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WORKING GAYS
SAY NO TO ERAP
PRESS STATEMENT by Progay
Philippines
8 March 2000
The Progressive Organization of Gays in the Philippines (Progay) join women the world over in militant struggle on the occasion of International Women's Day.
We working class gays and other basic sectors in the gay and lesbian community
relive the original ideals of the women's movement for the total liberation
of humanity led by the exploited classes of the world against exploitation and
oppression - as first expressed by the angry women
workers of New York in 1857 in protest of the inhumane
working conditions.
The decrepit workplace and housing conditions that pushed women to the streets
143 years ago in protest remain very true today. The massive unemployment, depressed
wages, economic exploitation, sexual abuse and cruel living conditions prevalent
during the early days of capitalist
development in the West are as vividly true today in the Philippines and other
Third World nations.
Instead of equality before law and liberation from fruitless toil, the vast majority of people suffer from the hegemony of monopoly capitalist expansion by imperialist rulers and their client fascist regimes.
In nations exploited by imperialist and feudal monopolies, the people who suffer most from this unfair and unjust setup are women, ethnic minorities, gays and children, both in the backward countryside and in the decaying cities.
As the crisis of monopoly capitalism heightens competition between and among nations and corporations, millions are put out of factory jobs and pushed to labor export, prostitution and the informal sector; states are restructured to cancel social services and to sell health and education to the poor for profit; farmlands are being grabbed from tillers and re-used for export crops, mining and commerce; and military and police states are being strengthened to suppress the rising social unrest from this unravelling disorder.
Working class gays in the Philippines share specific characteristics of the
rotten society's oppression of Filipino women. As traditional discrimination
and homophobia evict effeminate gays from formal employment, poor gay men who
subsist on informal jobs see their incomes fall at the
slightest signs of crisis. The only alternatives many gay men find to bridge
the income gap are prostitution, labor export market and anti-social means such
as trafficking contraband. In this way thousands of gay men land in jails here
and abroad uncared for and left to their own devices.
Unable to afford rising rents, gays try to put up own-account shops for garments and cosmetology in urban poor hovels, but these are wiped out in the most massive campaign of demolition and eviction by the present administration.
Gay students find it increasingly difficult to stay in schools as rising tuition fees and huge budget cuts by Congress of the education budget force them to find work instead. School administrations are working to close down student papers and militant organizations and to prevent gay associations from functioning.
The US-Estrada regime's rising tyranny is victimizing women, gays and other sectors of society in the most barbaric fashion comparable to imperialist-backed puppet regimes in Turkey, Peru and Western Africa. Partly to sweeten the crushing effects of liberalization, privatization and deregulation policies to the poor, Congress is passing tokenistic magna carta bills purportedly to favor women and gays.
Bills for gay rights for example, supposedly outlawing discrimination, are
amusing diversions to show to the world the regime's façade of democracy
and to divert the people's anger to the evil initiatives in Congress, notably
Concord-Charter Change, Retail Trade Liberalization Act, the Energy Reform Bill
and the Omnibus Amendments to the Labor Code. The gay and lesbian rights bill
in Congress has been exploited by other factions of the ruling classes to demonize
homosexuals and as a campaign platform of politicians of the Religious Right
for the elections in
year 2001.
In this context, we disown the US-Estrada regime and its comprehensive program
of repression and deception. His continued rule will only intensify the control
of monopoly capital and comprador-landlords over the country. His attempts to
rig the legal processes and militarize the
cities and countryside in an undeclared martial law expose his naked desire
to maintain himself and his drunkard legions in power. We join the women and
other sectors in society in calling his resignation. We say no to Estrada, no
to macho fascist rule, no to cronyism, no to globalization.
We in Progay will continue working with genuine militant organizations in promoting not only gay rights in action, but more so, the people's basic rights to land, jobs, food, housing, education and social services. ###
