Robredo slams 'disrespectful, abusive' behavior to women amid Pisay controversy
MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Leni Robredo urged the public to call out disrespectful and abusive behavior toward women in addressing the controversy surrounding Philippine Science High School students.
Six graduating students of PSHS, also called Pisay, were found to have been involved in spreading lewd photos of their female schoolmates.
According to Science Secretary Fortunato dela Peña, the six students have been barred from their graduation rites on Wednesday.
The vice president called on the high school to see to it that the six students would be appropriately sanctioned.
"Not making excuses for it, not attempting to justify it, but recognizing it for the injustice it is, and taking the necessary steps to ensure it is not repeated again," Robredo said in a statement released Wednesday.
Robredo expressed hopes that PSHS would consider this principle in resolving the controversy in the high school.
The vice president also noted that the controversy is more than just the concern of the high school.
"It is an issue that goes to the heart of how we, as a society, must act when women are disrespected, demeaned, or abused, particularly when this is passed off as 'boys' having 'harmless fun,' and therefore 'normal' and 'acceptable,'" she said.
Robredo said that women have long been forced to "endure various indignities in silence" from having their worth based on physical attractiveness to assumptions that women are only fit for subordinate roles.
Women have also been subjected to verbal harassment or gender-based violence, the vice president added.
"What is worse, this condescension and abuse [are] presented as simply being 'the way of the world,' with those who protest dismissed as 'overreacting' or 'someone who cannot take a joke,'" Robredo said.
This statement days after President Rodrigo Duterte made rape jokes during the graduation rites at the Philippine Military Academy, which drew laughter from the crowd.
Robredo was also in attendance during this event, where Duterte pretended to read out offenses made by PMA cadets, which included rape.
In September last year, Robredo called out Duterte for making another joke in connection to the reported rise in rape cases in Davao City.
"We have to protest. We know that's not right. There is rape because there are rapists, not because there are pretty girls," Robredo said in September.
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