Senator Risa Hontiveros on her daughter coming out queer
By Cristina DC Pastor
The calm and almost euphoric reaction of Senator Risa Hontiveros to her daughter’s coming out is not the typical response of some Filipina mothers on learning their daughters are gay.
In some cases, coming-out stories are tense, dramatic confrontations between parent and child, with words of anger wrapped around feelings of blame, shame and guilt.
Hontiveros and second daughter Helena – also known as Ianna – had a delightful conversation recalling how she came out and how her famous mother received the news.
“Ma, were you shocked when I came out?” asked Helena sporting a short, not-too-edgy haircut parted in the middle. She wore oval glasses, had beads around her neck and her hand almost always touching her face.
Replied Hontiveros, “No. I had a sense, mother’s instinct.”
The two women would break out into fits of giggling during the conversation recorded and produced by the office of Senator Risa Hontiveros.
“The way you told me pa was so nice,” elaborated Hontiveros. “You told me in a question. You asked me, ‘Ma how would you feel if I liked another girl?’ I just was so happy. Not only that you came out and you told me pero you phrased it as liking or loving someone.”
As she pointed out, “Everything is about love. Sobrang happy (ako) and I was so relaxed. It’s so natural.”
Hontiveros has always been the feisty lawmaker from the time she was a party-list representative for Akbayan from 2004 to 2010 until she was elected to the Senate in 2016. She and her late husband, Francisco Baraquel, have four children Issa, Helena, Kiko, and Sinta.
In 2018, she authored the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Expression Equality Bill (SOGIE), also known as the Anti-Discrimination Bill, motivated in part by her daughter’s gender identity. The bill seeks to prevent discrimination against people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.
Hontiveros said her message to the LGBTQ community is to, “Be who you are. You just deserve it as human beings. It’s part of our integrity. Love who you love. How can any of us be happy if you don’t love the ones we love?”
Helena responded by saying, “There’s no one way to live your life as a queer person. You’ve got to find what will make you happy, what will make you fulfilled. What fights you want to take up…I think being queer really enriches my life. It’s something I can explore freely and happily and I want that for everyone.”
She looked back at how she came out to her mother 14 years ago. She was on her way home determined to emerge as queer, and she knew her older sister Issa would be home too.
“Knowing you and ate were home was very comforting to me,” she said. “There was always that feeling of openness and honesty. And safety.”
The two sisters were very close, said Hontiveros. “They were like soulmates.”
She said her mother’s reaction was “medyo anticlimactic.”
“There’s no drama. I didn’t feel any tension, any fear. You’re fine as a parent,” shared Helena. Followed by a joke that, “Parang checking it off the bingo card, ‘May bakla na akong anak’.”
The two women found laughter in a topic that would sometimes polarize families and the larger society. Being queer is not just about having a “different” child but having a child that is likely to face ridicule, violence and the risk of being discriminated by society, a parent’s constant source of anxiety.
Helena Hontiveros Baraquel is fortunate to have an understanding parent and one who has the power to provide protections and make life a little bit more fulfilling for the Filipino LGBTQ community.
© The FilAm 2024
