Here’s the thing about the Philippines. We don’t actually have Gender Equality. Men and women are definitely treated differently in society. This is hardly even debatable. It’s clear as day to see.
But what we do have is a society that doesn’t make a big deal out of it like many Western countries (in particular the United States) do. You see, in the Philippines people realize that men and women are different, women are to be valued and treated with respect, and men are there to protect and provide for women and their families. This is the traditional view of Philippine culture, and everyone realizes that this is a smart, intelligent, logical, and fair point of view to take.
While some of this is starting to change and there are some radical feminists creeping onto my Facebook feed thanks to being “infected” by the feminist nonsense that the younger generation is picking up from Western culture, by and large most Filipinos still have this reasonable, traditional outlook on balance between genders.
Most Filipinos generally don’t make a big stink out of feminism, and thank God we don’t, but still have a core gender view in our culture that is for the most part compatible with liberal gender equality ideas — meaning that most Filipinos are perfectly fine with women working, doing well in the work place, but recognizing that they are different from men and should be protected, afforded protection, and things like that.
You could say that the reason for this is because the Philippines is generally a conservative society — meaning that we honor the traditional view of things. It’s important to note that even in Western societies where there is now a terrible slant of gender inequality thanks to crazy radical feminists and liberals, these societies used to have similar ideas of chivalry and protecting women. But Western societies tend to be more liberal than Asian societies, and the results are pretty clear: you have mass hysteria and crazy feminists who think all white men are guilty. It’s this crazy ultra-liberal outlook that throws away the mores and culture that brought us to this point in civilization through the past several centuries that is causing this crazy gender wars issue.
The Philippines for the most part has managed to retain that traditional outlook that preserves the order of society, but managed to also realize many of the liberal values that allowed women to have suffrage, voting rights, and be career women without stifling women for the most part. And why is that?
In my view, the real reason Filipino women are afforded such “equality” in Philippine society can probably be traced to pre-colonial times. i.e. - the time before Spaniards conquered the Philippines.
Back in pre-colonial times, in other words the original culture of Filipinos, women were given such a big, important role in society. We never lost this trait. Before the Spaniards came, Filipinos lived in a mostly agricultural society with very little concern for building structures, gaining prestige, and other excessively prideful things. It was a simple life organized into social units known as barangays, and women in this age were given a lot of importance, and were capable of holding leadership positions.
Women could be healers (known as babaylan), priestesses, even warriors and leaders. A daughter of the Datu (the equivalent of a King or village chief) would be the heiress of the tribe, unlike in European society where a woman was just something to be wedded off to make alliances and not seen as the rightful heir to the throne. Women in pre-colonial times could inherit property, and were usually skilled as well, able to do weaving, pottery, jewelry and other things, and these were valued skills in society. In addition, it’s said in the Philippines that while a man may be the ruler, the woman is the governor. This was certainly the case in pre-colonial times, and is still the case today: a man cannot spend money on a big transaction without the wife’s approval. Women control the finances in a household, even to this day. I have many friends who hand over their entire paychecks to their wives each kinsenyas.
You could go so far as to say that Western society and culture tried to poison this beautiful culture of the original Filipinos, but thankfully it didn’t completely take root to stamp it out.
Even after Spanish culture (and American culture) took root, Filipinos still dote way too much on our women. We grow up loving our moms. We love women. There’s even a term in the Philippines called under de saya” which literally means “under the skirt,” and the closest translation would be “hen-pecked.” Men who are “under de saya” are often ridiculed but they’re pretty common, it’s because Filipino women are strong and many can easily assert their dominance over men. It has always been this way, it seems, as I noted in the pre-colonial bit earlier.
This is further reinforced by how women in the Philippines really just tend to do better than men in many things, from grades and studies back in school, to finding jobs and getting promotions. It’s pretty easy for Filipino men to just sit back and admire the Filipina, because she really is worth fighting for and fawning after.
Some say that women still have a glass ceiling in the Philippines, but this isn’t true in my experience. When I used to work for General Electric here in the Philippines most of our middle managers and leadership band executives were women. Out of 4 executive posts one was a man and three were women. Among the middle managers only two were men (and they were both gay) and the other five were women. Glass ceiling shattered.
So while I’d say that gender equality isn’t really a thing (I don’t believe in Gender Equality), Filipinos have a culture that respects and gives importance to women, recognizes that they are different but worthy of respect and reverence. This is better than an artificial notion of gender equality where men and women are the same and to be treated exactly the same.
I don’t want to see my mother or my wife have only one week of maternity leave, I don’t want her lifting the heavy weights at home (I’ll do it for her gratefully), and other things. That’s our role as men. Women have their own role, and that’s how it should be.
