MANY are man enough in this country to admit it’s not only the church where chauvinism holds sway. With the ardor of a devotee, many of us have known no less than an out-of-body experience—-a sensation of uplift, a touch of bliss—-in the cockpit and the massage parlor.
A piece of heaven is just a stroke away especially for those with money to burn. And they would not care if there may be hell to pay as long as their hackles can rise to the occasion, whether in ways literal or figurative.
Woe unto the women whose pet peeve is a rooster that tends to get more of their husband’s coddling. Or, some “chicks” game enough to make ends meet. Never mind if the end—-to transcend third-world economics with a survival instinct steeped in the odd dynamics of “kakha-tuka” and Kama Sutra—-does not justify the means by which morality often crows about.
Over the controversial “lingam” massage, in the service of man’s “wand of light” viewed as sacred in Sanskrit, some of Cebu’s most powerful ladies are seeing dark-tongued vultures feeding on the bodies of their less privileged sisters.
This time around they are squinting no less sharply than the voyeurs. “A tight watch” has been ordered by Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Paz Radaza on spas and massage parlors in her jurisdiction. From the vantage point of the Provincial Women’s Commission (PWC) headed by Agnes Magpale, lighting up the “lingam” is downright indecent and “must be seriously looked into.”
Its alleged therapeutic effects still remain to be seen, according to Gov. Gwen Garcia. Unblinking against the desecration of women’s dignity, she’s certain about the smokescreen of prostitution vis-à-vis the world-class outlook of the Authentic Lingam Massage’s owners who tout only tourism-worthy benefits beyond monkey business.
“It is accepted in strict Singapore and widely embraced in Muslim Malaysia, practiced in Egypt, Thailand, New York, California and London,” they say.
But adamant to “call a spade, a spade,” the good governor is shoving into our eyes what is already clear as day about what men often do with their masseuse. “They're doing that,” she snarls, “for the pure pleasure of it.” Which is the same urge, exactly, for the orgy crowding the cockpits on any given Sunday, and yet how come we hear nary a pipsqueak of indignation from our chorus of do-gooders?
“Bigwigs turn up for a million derby,” read a recent report about politicians who might as well have flaunted their hard-on for their gamecocks. Come to think of it, such high-stake bets out in the open are nothing short of obscene in the face of the many groveling for a hand-to-mouth subsistence, whether or not behind closed doors of spas and massage parlors.
Getting one’s feathers ruffled is enough even for some well-meaning women to lose focus or to look cross-eyed. How sad to see them in a bad light, in spite of their good intentions, while many of us are not man enough to hide, or to cover our faces flushed with the underside of delight.
(geemyko@gmail.com)