I have to agree. This is not just about
Anne Curtis.
Quezon City Rep. Bong Suntay set off a firestorm last week. After proudly announcing his sexual fantasies about Anne Curtis in a House hearing, what followed was a week packed with outrage from women and women’s groups.
But the week was also replete with apologies from Suntay.
He apologized because he had to. The public backlash was brutal. And yet, his constant refrain was that his statements were not spoken with malice or intention to offend implying he did not actually commit any wrongdoing.
When pressed, he admitted to “perhaps” using the wrong analogy which seemed to imply that he still believed there was nothing wrong with his blatant objectification of women which is what he should really have apologized for.
The wrong analogy was simple stupidity, the objectification of women, dangerous misogyny.
He apologized “to those who were offended” — as if they were members of a fringe group whose views simply needed to be tolerated because he, unfortunately, slipped up. But Suntay’s Freudian slip would open a Pandora’s box.
I thought Suntay was alone in his misguided belief that sexual innuendos were to be brushed off as comedy or commentary. I was wrong. Suntay’s tribe lives and thrives among us, breathing heavily yet hiding in plain sight.
I have to agree. This is no longer about Anne Curtis.
After the collective outrage from women came the concerted vitriol from the male apologists: those of the view that women who wear little and reveal a lot should not blame men for fantasizing about them.
Misogynists have belabored this point. They blame what women wear because this, they claim, starts the fantasy. But they miss the point, entirely.
We are not calling you out for what you fantasize about. We are calling you out for your sense of entitlement and impunity to speak and act on whatever is on your mind.
If our choice of clothing causes you to salivate, it does not give you the right to partake. Because if that were the case, then, your choice to hold revolting views about us should also give us the right to take a swing at you because we froth at such a fantasy, too.
Women wear what they do not to please you but to please themselves. When they look good, they feel good. And when they feel good, they feel confident about themselves. This confidence should not be interpreted as an invitation to be sexually harassed or assaulted.
Only a truly sick person would interpret a woman’s self-expression as an invitation for sexual assault or harassment.
I once attended a wedding rehearsal wherein we, readers, were asked by the officiating priest what we were wearing during the wedding. “Is it tempting?” I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at such a ludicrous question.
But I was sorely tempted to retort, “Well, I couldn’t say, Father, if you would be tempted by what I will be wearing.”
Do not weaponize our clothing or lack of it and use it as scapegoat for your vile intentions and actions. We have no control over your mind. When you use what we wear as an excuse for what you choose to say or do, you abdicate ownership of your word and actions.
We do not moralize over what you fantasize about. You are free to fantasize. You are not free to act without consent. And while you may argue you have no control over where you mind goes, you have control over what you say or do.
The ability to abstain, after all, is what separates human beings from the rest of nature.
I have to agree. This is well and truly beyond Anne Curtis.