Flaggot

I think the last thing a Supreme Court Justice would want to be remembered as is a bigot and a homophobe. Unfortunately, that's just what former Justice Isagani Cruz seems to be bound for, after having published his now infamous opinion column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer entitled "Don we now our gay apparel."

In the flowery language he must have thought was so zippy at the time he was writing them, Justice Cruz said: "Must we allow homosexuality to march unobstructed until we are converted into a nation of sexless persons without the virility of males and the grace of females but only an insipid mix of these diluted virtues? Let us be warned against the gay population, which is per se a compromise between the strong and the weak and therefore only somewhat and not the absolute of either of the two qualities. Be alert lest the Philippine flag be made of delicate lace and adorned with embroidered frills"

My reaction? Finally, a sensible suggestion for the Philippine flag! I always thought it was so boring with those standard red, white and blue colors and the yellow sun - so blah! Couldn't our forefathers have thought of something more original, more eye-catching? Now lace and frills - that's something that will make our flag stand out - especially during international gay pride parades!

Thank you Justice Cruz, for that suggestion. Perhaps, this redesigned flag will also become the new symbol future generations will use when paying tribute to bigots. Didn't some religious leader say something about turning the other cheek? This 'soft' lace-and-frills approach jives perfectly with that cheeky suggestion.

Forgive me for focusing on the flag - the thing is, all the other comments of Justice Cruz have already been torn to shreds by Manuel Quezon III (grandson of the former President) in his two rebuttal pieces, and it was quite obvious which opinion writer had the intellectual upper-hand. I didn't quite see the need for me to join the fray and attack homophobia, not when Manolo was doing so well.

The only itsy bitsy comment I might want to add is that Justice Cruz has apparently not experienced what it's like to be physically abused, or even 'just' discriminated against. It's sad for a Supreme Court Justice, who is supposed to be the last arbiter of what human rights consist of, and who we expect to define human rights for us, to condone, if not actively promote, violence against gay men - especially those who aren't as discreet or as dignified as he wants them to be.

Not just that - Justice Cruz also managed to sideswipe women in the process. Virile strong males versus graceful weak females? What century are we in? Or should the question be, which century is he stuck in?

Justice Cruz, in case you're curious, then wrote a follow-up column initially back-tracking from his earlier piece. While saying he wouldn't have written what he did out of respect for a fellow columnist (because he didn't know his sexuality), Cruz ends up deriding Manolo Quezon anyway. In the process, he quotes Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, apparently trying to impress the hell out of his readers.

Holmes was probably the best American Supreme Court Justice Isagani could have conjured, since, as Manolo subsequently points out, Justice Holmes is known for his decision authorizing the forced sterilization of women. (I wrote about that anomalous decision in this very column a few years ago.) In other words, Holmes was a proponent of eugenics, the same principle underlying the Nazis' final solution.

Yep, Justice Cruz certainly knows who to cast his lot with. It doesn't seem as if his progeny will have a lot to be proud of twenty years from now. (Now that's exactly why I don't want to have children! Knowing how politically incorrect I am, they'd be rolling in their graves centuries after I've entered mine!)

See - this is what you get when a lawyer tries to become a fashion designer. If I had to give advice to the eminent Justice, it would probably be - "Stay away from fashion - stay very far!"