Sen. Vicente Sotto’s interpellation of the RH Bill at the Senate has deteriorated into a witch-hunt of organizations supporting the bill that, in his opinion, have an agenda to legalize or promote abortion in the Philippines. The organizations that he has named so far are the Family Planning Organization of the Philippines (FPOP), Likhaan Center for Women’s Health (Likhaan), the Women’s Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR), and the Democratic Socialist Women of the Philippines (DSWP). More could follow as the senator has asked for a list of all organizations that have expressed support for the bill.
Instead of arguing about the content of the RH Bill, Sen. Sotto has shifted to attacking advocates.
This crude antic is an implied admission of weakness in conducting a reasoned and respectful debate with fellow senators who are, in the final analysis, the authors and sponsors of the measure. Civil society organizations (CSOs) are formally invited to public hearings on proposed laws and asked to present and argue their position. This engagement of CSOs is a key feature of democracy, of governance through dialogue. Unfairly using the immense powers of the Senate to attack CSOs for their different points of view is the act of a bully and violates the tenet of responsive governance.
Some RH Bill advocates—like the organizations maligned by Sen. Sotto—are truly concerned about the harm to women and their families of unsafe abortion. Because of our work in very poor urban and rural communities, we know firsthand of women who have suffered severe complications—hemorrhage, infection and perforated bowels—some of whom survived, while others died. We know of women survivors who were subjected to verbal abuse, maltreatment, and neglect in hospitals by the medical people who were supposed to help them. We know too that the reasons that push women to have an abortion are desperate, that the decision to have an abortion is never easy, and that if women could prevent abortion, they would.
Beyond the RH Bill, we stand for openly and soberly discussing the impact of abortion in the Philippines and finding humane and workable solutions. Last time we heard it, discussing abortion is legal in this country. A century of criminalizing abortion has not stopped its widespread use, but only made it dangerous.
The RH Bill has at least three features that can substantially reduce abortions without even changing the law. Family planning—whether through natural or artificial methods—can address the root of abortion, unintended pregnancy, by enabling women and couples to plan the timing, spacing and number of pregnancies. Post-abortion care, including medication, surgery and counseling, can save women’s lives, preserve their health, and help them to use family planning that will prevent repeat abortions. School-based sexuality and RH education can address peer pressure and sexual coercion and violence, delay sexual experimentation, and promote responsible behavior so that unintended pregnancies are reduced.
Those who obstruct family planning while exulting in the Philippines’ extreme anti-abortion law—which has no exception even when a woman’s life is in danger—are morally responsible for the vicious cycle of unintended pregnancy and abortion that continues to kill and maim masses of women. If government-supported measures to reduce abortion or to treat and counsel women with post-abortion complications are denied, where else could women go? What else could women do?
Sen. Sotto, if he has a modicum of sympathy for women, should find solutions to the problem of abortion instead of maligning organizations that support RH. If he is against RH, what is he for?
Anyone concerned about the health of women and the families that they care for will find it unconscionable to object to the RH Bill. If Sen. Sotto is worried that the bill will legalize abortion, then he needs to simply study the text and accept or reject it based on what he actually reads, not on what he reads of advocates’ intentions.
Released 7 September 2011 by:
Roberto Ador
Executive Director,
Family Planning Organization of the Philippines
Junice D. Melgar
Executive Director,
Likhaan Center for Women’s Health
Sylvia Estrada Claudio
Chairperson,
Women’s Global Network for Reproductive Rights
Elizabeth Angsioco
Chairperson,
Democratic Socialist Women of the Philippines
For further information, contact: Joy Salgado • Likhaan Center for Women’s Health • 926-6230 • 411-3151
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Image from trialx.com
I don't vote for politicians who are intellectually weak, regardless of how popular they are! Be that as it may, he is still an elected senator, thus my earlier statement. If you still claim that you don't deserve him, well…
I wish our election system had a 'LIKE' and 'UNLIKE' button instead 🙂
You just shade a thumbs-up or thumbs-down icon on your ballot sheet.
Instead of voting for a candidate, you have the option of casting a "negative" vote which counts as -1 in the tally. In the last few elections, I had more candidates I disliked more than I actually liked.
Or, simply revise our election laws concerning candidates' qualifications which would automatically disqualify those who are educationally-deficient, immoral, dishonest and character-flawed. Wait, who will be left?hehe
Can we just put bombs in the necks of public servants? Every time a citizen is dissatisfied with the public servant, he presses a button at the City/Municipal/Baranggay hall.
Similarly, another button may be pressed for good service.
When a certain threshold is reached. Boom! 🙂
I cant wait till they perfect neural technology. When we reach the point when technology can determine when a person is lying with a high degree of certainly, we need to hook up these devices on all public officials and put a red LED light on their noses which will light up when they're caught lying. Sotto would look like Rudolph the reindeer every time he opens his mouth to say something outlandish.
We deserve the idiots we elect to congress!!!
No, I didn't vote this idiot. Maybe you deserve him. 🙂
Didn't vote for him either, but that's democracy at its best(or is it 'worst'?).
That's what i keep saying: the people vote for idiots, they have no right to complain why their lives suck.
however, those that actually know better pay for it as well…
Exactly! If only we can educate the masses to be more circumspect in who they elect to congress, this country can really move ahead…
yes the challenge is convincing them. They would happily vote for their favorite sports star, action hero, singing sensation or anyone who can shell out the best jingle. or worse whoever their church leader chooses – aka block voting, CBCP's favorite tactic.
Two minor comments:
the fallacy of the masses that showbiz people, action stars, etc. are pro-poor, thus should be elecTted, has to be debunked; only then will the right people be elected.
There was never and will ever be a straight catholic vote. This was proven by Honasan and Flavier who got elected despite the church's strong oppositon. To my knowledge, only the INK has a real straight-vote practice…
1) yes definitely. i always get a shimmer of hope when a celebrity loses badly during elections. at least some masa are wisening up.
2) though not as prominent in the national elections, local elections can be dominated by them, particularly in the provinces. i've gone to the cbcp website they like to flex that fact.
Religious influence or not, local elections have always been much easier to manipulate, be it by the candidates' 3Gs (guns, gold & goons), electorate's desire for change (cases of the assistios of caloocan, romualdezes of leyte, etc., come to mind) or the candidate's winnable characteristics (personal integrity, business acumen, etc.).
an alleged rapist protecting the beliefs of the roman catholic church. quite fitting really.
correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it Vic Sotto, along with Joey de Leon and Richie d'Horsey who were implicated in Pepsi Paloma's rape? but reports do indicate that his brother, already a senator, did use his political connections to pull his brother's ass out of the fire… leading to the starlet's alleged suicide not long after.
Tito wasn't a senator yet back then. I don't think he was even vice-mayor.
oops, ur right. Googled up this report:
"Excerpt from TALK SHOW Fundy C. Soriano:
Tito Sotto's talent in politics was first tested on October 1982 when he spearheaded the settlement for the rape case filed by sexy stars Pepsi Paloma and Guada Guarin against Tito's younger brother Vic Sotto and his "Eat Bulaga" co hosts Joey de Leon and Richie D'Horsie. In the case records, the rape case was made known when Pepsi Paloma's mother approached Atty. Rene "Compañero" Cayetano (father of senators Alan Peter Cayetano & Pia Cayetano) to ask for legal assistance to achieve justice for her daughter who was molested by the three hosts of "Eat Bulaga".
When it was made known that the case is being filed by the former senator Cayetano to the Fiscal of Quezon City, the teenage starlet disappeared, but was expeditiously recovered by the men of Col. Rolando Abadilla and Capt. Panfilo Lacson, who is presently a senator, of MISG from the hands of notorious hoodlum Ben Ulo. The name of the Sotto's leaked when Ben Ulo admitted that he is an accomplice to the Castelos, maternal clan of Tito and Vic.
According to Pepsi Paloma, it was mainly Tito Sotto who coerced her to sign the affidavit of desistance to throw out the filing of the rape case, which is punishable by death penalty. Justice was stopped from moving when the comedians humbly made a public apology to the judge to where they admitted to the crime committed to the starlet, who committed suicide by hanging herself afterwards due to the trauma she experienced from the hands of the comedians."
how… apt. Tito Sotto's nemesis then was the senior Cayetano… now its Pia he's facing in the RH senate battles.
and boom goes the dynamite
Senador pa rin pala yang pinaka-korny sa TV&J? Wala talagang katinuan ang Pilipinas!
yang pagtutol ng simbahan sa rh bill has nothing to do with moral issue, it’s more of a political issue. kapag nacontrol kc ang populasyon kokonti na lang ang mga communicants ng simbahan, in short kokonti na lang ang magbibigay ng abuloy, and the empire will collapse like a house of cards hehehe..09326018758