taxonomy



“Mahirap ba maging bakla?” I asked. It was a harmless question but it cut through her anyway. Her. What a strange pronoun to use. It’s not one I would like to use but JR, who now goes by the name of June, insists on it.

“It depends. Alam mo naman, maraming klase ng bading.” The others looked at her as though she just told us the world was square and not round. “Maraming marami! Kasing dami ng kulay sa pinaka-malaking box ng Crayola! And together, we all form a magical rainbow.”

“Typical,” I thought to myself. “Lacing truth with humor so it doesn’t seem so blunt.”

“Di niyo ba alam yun? Maraming klase ng bading.” June began. “May bading na parlorista, may bading na effem. ‘Yan yung typical na maingay, walang time kung makapag-pulbo at minsan nagda-damit babae. ‘Yung parating naka-pambabae, draggar. Merong nagpapaka-lalake na walang tigil mag-gym. ‘Yun yung tipong nambabarurot sa kama! Merong mataba. May specific market naman ‘yan. Merong payat. May matanda. May bata. Siguro depende yan sa klase ng kabaklaan mo. Sa Pilipinas, mas madali maging bakla kung pa-discreet ka. Straight acting daw eh nakakabahing naman ang pagka-paminta nila.”

“How ironic,” a friend chimed in. I was grateful she broke the silence. Our more conservative friends were still in shock.

“Bakit naman?”

“For a lifestyle born out of diversity and known for open-mindedness, you people sure do engage in a lot of stereotypes.”

Photo Credit: La mala educación

Garbage
Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go!)
beautifulgarbage

62 comments

  1. I have always thought it so curious for my grandmother to feel so uncomfortable using "she" and "her" with transgenders when in our native language there is no distinction and she can't get it right in English under other circumstances half the time anyway.

    I don't see the enumerating of many of the different recognized categories of bading to be inconsistent or contradictory to a state of open-mindedness or of diversity. In order for their to be diversity, there must be a discrimination between different things, otherwise it wouldn't be diversity. Just one big chaosmotic monad -- the big infantile fantasy of the CBCP. In order to recognize the illusory nature of reality, we must first recognize reality.

    ReplyDelete
  2. picking the mind of a trannie is something i want to do. Never met one. I want to hear first hand their opinion of straight acting gay people. hmmmm.

    ReplyDelete
  3. pukiloo.... pampressure ang crayola ng balor mo.... balentayms na balentayms na....

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have high respects for the tranny and parlorista at work. They seem less intimidating and snooty than the likes of me.

    ReplyDelete
  5. @LOF ~ kinda like how you need to accept the reality of evil to be able to do good?

    your grandmother must be actively using the female pronoun. i'm guessing she really pays attention to these things. the fact that Filipino has no gender-specific pronouns drives me crazy. i have trainees who get confused with the pronoun and antecedent.

    as for not seeing the contradiction, my apologies. the original conversation was more vulgar than this. i couldn't really write it down verbatim. it seemed (to me, at least) that while the whole thing was very entertaining, june had some pre-conceived notions with each gay guy type. that's why i took a mental picture of the conversation.

    @engel ~ you'll meet all sorts in this industry. i noticed there are a lot in directory assistance. haha i wonder why.

    as for their opinion on straight acting gay people, i wouldn't really know. june says they make her sneeze. :D

    @yj ~ aba shempre! pang balentayms hehe

    @galen ~ true. once they take you in, they'll take care of you as long as you don't cross them. some of my best gay friends are trannies.

    @angelo ~ itech ay chismes. hehe kumbaga sa twitter, OH.

    @erik ~ c:

    ReplyDelete
  6. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  7. actively using the male pronoun! with bakla its the only time she gets it "right" in her mind. maybe that observation can help you with your unhelpables.

    ReplyDelete
  8. well in my profession, no one is ever unhelpable. haha but i get what you mean. maybe i need to analyze the cause to understand the effect.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Sino si ate? Pangalanan nang mapangarangalan!

    ReplyDelete
  10. one has to admit: our world is not a boring world.

    ReplyDelete
  11. @vic ~ kwento ko sayo pag nagkita tayo. haha hayaan mo, papangaralan ko siya for you.

    san pala yung stress nung word na yun? diba it can mean bigyan ng award or iberate?

    @geek ~ but of course. what are we if not colorful?

    ReplyDelete
  12. "For a lifestyle born out of diversity and known for open-mindedness, you people sure do engage in a lot of stereotypes."

    - It's funny (laughable, actually) because it is true.

    ReplyDelete
  13. i'm still confused sa post. hehe.

    but just to react on the last sentence, hehehe. :) that truth sure does amuse me. :)

    ReplyDelete
  14. i heart this.

    pero ang truthfulness eh some people will not just get it ... yun lang ..

    anyway .. i'm looking forward to our coffee contingent .. hehehhe

    ReplyDelete
  15. you cannot tell a person how to live their lives or how to see themselves.
    they have the right to be who they want to be.
    i am sometime pamin, sometimes pagurl, sometimes totally out of this world

    i have parlorista, pamin, and transgender friends. a transgender friend of mine, sass sassot, was even invited to speak by the u.n.

    they are proud of who they are and coexist beautifully.

    just because some people in the gay community are narrow minded and tend to judge by labels, doesnt mean you can stereotype the gay community as a people at war amongst themselves.

    are there not different types of heterosexuals as well?




    hindi mahirap maging bading. mahirap lang maka kilala ng mga taong makikitid ang utak.
    im happy. peaceful. enlightened.

    i have learned to accept the people i love for who they truly are.
    and i know well enough not to judge those who are not a vibrational match to my being.
    do not judge or stereotype people just because you don't understand.
    let them be.

    ReplyDelete
  16. mahirap na masarap. makulay at makulimlim. masaya kahit madrama. basta, kakaiba! :)

    ReplyDelete
  17. Ang cute naman ni ate. They all form into a magical rainbow!! I'd love to see that. Haha. Infernes lang. :))

    ReplyDelete
  18. how ironic indeed. tagos na tagos ang comment ni friend :)

    ReplyDelete
  19. @mak ~ and when the laughter dies down, that's when the real trouble begins.

    @angelo ~ it's just that because it's in our nature to classify, a lifestyle that should embrace everybody starts to judge and act out on each other. all u need to do is go to any gay forum and you'll see people who are anti-effem anti-this or anti-that. it's just a little funny.

    @bernadette ~ i hope one day all tribes will be united. haha hope lang naman.

    yup! let's coffee soon! :D

    @paulo ~ wow. thanks for visiting. hmm.. where do we begin?

    yes, it's a free country and just as free as i am to write down my thoughts here, you're free to agree or disagree too.

    if you're the paulo i think you are then yes, you are a perfect example of how hard it is to classify people. this post was simply about how hard we try to put people in labels and boxes. i don't really like that.

    i didn't really mean any harm by posting the judgments you read in this post. it was just something i found interesting and truth is, it sucks to be classified like that. at the end of the day, i just wanted to remark on how odd it is that a taxonomy exists in subcultures.

    i completely agree. napakaraming tao na makitid ang utak but this is the world we live in and i guess we just have to find a way to happily co-exist.

    it's good that you accept everyone for who they are. i hope i didn't offend you with this post. i would like to see your page. i wish to read more thoughts like the one you left on your comment.

    @aris ~ amen! :D

    @pau ~ sige pakilala ko kayo. hehe

    @lee ~ nagulat nga ako sa katapangan nya. buti di na-offend yung friend namin.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Nyl: perhaps paulo misses the irony that in order to be able to perceive someone for "who they really are", one must make a number of judgments about what that is, in order to accept "who they really are"...

    ReplyDelete
  21. but sterotyping works and keeps the society operational hehe

    ReplyDelete
  22. @nyl hello. nakita ko kasi yung comment mo sa blog about jujiin's exhibit. i thought i'd visit. hindi naman ako galit o na offend haha. wala lang ako magawa. namimiss ko na kayooooo. si almi i ran into him once sa shang. i miss high school. im so fucking old.

    @line of light there is no irony in accepting someone for who they are, for there is no judgement from my part, for when you let go of the ego, the "education", the brainwashing, the conditioning, the virtual wall we were taught to build around all of us, how we "should" think, how we "should" be, what we "should" believe in... once you learn HOW TO BE... there is no irony. believe me, once you see things from an ego-free perspective, once you learn to be FREE, you will learn to accept life for what it is. beautiful. love. fair. magnificent.

    and you will learn that those who do not agree with your vibration do not necessarily need to be "judged", but you will actually learn to ALLOW them to be who THEY ARE.

    judgement is no longer in my vocabulary. i have evolved past that. so, no, im not missing the irony here.

    i am merely HAPPY.

    or perhaps the fact that i accept people for who they are but work in fashion is the real irony here?

    hahahahaha

    eyelovette.

    ReplyDelete
  23. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  24. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  25. DIVERSITY

    There is such a tendency to say, "Well, I would do it this way, and if you don't do it the way I do it, then there's something wrong with one or the other of us." And that isn't true at all. You are just approaching things in different ways, all working. Whether it seems like it or not, you are all working toward the same ultimate goal of joy.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Paulo: i do not dispute that narrow-minded is a problem of inappropriate or "broken" judgment. however, perception and intelligibilty presuppose judgment and discrimination. otherwise, there would be no differentiation and nothing would be intelligible or perceptible making it impossible to "accept" someone or something since there would be no judgment available to determine that there existed someone or something in need of "acceptance".

    ReplyDelete
  27. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  28. i smile.

    i look at my boyfriend, our dogs, then outside our window.

    i think of my friends, my life, what i have and what i am.

    i love, and i do not judge.
    i do not make excuses. i do not try to explain.
    words cannot explain what it is to love, to accept.
    to be.

    i look outside our window.

    what a beautiful, judgement-free day.
    i am lucky.

    i smile.

    ReplyDelete
  29. @lof ~ exactly. to understand differences, we need to embrace them.

    @dave ~ and while the process hurts sometimes, it is still very essential to the community.

    @paulo ~ sabi ko na eh. hehe thanks for visiting. we all want to live in a world without judgement or fear but sadly, this is the reality we live in and it's up to us to ensure that our lives are as free from hatred and judgement as possible.

    @lof (comment 2) ~ perhaps it's because we're strong realists that's why we're often misunderstood. haha

    ReplyDelete
  30. @Nyl: i think paulo and i agree, i just think he's skipping two important steps which logically end up undercutting his own argument... because true love is founded on seeing things as they really are (and as I mentioned, perception and intelligibilty presuppose judgment)... the epistemological foundations of reality is indeed a tar baby...

    ReplyDelete
  31. because it takes real love to see a person's brokenness and not want to leave.

    ReplyDelete
  32. it takes real love to see what is ours and what is not ours, what is theirs and what is not theirs... and then to accept it all... a lifetime struggle...

    ReplyDelete
  33. i agree, we all belong into the same hard drive but we are so fond of partitioning it to this and that.

    i think stereotyping is not exclusive for a certain group of people. i guess it's human nature for man to classify things and box them up according to his preference.

    ReplyDelete
  34. "I could not believe that such a body was for free"

    miss this song... madownload nga hehe...

    ReplyDelete
  35. ' whoaa that last line was an eye opener.. come to think of it, we all suffer from stereotyping in any form irregardless of sexual orientation.. it just so happens nah dahil nga lifestyle nila at explosive and outstanding creativity, napaka-ironic nga naman..

    ReplyDelete
  36. @max ~ that's a beautiful metaphor. why didn't i think about that? grrr.. hehe

    yes, it's part of human nature to want to classify and stuff. we even have a whole study devoted to it. it just sucks when it's our turn to be classified.

    @glentot ~ i love this song too! a lot of people thought beautifulgarbage lived up to its name- garbage but i really liked it. i was actually thinking of androgyny for this post but in the end, my love for cherry lips prevailed.

    @thelastjedi ~ thanks for visiting my blog! :D welcome. :D

    irony is a funny thing. it makes you feel smart when you see it but when it happens to you, it kinda sucks. (no pun intended lols)

    ReplyDelete
  37. it only sucks if you are embarrassed by your own humanness..

    ReplyDelete
  38. i didn't see ur last comment. my apologies.

    i like what you said. ma-twitter nga. hehe

    and yeah, i am a little embarassed. not because of my humanness but by how easily i can be classified. i wonder how it feels to break the mold.

    ReplyDelete
  39. haha @ magical rainbow. :) the world will indeed be black blue and gray if not for the gaylaloos!

    ReplyDelete
  40. how odd. i'm in black, blue and grey ngayon. haha

    psst..penge tickets sa kris allen. haha

    ReplyDelete
  41. aliw ako sa mga comments. ^^ we should shatter those labels. nasabi na nila lahat ng gusto kong sabihin.

    pala, nagugulo ung feed mo sa inbox ko. naglipat ka pala ng add. hopefully naayos ko na. ^^

    love, kisses and such! ^^

    ReplyDelete
  42. hmm... i will have to think about that...

    ReplyDelete
  43. @toxic ~ oo nga eh. balak ko sana mag-announce ulit sa old url kaso baka masyado namang papansin. buti nakabalik ka. :D

    @lof ~ who wants to be classified, ryt?

    ReplyDelete
  44. i am thinking about the requirement that for something external to effect us, we must, on some level consent to it or it must resonate with us internally... so my question to myself is: how is the problem of "being classified" an internal problem?

    ReplyDelete
  45. basta may isang salita at lalaki kausap maski baklang bakla pa, nirerespeto ko yan

    ReplyDelete
  46. @LOF ~ i think it is. it's all a question of your attitude. if u don't mind being easily classified, it shouldn't be a problem.

    @cio ~ maganda yan. respect shows a lot of maturity.

    ReplyDelete
  47. I think it depends on where you're from. Here in the Philippines, it's not as hard as say, in the Middle East where homosexuality is considered taboo. :)

    ReplyDelete
  48. true true. now those people have a problem. :D

    ReplyDelete
  49. I still think its an internal problem fundamentally, especially if its taboo.

    ReplyDelete
  50. internal like inside a person's brain or within a group or organization?

    ReplyDelete
  51. internal to the person's soul/mind/heart....

    ReplyDelete
  52. if we say that judgement is a constant and that there is nothing we can do about it then taxonomy becomes an internal problem. i agree now. hehe

    ReplyDelete
  53. hmm. is it easy na maging anu ka?
    hehe ;)

    epal lang

    ReplyDelete
  54. judgment is a constant insofar as it is the basis for an experience of the universe. taxonomy, as the practice of classification, is a way to put different values on those judgments (this is what Paulo had a problem with, but conflated it with judgment in general). therefore, classifying is always first an internal matter -- in experience. i can't speak to the final cause, that's a mystery of nature.

    ReplyDelete
  55. @careforyou ~ i think everyone here's pretty at peace with their identities. no harm. :D

    @LOF ~ where would we be without these mysteries anyway? hehe very well said, lance.

    ReplyDelete
  56. super malapit ako sa mga gay friends ko...
    and yes!
    iba-iba sila...
    love the part na inahalintulad sa box ng crayons!

    MAKULAY!!!

    :P

    ReplyDelete
  57. maihahantulad ang mga bading sa sinabawang gulay. nakakakulay ng buhay! haha

    ReplyDelete
  58. oo mahirap maging bading!LOL

    taray nun a "we all form a magical rainbow" haha

    ReplyDelete
  59. haha i think she just wanted to cover up yung harshness nung sasabihin nya. hehe

    ReplyDelete
  60. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  61. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment