Category: sex

ka freddie

comic relief, the kneejerks to ka freddie’s love affair with a 16-year old, ranging from scandalized and outraged to bemused (legendary nga!) and envious (astig!).

of course we’re hearing more from the scandalized and outraged, as in, it’s a crime, the girl’s a minor, he should be taken to court and made to desist from such legally and socially condemnable behavior.

at the height of the violent reactions on social media, i happened to catch on blink channel the british film notes on a scandal where kate blanchett plays a schoolteacher in her 30s, maybe 40s, married to a much older man, and she has an affair with a 15 year old testosterone-high student who has the hots for her.  not a love affair, more like a lusty one.  when they are found out (thanks to judi dench who plays a lesbian teacher in love with blanchett), the boy’s mother makes sugod blanchett at home, and so the husband finds out and his question is WHY? and she starts with I WONDERED…. and the husband screams DO YOU THINK YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE? WE ALL DO, BUT YOU HANDLE IT!!! (or something like that).

i wondered what blanchett was about to say, she wondered what?  i guess, what sex would be like with someone younger?  something, in fact, that’s said to be rejuvenating, at least according to ancient texts on esoteric sex.  for men especially, who sought longevity or immortality, sexual intercourse with young virgins was said to be the way.  and, i hear, even for today’s older men with jaded apettites, nothing excites, perks up, again like the anticipation of and intercourse with a nymphet.  i would suppose it’s the same for older women with pubescent boys.

among musicians naman of ka freddie’s generation the question is, why did he even have to call attention to the affair?  for the publicity, it is supposed, in aid of selling his new joint in QC, and maybe a new CD?  but people are apalled, i thought, only to be reminded by a 40-year old male that any publicity is good publicity, and, if he were ever in the vicinity himself, he would surely check out ka freddie’s bar, sabay silip sa 16-year old.  lol.

interestingly enough, anti-RH bishop oscar cruz, from whom i expected the usual blahblah against all the talk as occasions of sin, because inciting to impure thoughts, sixth commandment and all that, was quite liberated about it.  speaking from experience as head of the National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal (NAMT) of the catholic church, he only warns the couple that the huge gap in ages won’t make it an easy relationship to sustain.

my own initial take was as one who trained in psychology: minors are usually still naive and innocent about the wicked ways of the world.  but then i heard ka freddie on a headstart replay saying that the girl was already working as a model, moving around on her own, when they met.  it was is possible then that she’s mature for her age, streetsmart even, maybe she knows what she’s doing, and feeling.  benefit of the doubt.

just the same, i wish ka freddie had not outed her when he did, the way he did.  his excuse is, i was asked who i was with, i was only being honest.  or something to that effect.  but honesty is not always the best policy.  he could just as easily have replied, kaibigan (accent on the second i), and changed the subject, let the story be told in its own good time, instead of himself hastening her exposure to public scrutiny and speculation.  privacy works wonders for relationships, especially unconventional ones.

New HIV cases in PH hit record high in May; most carriers are male, aged 20-29, found in NCR

The 415 HIV cases in May was the biggest monthly figure that the DOH recorded since the agency started its surveillance of the dreaded disease in 1984. The  figure was also 52 percent higher than the cases recorded in May 2012.

this is so disturbing.  warrants a crash course on HIV-AIDS for the sexually active.  please read: The Perils of Sex, The Perils of Sex (2), The Perils of Sex (3).

media, priests & abortion

media is plural for mediocre, rene saguisag says in his manila times column on the same day that mark robert b. baldo in a letter to the inquirer editor decries the failure of media to level-up the public debate on the RH bill.

A cursory look on the articles printed in this broadsheet shows this to be a recurring theme: luminaries using the infidelities of some Catholic priests in Europe to discredit the Church; some citing the political affiliations of some bishops; and others, presenting flawed accounts of Church history. This is a mistake because no longer do we hear mention of arguments by both parties.

… Media inevitably shape the public debate. I am not talking here about whether the bill should be passed or not, or whether the media should frame it in such a way that it would be passed or not. I am simply talking about how to frame the debate in such a way that it would stimulate productive discussion rather than a stirring drama about a declining institution in Philippine society.

indeed, na-sidetrack, nagpa-sidetrack, na lang ang media sa rizal vs. damaso drama ni carlos celdran.   easier naman talaga to go with the flow, kahit paatras, than to move on, against the tide, to the more difficult formidable challenging task of helping along the RH discourse toward a clear resolution.

in Some issues about the RH bills fr. joaquin bernas writes:

When does human life begin? We probably are all agreed that man must not destroy human life. Our Constitution protects life “from conception.” There is some indication in the deliberations of the 1987 Constitution Commission that this means “from fertilization.” But there are contrary views. Who will decide which view is correct?

granted, for the sake of no-argument, that the philippine constitution means “from fertilization” and that congress will so concur, what then?   logically, it should mean the end of all debate because as with the natural family planning method (no sex during ovulation), with artificial contraceptives no fertilization happens, which means no life is destroyed, so condoms, pills, and IUDs should be okay-all-right.

and yet and yet and yet, priests and other rabid pro-lifers continue to insist that birth control pills (that prevent ovulation so no egg is produced for sperm to fertilize) are abortifacients.   nakakaloka.   how canyou even begin an intelligent discussion???   for the longest time i couldn’t figure it out.   why the lying.   why the dishonesty.   why the misinformation.   until suddenly it dawned on me, after reading this, still from fr. bernas:

The determination about the beginning of human life will also be relevant to the debate on abortion. Clearly abortion is prohibited and penalized by law. But when does abortion take place? At what stage of the reproductive process will interruption be considered an offense against life? At fertilization or only after implantation? Are there birth control devices or pills which are abortifacient? If so, in what way? There is debate about the abortifacient effect of some birth control means. Who is to settle this debate—Congress? The Courts? Science? the Church? The ralliers? I understand that the various pharmaceutical and medical literature on this are conflictive.

the questions tell me that fr. bernas knows more than he’s telling, much like a parent who has a hard time talking to a teen child about sex because the openness and the info could be misconstrued as license to have sex.   in this case the information, which is most likely new to many many filipino women, rich and poor, young and old, could be misconstrued as license to interrupt the reproductive process by preventing the implantation of a fertilized egg, which apparently he equates with abortion.   i totally disagree.

just to make sure i have it right, i emailed my balikbayan brother dr. godofredo “butch” stuart, now based in tiaong, quezon, who is my first resource on contraception.   his response:

REPRO 101

Fertilization occurs when sperm-meets-ovum, 200 to 500 million sperms in the ejaculate, discharged into the vaginal vault, embarking on journey up the vagina, up the cervix. Only less than a thousand survive the swim and make it to the fallopian tube, into the “last lap” of their swim. These sperms have fertilizing capabilities that last only for 72 hours, sometimes 96 hours.

And once a month, normally, one mature egg is released from the ovary, fertilizable only for 24 hours. Into the fallopian tube it begins the journey, where it is met by one of the surviving sperma. So fertilization occurs, resulting in a zygote.

The germinal stage (0 to 2 weeks) begins when the zygote journeys down the fallopian tube to the uterus, reaching the uterus in 4 to 5 days, floating freely in the uterine cavity for several more days, finally adhering to the uterine wall about the 8th day after fertilization. By the 12th the egg is firmly implanted. And by the end of the second week the uterine wall has completely surrounded the newly developing organism.

This is the basic arithmetic on sperm and ovum life spans, and how the implantation happens many days later after fertilization. And how morning-after contraception works in the schemata of the germinal stage and implantation.

check out his website stuartxchange.com where he has a page on emergency post-coital contraception.   between fertilization of the egg and its implantation in the uterus, there’s a 7-day window during which contraceptive pills taken in certain doses effectively prevents implantation, which is how the morning-after pill (banned here) works.

the question is, when a woman resorts to emergency contraception, is that abortion?   i don’t think so.   while it is true that a fertilized egg has life, still it’s NOT A VIABLE LIFE, not until implantation.

DOC BUTCH :  Yes, non-viable until implantation.  Alive, yes, as in in-vitro fertilization, alive in the laboratory milieu, but still needing the uterine implantation to enter a sustaining nutritional environment.

which brings me back to fr. bernas’s questions: when does abortion take place?   answer: certainly not when a woman resorts to emergency contraception “the morning after” sex, because a fertilized egg (if at all there is one) is not yet a viable life-form.   and no, BIRTH CONTROL PILLS ARE NOT ABORTIFACIENTS:  once a fertilized egg has implanted onto the uterine wall, no amount of these pills can dislodge or remove it from the uterine wall.   (only real abortifacients can dislodge, abort, a zygote, but that’s for another blog.)

of course pro-lifers would disagree with me till kingdom come.   but try googling it and you will find that there are as many arguments for fertilization, as there are for implantation, as the beginning of human life.   so fr. bernas asks: who is to settle the debate re the alleged “abortifacient effect of some birth control means” — congress? the courts? science? the church? the ralliers?   answer: NONE OF THE ABOVE.   i say THE WOMAN DECIDES, not the priests or the opus deists.

DOC BUTCH : From opposing ends, it will never be answered or agreed upon. Yes, in the end, it should be the woman’s right, sole and inalienable, unburdened by archaic church edicts and impotent male political will. Too, a daunting responsibility for “educators” with the burdensome task of educating the womenfolk. And how to make the information available and comprehensible to the masa, who still resort to coat-hangers, grapevine pharmaceuticals, and dangerous herbal concoctions.

indeed.   widespread underground procedures kill about 1,000 women each year in this predominantly roman catholic country.

An estimated 560,000 women in the Philippines in 2008 sought abortion involving crude and painful methods such as intense abdominal massages by traditional midwives or inserting catheters into the uterus, said a report by the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights.

which brings me back to the media, which have the power and the means not only to shape the debate but to make available the information and educate the womenfolk, thereby “to change the status quo of high rates of infant mortality, maternal deaths, and abortions. It is a moral imperative that such dehumanizing conditions should not be allowed to continue.”

DOC BUTCH :    Media seems to kowtow to the powers that be.  It seems like institutional fear.  No cojones to challenge the church on such matters.  Or perhaps everyone of note in media went to the same church-sponsored Sex Education 101.  Masyadong malakas ang simbahan.

but is it just fear of excommunication and hellfire,  or is it also a lack of critical thinking,  and not caring enough about the issues that matter?   media is plural for mediocre?   yes, all of the above.

jueteng’s wild 2

i agree with conrado de quiros.   the only way to deal with jueteng is is to legalize it.

i know, i know, many of you out there believe that jueteng is bad, it’s immoral, the poor waste their time and money on games of luck when they could be making sariling sikap (yeah likeplanting kamote) to lift themselves from poverty, and besides most jueteng profits fund patronage politics, so jueteng contributes to corruption big time, every greedy one is on the take, be it mayor or governor, police or military, congressman or senator, or president even, as we all know firsthand from erap’s impeachment trial, and what about the jose pidal senate hearings, buking na buking, the huge bribes can make it all the way to the top, grabe, so let’s do away with jueteng, yada yada….

but that’s the line mismo of the notorious anti-jueteng archbishop oscar cruz, the same archbishop cruz who condemns not just artificial contraception but even natural family planning (that advises against sex during ovulation) because it’s “inimical to the health.”   ano daw?   so he’s all for women having sex during ovulation, never mind if they can’t afford big families?   why do we listen to him at all?

the archbishop likes to say that jueteng draws are rigged, the poor are being cheated, walang yumayaman kundi ang jueteng lords and their bribees. well, that’s not the fault of the poor who play, di ba?  and this is where nga legalizing it would benefit the poor.  legalizing means regulating means minimizing the cheating.  meanwhile, malamang nga na some if not most draws are rigged, but i would think it’s more the exception than the rule, because the poor are not dumb, they have their own intelligence networks, and they wouldn’t continue to play if they never win or don’t win reasonably often enough.

also the archbishop speaks against gambling as if it were a sin.   meron na bang 11th commandment na thou shalt not gamble?   thou shalt not play games of luck?   but why?   where’s the harm?   not everyone likes to gamble but that doesn’t make it harmful for those who do.   all the negatives attached to gambling — such as losing money that could feed clothe and shelter family or driving one to steal or sell drugs to get the money to gamble — are extremes: why penalize all for the sins of a few?

twisted, di ba.   and why blame the poor, why penalize the poor, for the corruption of the jueteng lords and of the government officials who protect them?  why even think of depriving the poor of jueteng, the one game of luck they can afford to play and be thrilled by (one peso can win seven hundred, home service pa) that along with sex and alcohol make their miserable lives bearable, when the problem lies not with them but with the jueteng lords and their corrupt connections in government?

let’s face it, except temporarily and only in small areas at a time, there’s no wiping out jueteng.    the challenge is how to legalize it so that a reasonable share of the profits go not into the pockets of crooked officials but are plowed back instead to pump-prime the economy and uplift the well-being of conditions of poor communities.   what would it take?   well, certainly not a government that’s intimidated by men in skirts.