News Release
2 October 2011
Senate RH debates explore the extreme and the ‘unknown’
The Senate plenary debates on the Reproductive Health (RH) bill have recently unraveled deep-seated religious beliefs and gender biases being harbored by some senators, according to Senator Pia S. Cayetano.
The RH debates are about to enter its sixth week when session resumes on Monday. There’s no immediate conclusion in sight, as critics of the measure try to exhaust arguments on all sorts of issues, such as gender roles and origin of human life that sometimes would border on the extreme, and in the Senate President’s own words, the ‘unknown.’
But Cayetano has reiterated that the RH bill sponsors are up to the challenge and ready for the long haul. “Interpellation and debates are normal processes in the Senate. I have no problems about it, although sometimes the issues being raised [against the measure] are a little bit frustrating,” lamented Cayetano, the principal sponsor of Senate Bill No.2865, the proposed ‘National Reproductive Health Act of 2011.’
Expressing hope for the enlightenment of the male senators who dominate the 23-person chamber, she added: “I still have high hopes for the men in the Senate. I’d like to think that they are enlightened, and I’d like to think that they are listening to the debates and can see through what is important. And I’d like to think that the men that we put into office can see that women’s lives are important because otherwise, it [non-passage of RH bill] redounds simply as discrimination against women.”
At one point while pondering on the question, ‘Where does life begin?’ Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, one of two staunch critics of the RH bill in the Senate, argued that the human sperm and ovum are “alive” and that any activity or device that would obstruct their production inside the human body or prevent their meeting in the natural process of ‘procreation’ would already be equivalent to interfering with the production of life in defiance of the Constitution.
Excerpts from the Senate transcripts (21 September 2011):
Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile (JPE): “…We are dealing with an unknown. The question that must be addressed to us is: ‘Where does life begin?’ Because if we read the Constitution, what is protected is life: Life of the mother, life of the unborn. Now, who is this ‘unborn’? Where does it begin? And the Constitution says, ‘unborn from conception.’ And the question that bothers me is…I go further than the point where the sponsor is discussing and that is, is the sperm alive? Is the ovum of the woman alive?
“I have consulted doctors and the answer is yes. The sperm of a man cannot fertilize any egg, not the egg of a whale, or a lizard, or a bird, or a fish, but only the egg of a woman. And neither can the egg of a woman be fertilized by any other sperm except the sperm of a man, so that these two elements must be together to create life. But each one of them has life. There is no question about that because they have mobility: They move; they develop.”
“…The moment the sperm is out, there is a competition among millions, not thousands of spermatozoa gamete but millions, at least. According to the doctors that I have consulted, a cubic centimeter of semen should at least contain 60 million gamete to be able to attain a certain fertilization. And only one of these 60 million can fertilize the ovum.
“So, life begins at those points. Of course, the human life or the human being that will come will start the process of life when the two elements fuse to become one. And from then on begins the growth. Immediately there is a transformation which means that there is life. They cannot detach themselves to the uterus unless they have the life already at that point.
“Well as far as I am concerned, procreation starts from the act of the man and the woman to perform their assigned participation in this process of God.”
Sen. Pia S. Cayetano (PSC): “In other words, his Honor’s position is that when a man produces a sperm and a woman produces an egg – that already is an act that has to be protected?”
JPE: “There is life already.”
PSC: “Because there is life in the sperm and there is life in the egg?”
JPE: “But not yet a human life. Because a woman cannot produce a human being without the sperm of the man and the man cannot produce a human being without the egg of the woman.”
PSC: “Yes…”
JPE: “But having said that, these two elements, on their own, have life. They have a life term. The ovum of the woman survives, I think, within 48 hours and the sperm of the man in 72 hours.”
PSC: “Yes. So, may I just…”
JPE: “Yes?”
PSC: “Just to be sure. So, his Honor’s position is that the sperm produced by a man and the egg produced by a woman has life that will become a human life once they are joined.”
JPE: “Once there is a union and at a certain point there was a union – that is the point of fertilization.”
PSC: “Yes. And his Honor’s position is that there can be no interference with the production of the sperm and the production of the egg?”
JPE: “Yes.”
PSC: “In that case… “
JPE: “If we interfere, we are not allowing the natural process.”
PSC: “So, if a man and a woman are sleeping together as husband and wife and a man avails of the withdrawal method and ejaculates outside the vagina of a woman, that is ‘interference’ in the same way a condom would be, because the man and the woman decided not to allow the egg and the sperm to meet, is that his Honor’s position?”
JPE: “Well, if the man wants to satisfy himself by manipulating himself alone, if it is only for pleasure, that is the same thing like using a condom.” [Laughter in the gallery]
PSC: “No, I am sorry, excuse me. I did not hear his Honor’s response because of the laughter in the gallery…”
JPE: “Well, what I am saying is this: That if a man wants to only enjoy himself and that is also true in the case of a woman, the man can manipulate himself for mere sexual pleasure, that is no difference in using a condom.”
PSC: “Yes. But my question to his Honor is that: Does his Honor equate now the ejaculation of a man outside of his partner’s vagina to interfering with the production of life?”
JPE: “Yes.”
PSC: “It is?” [With tone of disbelief]
JPE: “Yes. That is my belief. That is a matter of faith to me.” [Note: Discussion would then shift to other topics.]
After this exchange, when Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago was later recognized to take the floor and was acknowledged by the presiding officer as visiting The Hague the following week to start her campaign as judge of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the senator known for her humor and wit, was not able to hold back her own take on Sen. Enrile’s proposition.
Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago (MDS): “I am still trying to determine whether the sperms and the eggs in The Hague in the Netherlands are alive or not, because if not, I do not want to go there!” [Laughter in the gallery.]
When the Senate debates shifted to the issue of gender roles and discrimination in society as among the main justifications for the passage of the RH bill, another interesting exchange took place between Senators Cayetano and Enrile.
A women’s rights advocate, Cayetano argued that the denial of reproductive health services by the government to its people is a form of discrimination against women, who have special needs for RH by virtue of their being women. On the other hand, Enrile, espousing traditional views, questioned whether gender discrimination really exists in Philippine society, even as he argued that it is not by law, but the ‘nature of genders,’ which assigns natural roles to men and women in various aspects of society.
Excerpts from the Senate transcripts (28 September 2011):
JPE (Selected quotes on his views on gender roles):
“In the coconut farm areas, I have yet to see a woman climbing a coconut tree to gather coconuts.”
“If we go to the case of our social structure, in the case of farmers, in the rural areas, the human beings plowing in the field – to plant rice, to plant corn, or to plant crops – are all men. Of course the women, they help in harvesting sometimes. But most of the time these are the functions of the farmers.”
“In the case of fishing, the fishermen are mostly men. In the case of lumbering, this is all the function of men…to earn a living for their families.”
“In the case of workers, most of our workers in the country are men, who feed their families, because that’s the nature of the genders: The women are supposed to stay at home and tend to the problems of the home and the children, and the men go out, risk their lives in order to earn a living. So one compensates the other.”
PSC (Selected quotes on her views on gender roles):
“His Honor’s [Enrile’s] view embodies the position that men have held for decades or probably for centuries: That the men’s work is the work that matters…Precisely why His Honor says men go out and risk their lives and women stay home and take care of the children.”
“Women’s work is invisible work…If you only consider the men’s work as that which provides for the family, then definitely, the woman is an invisible worker kasi wala nga sya sa radar eh.”
JPE (Selected quotes on his view on maternal deaths):
“I think I can venture to say that more men die going out to see or into the fields to earn a living than women dying because of giving birth to a child.”
“Every year we know of men who go out to sea, who go out to their farms and get bitten by snake. These are not counted by statistics.”
“What surprises me, in the rural areas, without the assistance of doctors, women give birth, hardly anyone would die. I do not know why they die in hospitals.”
“I am talking about the experience in my barangay where I grew up. I know everybody in that big barangay and during my whole time living in that barangay, I have not known a single woman who has died while giving birth. And yet this is the poorest barangay. I mentioned this again this morning, in the budget [deliberations] of the DSWD. Until now it is still the poorest barangay in the country.”
PSC (Selected quotes on maternal deaths):
“[Between] the chances of a man who is a seafarer, and a woman who is giving birth dying at home without the support of a professional…the chances of her of having complications that would require life intervention would probably be greater than her husband succumbing at sea…The women who die will not have their faces flashed [in the news] because oftentimes, this [story] would not be [considered] newsworthy…that women lose their lives in their own homes giving birth. It is not even as newsworthy as a fisherman who gets lost at sea.”
“Unfortunately other barangays are not as lucky as His Honor’s (Enrile’s) barangay. Women are dying and that is a fact.” #
PHOTO: How will senators vote on the RH bill? If the Senate ever gets to the point of voting at all, that is.
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I think the government being a secular entity should leave out ideas of the Roman Catholic (RC) church on the RH debate. True it is expressing its ideas but there seem to be that the Catholic Church is carrying its weight around. The RC is only one idea of the varied idea on the question of the Reproductive health debate. The debate should be based on evidence as what science is always telling us.
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On Enrile and Cayetano’s argument about gender issues, the fact the Sen. Cayetano is in front of Sen. Enrile, traditional views on gender responsibilities no longer apply, that is, men as the providers while women stay in the background tending to the family and the house.
if a woman is barren and known to be so via doctors and husband and wife, is this copulation still masturbation via enrile’s argument?
Does this mean that there will be an Inquisition to prosecute all those men who masturbate?
Good gods…when will the Filipinos be free of these religious nutjobs?
the body- we should protect the matter that creates life for it has a life of his own
the soul- we should protect the life of the matter that is to be created for he/she will have a life of its own
synergism of the two combined is still flaw to those who are still stuck to the realm of their tubular way of looking at life ( should i state that he/she is still living on a priori Spanish rule of religion)
Seriously, i don’t think anyone cares about this… I mean, is this really issue really senate-worthy topics? I don’t see how talking about having masturbation labeled as abortion really solves anything? Not only is it not productive, but, it really doesn’t solve anything and no one cares… Lets think for one second if it was actually passed as abortion, then what? Would it be condoned as a crime? Would it be punishable by law? How would it be implemented? I don’t know how long you guys debated on this issue but the time you spent debating on this is tax money people payed. It would be the same as stealing from your employer….
SUGGESTED READING: Theology of the Body by Pope John Paul II …to help gain clarity on the subject. good day
Inuumpisahan ko pa lang basahin, nauumay na ko. Isa ito sa mga best examples kung bakit ang bagal ng pag-unlad ng Pilipinas. Ang mga Pilipino, laging maraming paligoy-ligoy. We don’t get straight to the point. Ako nga nagtatrabaho na sa call center, minsan natatawa ako sa mga spiels na pinapabasa sa min. Ang hahaba, pwede naman simplehan. Nagtrabaho na rin ako sa government, at Diyos ko! Mga utak talangka mga nakasama ko. Kaya umalis na ko, baka mahawa pa ko. Mga utak talangka na nga, wala pang kakayahan na magtrabaho ng maayos. Hay!
I found a website that cites this page for the conversation here is what I said or partly:
http://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/8233
Gen. 38:8-10
8. So Judah said to Onan, “Come to your brother’s wife and perform the rite of the levirate, and raise up progeny for your brother.” ח. וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוּדָה לְאוֹנָן בֹּא אֶל אֵשֶׁת אָחִיךָ וְיַבֵּם אֹתָהּ וְהָקֵם זֶרַע לְאָחִיךָ:
9. Now Onan knew that the progeny would not be his, and it came about, when he came to his brother’s wife, he wasted [his semen] on the ground, in order not to give seed to his brother. ט. וַיֵּדַע אוֹנָן כִּי לֹּא לוֹ יִהְיֶה הַזָּרַע וְהָיָה אִם בָּא אֶל אֵשֶׁת אָחִיו וְשִׁחֵת אַרְצָה לְבִלְתִּי נְתָן זֶרַע לְאָחִיו:
10. Now what he did was evil in the eyes of the Lord, and He put him to death also. י. וַיֵּרַע בְּעֵינֵי יְ־הֹוָ־ה אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה וַיָּמֶת גַּם אֹתוֹ:
Putting this in an Orthodox Judaism perspective, masturbation is not at all abortion. It is the destruction of the seed (semen) outside of the VAGINA that is a sin. Therefore masturbation is still a sin, but this is not abortion which is equivalent to murder.
Abortion is considered murder when the fetus looks like a HUMAN, if it does not look a human yet, then abortion is allowed.
However, I do not know what the official view of Karaite Judaism would say about the verse above.
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If you analyze it clearly, what did Onan do? First his father told him to marry his sister-in-law, because Jews are suppose to perform levirate marriage when a brother dies, and to fullfil that and honor his brother, he[Onan] must impregnate his brother’s wife, that way he[Er] may have a child through Onan. But Onan, wasted his semen because he did not want to impregnate her, because he KNEW that the CHILD WON’T be his, at least not on paper, or their view, but genetically it was suppose to be his, if he got Tamar pregnant.
What was really wrong here, is that he[Onan] did not fulfill his duty. I other words he cheated and was dishonest.
Anyway Orthodox Judaism interprets the verse above as equivalent to masturbation, I’ll have to stick with that.
May I add also that Orthodox Judaism does not agree with condoms but, birth control pills. It also strongly does not agree on the withdrawal method.
This is just my 2 cents senator, you might want to ask the Beth Yaacov synagogue in Makati, I hope they can also guide you in your undertaking.
May G-d bless you and continue in this quest of yours.
Shalom!
Thank you for posting this. While many of the religious have expressed views on the RH debate and some congressmen do make judgments based on religion, it is usually only one religion–Catholicism. This post was insightful and informative.
Staff note: Thank you for posting your opinion.
What is the official Catholic Church teaching on masturbation, the withdrawal method, contraception, and abortion? How are they similar and how are they different? I think it’s relevant to discuss it here because Senator Cayetano’s disbelief with Sen. Enrile’s replies apparently reveals a certain misconception about the Church’s stance on the morality of the withdrawal method. It is doubly significant because the Church’s teaching is not purely based on faith – it expresses fundamental truths about human nature and sexuality that can be grasped by common reason.
The Church affirms that sex has two inseparable purposes: the procreative and the unitive. Sex was designed to be that activity by which the spouses participate in the transmission of life and at the same time bind them together in a unique expression of love. Any activity inherently contrary or opposed to any of these purposes constitutes a moral disorder.
Thus, the Church recognizes that the proper context for sex is: 1) between a man and a woman; 2) within marriage; and 3) open to life.
Thus, masturbation is a sin for it opposes both purposes. It is an abuse of the sexual faculty in a way that is not apt for the transmission of life and promotes selfish sexual enjoyment when it is supposed to be shared by spouses.
Contraception, defined as “every action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible,” is also wrong for offending both purposes. It obviously opposes procreation, for here the couple intend to engage in sex yet seeks to thwart its natural tendency to be fruitful. It is also opposed to the union of husband and wife. By withholding from one’s partner his/her capacity for parenthood, the spouses nullify the total mutal self-giving that sex should embody.
Some confusion arose from the distinction drawn from the terms “natural family planning” and “artificial birth control” methods. Some misunderstood the terms to be merely distinguished by the employment of artificial materials such as condoms, pills, or IUD’s. The truth is, the word “artificial” is used to highlight the fact that these birth control methods involves deliberate, human interventions aimed at making sex artificially infertile. Thus, the withdrawal method also falls under the the artificial means of birth control. The natural methods are those that involve fertility awareness involving abstinence during the fertile days and intercourse during the naturally infertile days.
One moral difference between natural family planning and artificial birth control methods is demonstrated by the fact that only in the latter is the infertile state willed and achieved by deliberate, human intervention, thus making its opposition to the procreative purpose morally imputable. Note that only deliberate human actions can have a moral character. A woman who can’t conceive a child because she is sterile or is naturally infertile at the time of intercourse can’t be blamed for her infertility. Those who used artificial methods, however, can be held morally responsible.
Now, abortion is the termination of an already conceived human life. This is different from contraception, in the sense that human life is already formed, making it graver. But we have to realize that its evil intentions are not much different from contraception. Both abortion and contraception propose that sex can be practiced without openness to life. Note that both actions treat life as an undesired object and only differs at the point in time of intervention.
Every sexual act can possibly create human life. That moment the spouses engage in the marital act, human life is foreseen to be possible. Human life is valuable and worhty of respect. Any human intervention aimed at blocking human life from beginning or terminating its development when it is already formed constitute an offense against the value and respect for human life because both aim to thwart its foreseen existence.
Imagine that moment when we were at our mother’s womb. If she decided to abort us, we would not have lived. Definitely offending, right? Let’s rewind a bit more up to the time when our parents were making us. Since we’re looking in retrospect, we’re sure that this intercourse will definitely give us this life we’re living presently. But if our parents intervened to reject our chance for life through contraception, we’ll also lose that chance of life. Isn’t that equally offending? At least, if our parents aborted us, we would have existed for a few weeks. That’s one way of seeing the moral evil shared by contraception and abortion – the golden rule style.
Having said these, we are not surprised to observe that in countries where contraceptive use is prevalent, abortion and divorce are also commonplace. Countries are experiencing below replacement fertility rates because couples harbor this contraceptive mentality closed to the joy of parenthood.
I hope our legislators will see to it that no law will pass that disregards the value of life and corrodes the sacred bond of marriage. Good day!
Sources: Catechism of the Catholic Church
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P85.HTM – on masturbation (2352)
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P86.HTM – on contraception (2370)
I got lucky to have read this article which was shared by my friends from UP. Filipinos need to know the stand of the senators so we’ll know who are the knowledgeable and deserving to be called honorable.
These kinds of inane comments, coming no less than from a distinguished senator JPE, boggles my mind. Sperm and ovum, does not constitute a human life, yes they are considered alive because they function as much as any other cells in the body, but they in itself, apart from one another is not yet considered as human life per se. Human life starts at the UNION of these two, for that would constitute what CONCEPTION means. For the sake of discussion , let’s say we humor JPE and consider sperm and ovum as the start of ‘Human life’, then we are all guilty of murder! Why? For girls and women who menstruate every month, the body throws out the unfertilized ovum along with copius blood, so she is ‘a murderer’ based on JPE ‘s definition, the boys, on whom upon entering puberty does experience nocturnal emissions( ejaculations which can occur while sleeping), due to raging testosterone hormones should also be implicated for ‘murdering’ sperms, but since he did not plan it, maybe ‘homicide’ will fit? Ahh, and for those women who, ahem, ‘ swallows’…. What crime did they commit? Cannibalism?!!! Arrrgghh!