Illiteracy at the COMELEC

If proof were needed that Filipinos cannot write, I give you COMELEC’s SPP Case No. 09-228 (PL), entitled “In the matter of the petition for registration of Ang Ladlad LGBT Party for the party-list system of representation in the House of Representatives, represented herein by Chairman Danton Remoto,” promulgated on Nov. 11, 2009, by Hon. Nicodemo T. Ferrer, Hon. Lucenito N. Tagle, and Hon. Elias R. Yusoph.

After the usual legalese introduction, the decision goes straight to the heart of the matter: “This Petition is dismissible on moral grounds.” As bases for their decision, the Honorable Commissioners cite two documents found on the Web, “Homosexuality: The Christian Perspective” in Bible.org and Roy Waller’s “The Muslim View of Homosexuality” in narth.com, and Lehman Strauss’s statement that “older practicing homosexuals are a threat to the youth.”

Allow me, Honorable Commissioners, to give you a lesson in English 101.

I would never allow my freshman students to cite websites unless there is indisputable evidence that the websites are trustworthy. The reason is simple: studies of the factual accuracy of the Web show that very few websites are updated or even credible. (If you don’t believe me, just go to the website of COMELEC itself. When I visited it last Monday, there was still a notice that the deadline for filing applications for registration, transfer, correction of entries, and reactivation was Oct. 31.)

Take Bible.org. Its website describes the organization: “The Bible.org family is a community of Christians with a shared vision and purpose. It is made up of men and women from all walks of life, e.g., scholars, pastors, teachers, students, housewives, etc., from all across the globe who have moved from sitting on the sidelines of life to joining the race of life making their lives count for eternity by sharing what they have been freely given by God with others.” Bible.org is not the Pope’s blog, not a divinity school site, not even the site of a professional organization of biblical scholars.

It is a non-professional, amateur group of Bible readers, including housewives. (There’s nothing wrong with being an amateur, but don’t we all go to a licensed physician when we are sick?) There are thousands of “communities of Christians” all over the world. Why single out Bible.org? In fact, since the Honorable Commissioners use the website merely to quote Romans 1:26-27, why not just use any of the translations of the Bible authorized by one of the Christian churches? There is something very wrong about people who read the Bible only as quoted on websites.

The misreading of Waller’s article is even worse. In the article cited by the Honorable Commissioners, Waller actually merely reports on the ongoing debate within the Islamic community about the acceptability of homosexuality. (That there is a debate is very important: not all Islamic theologians disapprove of homosexuality.) The passages from the Qur’an that the Honorable Commissioners quote are actually quotes within quotes within quotes. Waller writes about Nadia El-Awady’s “Homosexuality in a Changing World: Are We Being Misinformed?” which appeared in IslamOnline.net. Nadia El-Awady in turn quotes Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, who in turn quotes the Qur’an. As in the case of the quotation from Paul, the Honorable Commissioners could have cited the Qur’an itself. Or are they afraid that one of the many scholars of Islam (who disagree with each other) will issue a fatwa against them?

Worst of all is the reference to the late Lehman Strauss. Strauss wrote that “God never created man with a so-called ‘homosexual need.’ No baby is born a homosexual. Every baby is born male or female.” That statement has since been debunked by various scientific studies, which show, as yet another website puts it (why prefer one website over another?), that “in fact, there are well over 70 different types of proven sex-chromosomal problems and many hormonal problems that effectively counter Strauss’s unscientific claim.” In any case, Strauss was an expert in Old Testament history and was never known to be an expert on anything after the birth of Jesus.

How are we going to trust COMELEC to count our votes accurately in 2010 when at least three of the Honorable Commissioners cannot even pass a Freshman English course?

The Tagalogs have a bit of folk wisdom that might be relevant: “Kung sino ang pumutak, siyang nangitlog.” The English equivalent might be: “It takes a thief to catch a thief.” In language even the three Honorable COMELEC Commissioners might understand, “Men afraid of gays are likely to be themselves gay.”

O, di ba?

BOOK LAUNCH: One of the books to be launched by Anvil Publishing today at Greenbelt in Makati, is a product of De La Salle University’s consortium of publishers. The book entitled Women Loving by former DLSU Literature Chair Jhoanna Lynn B. Cruz is guaranteed to make the Honorable COMELEC Commissioners age even more rapidly than they are doing now. It contains stories about women loving women. Of course, it contains a lot more than lesbian love stories. It is one of the best collections of fiction to come out this year, if I may say so myself, being its publisher for DLSU.