theBIGredBAKULAW

Perhaps my most controversial music video to date. Much ado about the uniforms. We tried to remove the patches of the school uniforms and alter them a bit. I suggested the idea to the band after seeing that compared to the gay community, the lesbians are finding it hard to come out of their closets especially in universities and colleges and they are not being taken seriously by the populace especially the teens and those in their early 20s. The video was supposed to empower the lesbians through a simple song. in the beginning, I already realized that handling gender issues are very, very sensitive and I was in constant reminder to the band that the lesbian topic is really hard to tackle especially that it is a very sensitive issue. We tried our best to present lesbians in universities and colleges in a balance kind of way but it turned out some students of the schools who think the uniforms worn resemble their school uniforms and think it is offending their school. Cross-dressing by band members were done before by Francis Magalona and his band during the first Freeman album and by Parokya Ni Edgar when they were starting out (first, at their failed auditions at Mayrics and second, at the old Club Dredd in EDSA). It just so happened that Syato is an upstart band and is not handled by a big recording company who have men and women who can remedy such situations ASAP. For those who were offended, I am really sorry if you didn't get the point of us empowering the lesbian community in colleges and universities. We never intended to malign the lesbian community especially that most of the best friends I had in my life are lesbians and gays. For the school uniform issue, I don't think we maligned any school as there is no patch there to point of any particular school. ut let us not be hypocrites into denying that there are members of the third sex in our campuses who are finding it hard to come out and have their rights be heard. Sean Penn and the screenwriter of "Milk" recently delivered one of the beautiful speeches on gender equality and gender sensitivity when they got their awards at the Oscars. I hope people will have open minds on the third sex in this Catholic dominated country. The world is coming out from its closets. I do hope the Philippines won't be far behind. Let's end hypocrisy.