang Ladlad. It is infinitely more deserving of a seat than those pretentious pet party-lists of politicians (Mikey Arroyo’s Ang Galing Pinoy anyone?).

“I’m a 34-year-old NBA center. I’m black. And I’m gay.”

I didn’t set out to be the first openly gay athlete playing in a major American team sport. But since I am, I’m happy to start the conversation. I wish I wasn’t the kid in the classroom raising his hand and saying, “I’m different.” If I had my way, someone else would have already done this. Nobody has, which is why I’m raising my hand.

When I was younger I dated women. I even got engaged. I thought I had to live a certain way. I thought I needed to marry a woman and raise kids with her. I kept telling myself the sky was red, but I always knew it was blue.

I thought April 2013 could not get any better for gay rights and acceptance when Uruguay, New Zealand, and France all passed legislation allowing same-sex marriage in their countries within 2 weeks of each other, becoming the 12th, 13th, and 14th countries to do so. The last time a country reached that milestone was Denmark back in June 2012.

But as the month was ending, Sports Illustrated broke the story on Jason Collins, a 12-year NBA veteran player, coming out as a gay man, the first athlete from any of the four American major league sports (NBA, NFL, MLB, NHL) to do so while not yet retiring. It was a watershed moment and what’s best is that the reaction was ovewhelmingly positive, from Collins’ teammates and coaches in basketball, to former president Clinton, and current President Obama.

Collins’ first-person essay, which you should really read, is a well-written account of his struggles being a professional NBA player hiding in the closet. His interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos is also a good read, providing more background the the path that led to where Jason Collins is now.

I hope that this brave step taken by Jason Collins will pave the way for other players to come out or at least make the sports field an even more tolerable place for athletes who have differing sexual orientations. (All four major league sports have started to enact programs to combat homophobia in their sports.) And I also hope that Collins, who becomes a free agent later this year when his contract with the Washington Wizards ends, will get another season playing the sport that he loves as a proud and out gay man.

Clinton + Callum

I just saw this great wedding video featuring Clinton and Callum, a gay couple from Australia. (While Australia does not recognize gay marriage (yet), our friends from Down Under do enjoy some form of domestic partnership.)

The video certainly brought tears to my eyes and I loved seeing them surrounded by family and friends as they vowed to become “partners for life.” And since the video is on Vimeo, we are spared the usual hateful comments that permeate similar videos on YouTube. That both Clinton and Callum are good-looking, is just icing on the cake.

I hope this brightened up your day!

On Anderson Cooper and the need for visibility

One of the biggest gay-related news that broke out in July was the official coming out of Anderson Cooper. Anderson Cooper is possibly one of CNN’s most well-known anchors and through an email he sent to his friend Andrew Sullivan and which the latter published with Cooper’s permission, he finally confirmed what many people in the industry know: that he is a gay man. And proud of it.

Cooper’s coming-out letter is one of the best such letters I have ever read. You can see how much thought he put into it and it very much reflects the level of professionalism that has made him one of the most successful people in the news industry today. In his letter, he lays out the reasons why he decided to come clean and why only now. I highly encourage you to read his letter for yourself, but here are some selected passages that I particularly like:

I’ve always believed that who a reporter votes for, what religion they are, who they love, should not be something they have to discuss publicly. As long as a journalist shows fairness and honesty in his or her work, their private life shouldn’t matter. I’ve stuck to those principles for my entire professional career, even when I’ve been directly asked “the gay question,” which happens occasionally.

Recently, however, I’ve begun to consider whether the unintended outcomes of maintaining my privacy outweigh personal and professional principle. It’s become clear to me that by remaining silent on certain aspects of my personal life for so long, I have given some the mistaken impression that I am trying to hide something - something that makes me uncomfortable, ashamed or even afraid. This is distressing because it is simply not true.

I’ve also been reminded recently that while as a society we are moving toward greater inclusion and equality for all people, the tide of history only advances when people make themselves fully visible. There continue to be far too many incidences of bullying of young people, as well as discrimination and violence against people of all ages, based on their sexual orientation, and I believe there is value in making clear where I stand.

That last passage struck me in particular. He rightly states that societal acceptance of the LGBT community does not happen overnight and only happens when LGBT people become visible. Cooper does make a compelling case that we should aim to eventually come out of the closet in order to further the notion that PLUs are just like other (heterosexual) people in all aspects except for sexual orientation and/or gender identity.

Does that mean that I will come out anytime soon? While some friends and family already know about my sexuality, I have decided to remain in the closet for now. While I understand that the more out PLUs there are the better will be society’s acceptance, the process of coming out—whether gradual or abrupt—is an intensely personal decision that depends upon one’s personal circumstances. So while a gay man in Manhattan should not have too much problem being out, a young teen in rural America would be better off being in the closet for a while.

Nobody should be forced to come out when he or she is not ready, no matter how beneficial it would be in the long term.

The Pink Lantern

Ever since DC Comics let loose the tidbit that one of their prominent superheroes would come out as gay, speculation has been rife on which DC superhero it was. The most popular target was Batman due to his really close relationship with Robin. Another popular guess was Wonder Woman.

Well, I’ll confess that when I learned of the recent news that this gay superhero is the Green Lantern, I immediately thought, “Ryan Reynolds plays a gay character? Yay!” Unfortunately, it’s not Hal Jordan who’s gay but rather Alan Scott, the original Green Lantern from the 1940s. And it’s not actually the original Alan Scott (who married twice and had children) who is gay, but a rebooted Alan Scott who lives in a (also rebooted) parallel universe called Earth-Two. Confused?

Anyway, what I like about this “coming out” is that Alan Scott did not actually come out in the comics. He’s been out and gay right from the start of the reboot and his being homosexual and having a lover is treated as a non-issue (that’s him smooching his BF in the comic panel above). Artist Nicola Scott says of the new Alan Scott’s persona as directed by writer James Robinson: “He needed to be a big, strapping, handsome man that everyone would instinctively follow and love. Alan strikes me as an incredibly open, honest and warm man, a natural leader and absolutely the right choice to be Guardian of the Earth. His sexuality is incidental.” This Alan Scott is also an international media mogul, being the head of the fictional GBC Productions. (Think Rupert Murdoch, but younger, sexier, and fabulous.)

While this new Green Lantern is not the first gay superhero (in fact, Obsidian, the son of the original Alan Scott, was gay), many pundits say that he is the most prominent superhero to not be straight. The problem is most people already associate Hal Jordan (i.e., Ryan Reynolds) with the Green Lantern monicker, not Alan Scott, and so this new gay character would not be as revolutionary as declaring Superman gay. Time will tell if rebooting Alan Scott to be an alpha-male, confident, young gay man that is clearly meant to be a role model will have a far-reaching effect as Barack Obama’s coming out in support of gay marriage early last month.

But whatever the case, I’ll say kudos to DC Comics!

Study: Homophobic people likely repressing homosexual attraction

Alam na!

Many of us assume that extremely homophobic people are very likely homosexuals themselves. This is such a common assumption that it’s been used as character traits from Col. Fitts in American Beauty to David Karofsky in the musical-comedy Glee.

Well, I have only now come across a study that indeed gives evidence for that. According to this article from The Raw Story, “a research team from the University of Rochester, the University of Essex, England, and the University of California in Santa Barbara found that ‘homophobia is more pronounced in individuals with an unacknowledged attraction to the same sex and who grew up with authoritarian parents who forbade such desires.’”

The interesting insight I got from the report is the idea that we shouldn’t taunt or ridicule people with extreme homophobia. What they need instead is compassion and understanding. As one of the study’s author says, “We laugh at or make fun of such blatant hypocrisy, but in a real way, these people may often themselves be victims of repression and experience exaggerated feelings of threat. Homophobia is not a laughing matter. It can sometimes have tragic consequences.” I would imagine being compassionate or understanding a tough thing to do especially if you are on the receiving end of the homophobe’s attacks, but if the LGBT community is to attain the moral high ground, retaliating might only make things worse.

“I’m Christian, unless you’re gay”

Quite appropriately for Easter, I came across this thought-provoking essay written by a single dad. The article is titled “I’m Christian, unless you’re gay” and in it, the dad struggles to put into words the wrongness of righteousness. That is, how people of various religious beliefs use their faiths in order to be hateful, especially the case of Christians hating on gay people. The thing is, the central tenet of most of these religions say “Love others.” Why is then that we feel the need to shun people, to ridicule people, to persecute people, or even to kill people simply because they do not share our beliefs?

Predictably, this single dad’s essay provoked a lot of responses. Some are hateful, written by people who just refuse to get it, and quite a lot more stories that are positive and quite moving. There’s this daughter who got reunited with her family for Thanksgiving. There’s another woman-in-rehab whose family visited her after refusing contact for three years. And then there’s this mother who reined in her homophobia and started accepting—loving—her gay son.

The world would be a much better place if we only learned to be more loving rather than hating of other people.

Washington passes same-sex bill into law!

Right at the heels of the very good news in California, on February 13, the state of Washington has just signed into law a measure granting and recognizing same-sex marriage in the northwest Pacific state (that newly-colored dark blue spot in the upper-left corner of the map above). Assuming the new law hurdles an initiative and a referendum pushed by gay-marriage opponents against it later this year, Washington will join six other states in the U.S. (Iowa, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, and New York) and Washington, D.C. in celebrating same-sex marriage when the law comes into effect on June 7 later this year.

Way to go Washington! And just in time for Valentine’s Day! But the road to equality is still long as seen by the number of red states shown in the map above where same-sex marriage is constitutionally banned. But I agree with what Sen. Ed Murray, a Democrat from Seattle has to say: “No matter what the future holds, nothing will take this moment in history away from us.”

The overturning of California’s Proposition 8 affirmed!

Over 3 years ago, voters in the U.S. State of California narrowly passed Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. The amendment had added the following clause to their state’s constitution: “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.” I had expressed my dismay back then.

Proposition 8 was of course challenged, and after being upheld in May 2010 by the California Supreme Court, U.S. Federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker overturned it in August 2010. This was then appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals.

The latest development happened on February 7, 2012, when the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the overturning of Prop 8. In a 2-1 decision, the judges of the Ninth Circuit said:

“Proposition 8 serves no purpose, and has no effect, other than to lessen the status and dignity of gays and lesbians in California, and to officially reclassify their relationships and families as inferior to those of opposite-sex couples.”

“The People may not employ the initiative power to single out a disfavored group for unequal treatment and strip them, without a legitimate justification, of a right as important as the right to marry.”

What a great piece of news! And this comes after New York passed a same-sex bill last year. Unfortunately, a stay against full repeal of the amendment still continues pending appeals to either the full Ninth District Court or the U.S. Supreme Court and that means that California still cannot issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Nevertheless, the fact that U.S. federal judges struck down Prop 8 is still good news. And just in time for Valentine’s Day!

Next Fall: well worth seeing

Thanks to Migs’ blog post, I learned that Repertory Philippines is staging an interesting play named Next Fall at OnStage in Greenbelt 1. The play, which runs until February 5, is about these two gay men living in New York City who are in a 5-year relationship. What’s interesting about the plot is that the two men have differing opinions on religion: Luke is a young devout Christian who prays after sex and whose family doesn’t know that he is gay, while Adam is a middle-aged atheist who struggles with various mid-life problems. As expected, these two people’s differing outlooks in life is cause for one of the play’s main tensions.

I’m admittedly not a theater-going person not because I don’t like them but because watching plays is an expensive pastime. But if I were presented with the occasional but really interesting play, I’d consider seeing it. And Next Fall definitely fits the bill. It’s not often that a play is staged locally that tackles gay themes and is not an all-out comedy like Zsazsa Zaturnnah or Care Divas. So as soon as I read Migs’ article, I resolved to go and see it dragging a friend along as well. (The fact that Bart Guingona portrays one half of the gay couple was also instrumental in my decision. Hehehe.)

So how was it? While my friend and I agreed that the ending seemed a bit too abrupt, I thought that the play as a whole is well worth watching. I was particularly impressed by the set and technical details—who knew that a simple hospital waiting room table could also function as a living room coffee table, a park bench, and a prayer room pew? I also really liked the roll-on-roll-off apartment foyer.

As for the acting, it was superb! The small cast of 6 were all very good and their portrayals made it really easy to relate and empathize with their characters. Michael Faustmann, who plays Luke’s homophobic father Butch, was especially excellent.

I also loved the script and dialogue. Many of the lines were very witty and it all felt very natural. A few scenes also had me laughing like the one funny-because-it’s-awkward moment when Butch meets Adam for the first time.

As for the play’s story and themes, it was all quite relatable. I’m a practicing Catholic and just like Migs and CC (who wrote a favorable review of the play), I’ve also gone through the struggles of trying to reconcile what I know and experienced in my homosexual side with my Catholic upbringing. While I won’t discuss my personal stance regarding religion (maybe a topic for a future blog post?), I will just have to say that I consider myself more spiritual rather than religious.

That said, I felt that the religion aspect was a weak point of the play, at least with respect to the generally Catholic Filipino audience. The Christianity portrayed in Next Fall was decidedly of the American Protestant flavor making it hard for Filipino Catholics to comprehend. Among the concepts mentioned were the Rapture (something unknown to many Catholics) and sola fide (“by faith alone”) where to be saved you just have to believe in Jesus’ saving power instead of the faith-together-with-good-works that Catholics espouse. The latter concept was the reason why Luke justified his “sinful” gay lifestyle when Adam questioned him about it.

(Apologies for the religion tangent. )

Going back to the play, I highly recommend that you watch it if you can. While it’s no Phantom of the Opera, it is quite fun to watch yet tackles the serious stuff. It’s definitely time better spent than watching yet another crappy local gay indie film.

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Next Fall is produced by Repertory Philippines and runs until February 5 at OnStage, Greenbelt 1. You can buy tickets at Ticketworld. ABS-CBN News also has a review of the play if you’re interested.

Not yet, but hopefully in the future...

Here is a beautifully awesome hoped-to-be TV commercial in Australia to brighten up your day.

Thanks to Mugen for sharing this one.

2011: A milestone

2011 is a personally significant year for me: it is the year that people I have personally known have died of AIDS.

In previous years, HIV/AIDS was a seemingly distant, though important, issue. Yes, I’ve been following several local blogs written by PLHIV or people living with HIV. Yes, I’ve been blogging about HIV/AIDS for quite sometime now. (In fact, this blog’s very first article had AIDS as one of its topics.) Yes, I’ve even written a couple of posts to mark December 1, or World AIDS Day. But it was only relatively recently that this issue has hit this close to home.

30 years after AIDS was first discovered, the effect of the growing incidence of HIV and AIDS among the local LGBT community is increasing in alarming amounts. What really bothers me is that I have this feeling that what’s happening now is similar to what happened in the United States back in the early 80s. You know that feeling of dread and fear? The feeling of hearing people, a friend, or a friend of a friend, dying of diseases that healthy people would have just sneezed at? The feeling of rising urgency brought on by alarming statistics? This should not be happening because of the benefit of retrospect and of lessons learned by lots of other people the hard way. Yet here we are.

I hope that all of the projects are making their mark and that more people are getting educated. I hope that the recent spike is just because more people are getting tested and that the numbers would stabilize soon. I hope that antiretroviral drugs would continue to be freely available to PLHIV. And I fervently hope that our biggest enemy, stigma—the one thing that really dampens our efforts to fight HIV/AIDS—would decline and never again rear its ugly head.

What’s your number?

Have you watched What’s Your Number?, a romantic comedy film starring Anna Faris and Chris Evans (who was as hot as ever in the movie)? The movie is about this girl named Ally (Faris) who read a magazine article that women have an average of 10 sexual partners, and that those who have had 20 or more were unlikely to get married. Ally then panicked when she realized that she has already had 19 partners (that inadvertently became 20) and when she saw how one of her exes had become quite the dashing (but taken) man, she decided to look up her exes—with the help of her womanizing neighbor Colin (Evans)—to see who deserves a second chance (just so she doesn’t go over 20). Of course, romantic comedies being what they are, Ally predictably ends up with Colin.

While the movie is a good watch (and Chris Evans is one big reason why), I was more intrigued with the idea of keeping a tally of the number of sexual partners one has ever had. (But not because we PLU guys want to get married.) Well, I’m the type of person who likes to keep track of things (as if it wasn’t obvious from my blog), but sad to say, I already lost count years ago. One general problem is that it’s hard to define what exactly constitutes a sexual partnership. Does it have to involve penetration (either orally or down there)? Does it have to involve an ejaculation? What if you just kissed and jerked each other off in the back seat of a car but nobody came to orgasm? What if you had a threesome or participated in an O party—do you count all or some of the guys?

Chris Evans’ character in the movie jokingly said that his number was probably around 200. Well, if I was to give a ballpark figure for mine, I would have say that it’s around 250, using a very loose definition of a “sexual encounter,” one which involves some non-trivial contact in the groin area. Between the encounters I have had in the gym, spas, and bathhouses (especially if you have a quota), and SEBs, chance encounters, and one night stands with guys met at gay clubs, I would have to say that 250 is my number.

I’m personally a bit shocked by that figure. But if I were to be honest with myself (and with you readers), it’s a reasonable estimate given that I have been sexually active for more than a decade already and pretty much single for most of those years. So that comes to around once every two weeks. (Hmmm, compare with Tristan’s goal of 30 boys in 30 days. Hehehe.) I would guess that my number is higher than the average Filipino gay guy’s and I probably deserve to be labeled “promiscuous.” Fortunately, I’ve been quite lucky and safe in my encounters and I intend for it to remain that way.

Speaking of promiscuity, people generally think that gay men are more promiscuous than straight men. I believe that to be true. Well, gay men are as equally horny as straight men, but because there is no risk of pregnancy and because gay men don’t have to contend with hard-to-get women, we guys generally have more of it. (The 70s was a particularly hedonistic era in gay America.) The problem is, unwanted pregnancy is not the only problem and gay sex became an unfortunate medium for the early worldwide transmission of AIDS. (AIDS was originally called GRID: gay-related immune deficiency.) The dreaded disease thus became an instrument for the increase of stigma against people like us.

Promiscuous or not, and whether you have only had one sexual encounter or one hundred, keeping it safe is a must for everyone. Wear protection and get yourself tested. There are a lot of support groups such as The Love Yourself Project to help you get over your fears. All right?

So, what’s your number?

On Zachary Quinto and gay bullying

So the big LGBT news this week is that actor Zachary Quinto (aka Sylar of Heroes and Spock in the Star Trek remake) nonchalantly came out as a gay man during an interview with New York magazine. I once blogged about his on-screen make-out session over two years ago, and who would’ve thought that Zach would admit to actually being gay? Zach being one of us seems pretty funny in the light of the popular bromance between Spock and Kirk in Star Trek and which spawned an entire subgenre of fan fiction called slash fiction. And that now makes 2 prominent actors in the Star Trek universe who are gay (the first one is George Takei who played Hikaru Sulu in the original series).

Slash fiction aside, the reason Zachary came out as he stated in his blog was because a 14-year old kid from New York named Jamey Rodemeyer committed suicide last month after experiencing relentless gay bullying from his peers. His death was actually even more tragic since Jamey himself posted his own It Gets Better Project video on YouTube a few months prior to his death. It seems that an online project that was started precisely to help inspire and to prevent young men and women from committing suicide because of gay bullying was not enough to help Jamey. Unfortunately, it didn’t get better for this poor kid.

This just highlights the fact that the LGBT community still has a lot of problems. Things are definitely better than now than it was 10 years ago, but we still have a long way to go especially here in the Philippines where we are still facing discrimination, and battling our HIV epidemic and its associated stigma.