TRYING to read the President’s mind – Cubao to Buendia on EDSA in five minutes, for example – is a slippery slope. The latest outburst, “Gusto ko happy siya!” – referring to every gender known to man and woman – was Digong’s way of calling the SOGIE bill a redundancy as there’s already an anti-discrimination law.
Which simply matches the mindset of “Mader” Ricky Reyes. In swardspeak, he’s saying it takes a bakla to understand another bakla; not even their parents know how. “Let it be,” he said of SOGIE. No matter how you mix the ingredients in your bun, “hamburger bakla pa rin.” He’s not making mincemeat of LGBTQIA+ issues, he’s teaching them to be comfortable in their own skins. Don’t wear a dress to call attention but to command respect.
“Even after surgery, a transgender woman continues to think with the brain of a man. But if you’re feminine through and through, you’re free to use the ladies’ room, what’s the problem? We have our own bars, our gay community,” said Mader, by his admission a true mama’s boy.
With his partner for life, Ricky has spent the last 40 years as a proud and loving parent of two adopted daughters who are honor students, as a celebrity entrepreneur operating a chain of beauty salons, as a philanthropist looking after more than a thousand cancer-stricken children. Indeed, he is vain about his beauty, never hiding the fact that “life is too short not to look your best and as young as your skin can take it.” Would that those trolling him followed his advice to become half the happy, successful gay that he is.
When Arnel Ignacio announced recently, “I am gay,” why did the room erupt in glee? “But I don’t want to be a girl.” An important point.
Arnel argues, “SOGIE is not an issue requiring national discussion.” Instead he asks, “Did Gretchen, the trannie who was denied entry into the ladies’ room in a Cubao mall, get a chance to take a leak?” Poor Gretchen, she spent more than 24 hours being moved from c.r. to security office to police station and no one bothered to ask which toilet she was finally allowed to use, and at what time.
