#JusticeForEbengMayor
A few days after the world observed the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Intersexism and Transphobia (IDAHOBIT) on May 17, a transgender Filipino man, Ebeng Mayor, was found dead, reportedly a victim of hate crime marked by the brutality of their death.
Mayor, from Batasan Hills in Quezon City, was already missing for three days before their body was found. Earlier reports point to Mayor having been raped, and then their body was mutilated before they were killed. A wooden stick was said to have been found shoved into their genitalia, a “brutal act (that) is a clear indication of a hate crime,” stated the Transman Equality and Awareness Movement (TEAM) in a post in Facebook.
As it is, members of the LGBTQIA community are more prone to sexual violence.
In 2015, for instance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the US released the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, which found that for LGB people:
- 44% of lesbians and 61% of bisexual women experience rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner, compared to 35% of straight women
- 26% of gay men and 37% of bisexual men experience rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner, compared to 29% of straight men
- 46% of bisexual women have been raped, compared to 17% of straight women and 13% of lesbians
- 22% of bisexual women have been raped by an intimate partner, compared to 9% of straight women
- 40% of gay men and 47% of bisexual men have experienced sexual violence other than rape, compared to 21% of straight men
The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) noted that within the LGBTQIA community, trans people and bisexual men face “the most alarming rates of sexual violence” – i.e. 47% of trans people are sexually assaulted at some point in their lifetime, and 48% of bisexual women who are rape survivors experienced their first rape between ages 11 and 17.
Locally, a survey conducted by TEAM in 2017 found that 28% of college level LGBT students in the Philippines reported experiencing sexual harassment.
TEAM is calling for “a full and thorough investigation of this atrocious crime and for the perpetrators to be brought to justice to the full extent of the law.”
While expressing condolences to the family of the late Mayor, TEAM is similarly calling for the immediate passing of the SOGIE Equality Bill, a law that has been languishing in Congress for over 20 years now, with its passing “delayed by cheap tactics by Senators like Villanueva, Sotto and Pacquiao.”
