[Pink Scene] Metro Manila Pride Queer Arts Festival: Queerception

Metro Manila Pride, Fringe Manila, Pineapple Lab and FEIST Magazine present Queerception: A Multi-Arts Festival Within a Multi-Arts Festival. The festival will feature 18 visual artists, 7 films, 4 musical performances, 5 spoken word artists as a celebration of the artistic abilities of the local queer and trans community.

Within the festival is also Once More With Feelings, which is a showcase of more LGBTQIA artists and a fundraising activity for the Metro Manila Pride March. So yes - two festivals in one! Suggested donation is PHP 250.00.

If you're interested, Queerception takes place on February 13, 2016 starting at 07:00pm at the Pineapple Lab in Makati.

[Pink Scene] QC LGBT Pride March 2015

This year's QC LGBT Pride March will be this Saturday, December 5, 2015. Registration starts at 02:00pm at Tomas Morato corner Don Roces Avenue.

In addition, this year's street party after the march itself will be handled by Jungle Circuit Party. The street party will not charge entrance and features several DJs including DJ Brian Cua, Billboard # 1 remixer DJ Toy Armada, DJ Poi, Brazilian DJ Romeo Cavalcante and International Circuit DJ Jay Santos!

[Pink Scene] Metro Manila Pride March 2015 - Fight For Love

After years of me writing about how the Metro Manila Pride March is traditionally held on the first Saturday of December after a decision to move things, it seems that this year the Metro Manila Pride March has moved back to the older traditional date of the last weekend of June.

There's been no announcement regarding the final location of the event, which is a little unnerving with the even just about two weeks away. But then again in 2013 the same organizing group (more or less) managed to put something together under a much tighter deadline.

So for now, save the date and look forward to a Metro Manila Pride March in June! They already have a strong theme with #FightForLove and we'll just leave the location as TBD.

[Pink Scene] Call to March for LGBT Pride!

Tomorrow is the first of December, and that means it's time for the annual Metro Manila LGBTQ Pride March. But this year there are actually two Pride Marches - one organized by Task Force Pride (TFP) in Malate and another organized by the Quezon City Pride Council and naturally in Quezon City. And while some have started to ask why there have to be two marches as if this was somehow a bad thing, I'd like to stress that this isn't bad at all.

In other countries we see different LGBTQ Pride festivals and marches hosted in different cities - not just states or political territories like NCR / Metro Manila but in actual cities. It's a great sign of support for the LGBTQ community and a good venue for getting more support for our fight for equal rights and full recognition in the eyes of the law.

For TFP, this marks the 20th year of LGBTQ Pride Marches in Metro Manila. The Metro Manila Pride march is the oldest LGBTQ Pride March in Asia and that's a lot to be thankful for indeed. We still have a long way to go in terms of national recognition and advancing any national legislation to protect the rights of the pink community, but that doesn't mean we should stop fighting.

For Quezon City this is the first LGBTQ Pride March to be officially hosted by the. Given the many moves by the city to support the LGBTQ community including a rather sweeping anti-discrimination city ordinance, there's a lot to be said about Quezon City as being a pro-LGBT city. And these efforts definitely deserve some support.

So whether you march in Malate on December 6 or you march in Quezon City on December 13 or both - stand up and be recognized! Show support for LGBTQ Rights! Whether you're a member of the community or a straight ally who wants to show support for your LGBTQ friends, then be sure to join at least one of the Pride Marches this year.

[Pink News] Quezon City Comes Out to Support the LGBT Community

So I've been pretty stoked about the fact that the Quezon City's City Council has pretty much passed an Anti-Discrimination Ordinance meant to protect members of the LGBT community. Extending beyond the context of the workplace, the Gender Fair City Ordinance is a pretty comprehensive city ordinance that offers a variety of ways to extend greater protections for LGBTs along with accompanying programs to educate people about the SOGIE concepts. It's a lot to tackle all at once, but for the most part it sounds pretty good.

But beyond the ordinance itself, which has largely been associated with members of the Council alone, it was nice to have Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista release comments not just in support of the ordinance, but also in support of same-sex marriage and greater LGBT rights. He's one of the few (if not the only) city mayor who has come out in support of LGBT rights in such a clear and definitive manner. In addition, these statements come backed by action in the form of the ordinance and the fact that the QC LGBT Pride March is actually one of the many events listed as part of Quezon City's 75th anniversary.

Under Mayor Herbert Bautista, Quezon City has suddenly become the only city government to publicly support LGBT rights. And if they keep this up, I totally see this as a serious effort by the city as a whole to make members of the LGBT community feel truly welcome and safe. And now I have even more reasons to be happy to be living in Quezon City. And I can see this as a key reason for more folks to find a home here - something that we've never really had up until this point. In the US they run annual lists for the top ten best cities for LGBT individuals but thus far we haven't really had any options around here.

And all the more I want to support the QC LGBT Pride March this year. Beyond the formation of the QC Pride Council last year and the city council wins now, there's certainly a lot to celebrate.

[Pink Scene] Metro Manila Pride 2014 Teaser

So the image above has started to make the social media rounds, which we can consider to be our first teaser for this year's LGBT Pride festivities. Interestingly enough, this was posted by a new page - Metro Manila Pride, which is different from last year's Metro Manila Pride March page. The dropping of the "march" seems pretty distinct and implies that our organizers want to do more than just put up a parade on December 6. But being familiar with how this annual event comes together, it seems clear that they're still trying to select a venue.

To be fair, the Metro Manila LGBT Pride March for 2012 actually featured a modest little bazaar featuring LGBT and LGBT-friendly businesses and was sort of the first steps towards getting out of the "just" a march model. Or you could go all the way back to when the Pride March was around the same time as the White Parties in June and thus they all felt like one integrated event.

Given how last year the LGBT Pride related announcements were a bit dizzying since it was on at QC, cancelled at QC and then revived at Malate. Hopefully things will run a lot smoother this year - whether or not the Pride organizers feel that they're ready to work with Quezon City again.

For now, stay tuned for more social media updates as they come along.

[Pink Scene] Quezon City World Pride Festival Cancelled

I have to admit, I had considered this to be a possibility but I still wasn't quite expecting it. This week the Quezon City Pride Council announced that they're cancelling the Quezon City World Pride Festival 2013 in order to reallocate the funds for the benefit of the victims of Typhoon Yolanda. Of the different events announced to be part of the festival, it seems that at least the InQCity Independent Pride Film Festival will still push through as another fundraiser for the same cause.

With TFP having announced the cancellation of the Metro Manila Pride Celebrations a few weeks ago, this is looking like the first year without any kind of LGBT Pride celebration (perhaps save for the various White Parties and Pride Parties back in June). More importantly, it may be the first year without an LGBT Pride March. And that is truly saddening. As much as I feel for those affected by the typhoon, the march and what it represents in terms of our overall fight for LGBT rights is still an important (and distinctly separate) issue.

There are talks going around of trying to push through with the March somehow outside of Quezon City, but it seems prudent to wait for an actual official announcement about that before reacting. I'd still want to march, most definitely. Let's see what happens over the course of the next two weeks.

[Pink Scene] TFP Cancels 2013 Metro Manila Pride Celebration

This weekend TFP announced that it was cancelling its 2013 Metro Manila Pride Celebrations for undisclosed reasons. As much as I have been critical of the group in recent months (specifically regarding how they handled their initial marketing for this event) and my history as a volunteer for the group, at the end of the day this is sad news. After 18 years of working to promote LGBT pride in Metro Manila through the annual Metro Manila Pride March and other activities, this marks the first year that TFP will not have an event.

In addition, the closing paragraph inviting others to take on the mantle of leadership for the group is a little unsettling and in itself hints at some of the possible reasons that the event is not pushing through. I'll leave it to all of you to discuss among yourselves.

At the very least, we still have the first Quezon City World Pride Festival to look forward to this year. Among Metro Manila cities, this is the first city-aligned Pride event ever and with luck this may become a model for future pride celebrations in other cities in the Philippines. With TFP's future looking a little uncertain, we may have indeed reached that point when city-level interest and awareness is needed to take the fight for LGBT rights to a more direct level in terms of talking to our local government.

What is important is that we always continue to fight for LGBT rights in the Philippines and celebrate the diversity of who we are.

[Pink Scene] Quezon City World Pride Festival 2013

Earlier this year, the Quezon City government announced that it was forming an LGBT Pride Council to "oversee the integration of all city programs and projects for the LGBT community". And while we have a large number of LGBT groups active in the country, there are very few cases when a city government actually takes steps to get involved and it's definitely a big reason I'm glad that I'm a QC resident. 

The Pride Council is led by movie and television director Soxie Topacio and the rest of the group consists of an interesting mix of LGBT advocates and government officials. But of course the real question about this whole initiative is what they're actually going to do to help the Quezon City LGBT community.

Beyond operating a one-stop QC protection center for victims and survivors of gender-based violence and abuse in the city, their first major project for the year is putting together Quezon City's first major pride activity. Called the World Pride Festival, the month-long event promises to be a pretty exciting celebration of the LGBT community and its allies.

[Technicolor Musings] Another Pride March As The Fight Goes On

Last December 8 was the 2012 Metro Manila LGBT Pride March - Sari-Sali: Pride in Action. Tobie and I marched together with the PG4M contingent along with quite a number of other organizations representing various LGBT groups, allies to the LGBT community and a number of companies and LGUs as well. It was quite the memorable event, although naturally I still wished that more people had attended.

Regardless of the opportunities that the march experienced this year, it still remains a key event in the pink calendar and an important reminder to the local community that we're still here and we're still demanding equal rights. Demonstrations like this go a long way towards the overall fight for the LGBT cause in the country and to some extent the world at large.

So for today I'll leave you with this question - How much do you truly value the cause of LGBT rights?

Whether or not you attended the march this year or in years prior or whether or not you vote for LGBT-friendly government officials and party-list groups, have you ever really thought about how much this matters to you. Do you think things are okay as they are? Do you think that the members of the LGBT community do not need access to civil marriage rights and other frequently discussed legal rights concerns? Are you okay with how things are for LGBTs in the Philippines or do you think we need change?

And just what are you prepared to do to help make that change happen?

[Technicolor Musings] Happy LGBT Pride 2012!

Tobie's Journey-inspired T-Shirt Design for Pride 2012

Yesterday was LGBT Pride here in Manila, and it was quite the fun experience. While there were a few hiccups initially, in the end the march itself managed to get underway decently enough.

I still wish that there had been more familiar faces at the march, but you can't win everyone right away. Every year I invest some of my social media time to promote the march and I think I'll continue to add pressure in the years to come to see how many people I can convince to march. It's a good goal to keep in mind for future pride marches.

So major kudos to Task Force Pride 2012! You pulled it off! Congrats!

[Technicolor Musings] Celebrating the Fight Against Intolerance

Every year, December 1 is celebrated as World AIDS Day, an important time to remember the continued fight against the spread of both the virus and the intolerance that naturally comes with it. At least that's the way things are now - with a lot of work and continued effort, we all look forward to the day that we bring the number of new HIV infections to zero and when people stop alienating people who have the virus.

At the same time, December is also a time when Filipinos - at least those in Metro Manila - take time to celebrate LGBT Pride with the annual Metro Manila Pride March.

It's interesting to note how both the fight against AIDS and the fight for LGBT rights have many similarities. Both are things (or perhaps states of being?) that are often met with a certain degree of ridicule and definitely intolerance born of ignorance. Naturally because of its prevalence, there is the inevitably thinking that one follows the other (and which comes first doesn't even matter at times). Too many people think that gay people are worth condemning and thus "deserve" to contact HIV / AIDS. Or some believe that people who have HIV / AIDS did something "wrong" to again somehow "deserve" infection.

But both being gay and living with HIV are not things to be ashamed of nor should these be things that we have to hide. They simply are what they are and until we as a society learn to treat it as such, then we'll never really get to where we need to be in terms of equal rights and true acceptance as a race. Until we can put aside these petty disagreements for those who are different from us, then we'll never mature as a people - or even as a species.

So take this month as a good time to remember the struggles that both these groups of people face every day. Take time to remember that gay pride is more than just a street party and HIV awareness and advocacy is more than taking an HIV test just once in your life. It is about changing the way you think and essentially changing the way we live our lives.

[Pink Scene] Help the 2012 Manila Pride March Happen!

The Metro Manila Pride March is a labor of love when you get down to it. It's put up by volunteers who do their best to keep the LGBT Pride spirit alive and expect nothing in return.

And thus every year, putting up the Pride March is always a worthwhile challenge - and Task Force Pride needs your help! There's a lot of expenses that go into paying for all the permits and renting the necessary equipment to make the Pride March successful.

This year if 1,000 people donated P150 each, you'd be helping us make sure we have lights and a sound system and generator for the program; food for the people who will be performing for free; rent for band equipment for the band members; tokens for our speakers, etc.

Show your support for the LGBT community and our continued fight for equal rights and better representation in government. Any donation that you can contribute will go a long way towards making this year's Pride March a success!

[Technicolor Musings] A Call to March on December 8

This year's Manila Pride March is set for December 8, 2012. The theme for this year is SARI-SALI: Pride in Action, which is focused on try community involvement in the fight for LGBT rights. And when I say community, I'm not just referring to those individuals who identify as LGBT, but also all those who support the community and consider themselves friends for LGBTs.

More than any other event in the yearly LGBT calendar, the annual Pride March is one that I will always consider to be more important than all others. Sure, all those color-themed parties are fun in their own right, but there are those years when I just don't feel like going. But the Pride March is different - and ever since I started marching in 2009, I've always felt like the march is a mandatory activity that I absolutely need to go to.

The Pride March is one of the greatest political statements we as a community can make to remind our government and everyone else in this country that we exist and that we deserve fair and equal treatment in the eyes of the law, I don't care how the march may not seem "fashionable" to you or how "uncool" it may seem. It's the one time of the year when it's more important for you to get involved. Without the full and visible support of the community, we'll never make any true headway with our government. And we're not even talking about the big ticket items like gay marriage. Even just the more basic items of non-discrimination and proper rights due when a partner is hospitalized and such.

If you're still in the closet, then you can still march while wearing a mask. If you don't want to appear on TV, you may be exaggerating things - it's not like every person in the march gets dedicated screen time. The news crews just take a few wide shots of the march as part of it goes by and splices a few clips as background material for the news round-up for the day.

So March with us on December 8. Help remind everyone of the importance and validity of gay rights.

[Pink Scene] SARI-SALI: Pride in Action - The 2012 Metro Manila Pride March

It's official - this years Manila Pride March 2012 will be on December 8, 2012. The theme for this year's event is SARI-SALI: Pride in Action, which is basically a big call to action for more people to join the fight for LGBT rights in all sectors of society.

The Pride March is a most unique experience that I have come to look forward to since I started marching back in 2009 and it's certainly something I'd recommend to all of you whether you're gay, lesbian, closeted or just a friend to the LGBT community.

More details will be forthcoming in the weeks to come, but here's the initial press release from PinoyG4M, who is this year's Secretariat group for Task Force Pride:

The 2012 Metro Manila Pride March is scheduled on December 8, 2012. PinoyG4M was selected as as the Task Force Price secretariat organization handling the Metro Manila Pride March this year.

This year's March theme is "SARI-SALI: Pride in Action" with the following objectives:

1. Get commitment from the city government to protect the rights of LGBTs via an Anti-Discrimination Ordinance (ADO).
2. Get commitment from student organizations to push for LGBT-friendly school policies.
3. Get solidarity statements from members of the private sector calling on the city government to pass an ADO.
4. Get support and affirmation of acceptance from families, friends and allies of LGBTs.
5. Gather support from contingents and individuals for the Ladlad Partylist.

Please visit the Metro Manila Pride March Facebook page or follow PrideMarch_MLA in Twitter to get updates on the Pride March theme, venue and guidelines.

http://www.facebook.com/manilapridemarch
http://twitter.com/PrideMarch_MLA

Other organizations and clans could pre-register by going to: http://bit.ly/PrideMarch2012

[Pink Scene] Pride of the Orient: The 17th Annual Pride March

Today's the day of Pride March 2011! This year's theme of sorts is Pride of the Orient and is the 17th Pride March in the country.

Assembly point is at the Remedios Circle (Malate, Manila) and registration starts at 01:00pm. The march itself begins at 04:00pm and the after program begins at 06:00pm.

Join us as we celebrate diversity and show our support for the Filipino LGBT community!

For those who are curious about the parade route, you can refer to the map below:

For other participant reminders, check out this link.

See you there and HAPPY PRIDE EVERYONE!

[Pink Scene] The 2010 LGBT Pride March On December 4

December 4 is not only Thai Environment Day in Thailand or Navy Day in both Italy and India, it's also the date of this year's LGBT Pride March! Sure, the traditional celebrations of Pride take place in June to coincide with the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, but locally we always have a separate parade in December that coincides with December being AIDS Awareness Month.

This year's LGBT Pride theme is "One Love" and it also marks the first time the march is moving from Manila to the generously supportive Quezon City!



Straight Loves Gay (Philippine Pride March 2010)

For the details, a few links to remember:

• Online Registration Forms
  
• The Parade Route
  
• Guidelines and Reminders for Participants

Show your support and stand up for LGBT rights! And if you're not yet out, you can still join by wearing a mask or whatever elaborate costume you can come up with. The point is, if you value LGBT rights, then show up and support the cause!

Assembly time is at 02:00pm - see you there!


Lagy Gagita for Pride March Philippines 2010

[Pink News] Oct 29 - Nov 4 Digest

Author's Note: Moving forward all gay-related entries will have the header "[Pink News]" in order to standardize things a bit

It's been a busy week for the gay world, in a manner of speaking. If you run a Google News search for [gay], you're going to come up with a variety of news clusters.

Given the upcoming US elections, it's inevitable for you to get articles related to the various state-specific votes about whether or not gay marriages should be banned in places like South Dakota and Virginia. In addition, we still have a few echoes left from the NJ Supreme Court decision from the other week. While putting marriage on the ballot this year is nothing new - it has been attempted before - it is a bit bothersome since this issue is clearly being used by both sides as a rallying point for supporters. Some would say any press is good press when it comes to important issues like this, but then again the atmosphere might not be perfect for this sort of thing and American homosexuals may be made to suffer should the vote not go their way.

More notable items of interest include Neil Patrick Harris coming out through People Magazine's Website in order to finally dispel all rumors about his sexuality. Personally, we here at the Guide are more than proud of Mr. Harris and his decision to come out. Now if only the rest of those celebrity closet queens out there would follow suit - we definitely have a few people in mind that we'd love to turn out queer, but then again these are probably just idle fantasies, haha.

On the darker side of the spectrum, we have the recent gay sex scandal of evangelist Ted Haggard. While he continues to deny the claims of Mike Jones, a gay massage therapist from Denver, CO who told the media that he had been prostituting himself to Haggard for the past three years in a sordid tale of sex, drugs and a very different kind of rocking and rolling, so to speak. Sure, he's denied the claims but he's also taken a leave of absence from the New Life Church and has "temporarily" resigned as president of the National Association of Evangelicals. Methinks thou doth protest too much, as the Bard would say.

And our last piece for the week is all about the recent anti-gay protests and violence in reaction to the yearly Gay Pride March that has been held in the so-called "promised land" for the past 5 years now. It appears that borderline tolerance has radically turned into outright hatred in a stunning series of protest actions and attacks from all religious denominations in the country. Whatever happened to religions representing peace and love, eh? The Pride March has united various religious groups ranging from Jewish extremists to Islamic fundamentalists, all against what Rabbi Yehuda Levin of the Orthodox Rabbinical Alliance of America and the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the U.S. and Canada has called the "homosexualization of the Holy Land." While the Guide more than supports free expression and everyone's right to their own views and opinions, this never justifies people to cross that line which defines the rule of law and what civilized is supposed to mean and take matters into their own hands.

These are interesting times for homosexuals and a prime opportunity as well to stand up for gay rights. It's a difficult fight, but one that is more than worth fighting for.