The Philippines Has a Big Sexual Problem
Yes, you read it right.
From our Austronesian roots to the colonial loopholes to the post-Independence libertine lifestyle to the age of social media when simps on two wheels hang around Ayala Avenue on Sundays and do creepy things, the Philippines is having an issue regarding its moral compass and the notion of sexuality as time passes on. It ranges from “bomba” films and its successors to pornography to the rise of suggestive content on social media to proposals on making sex education a curriculum in Philippine classrooms.
How far down the rabbit hole have we gone? Is there a chance to return? Should parents take the lead in letting their children understand how their human body works, especially what they have downstairs? And more importantly, how should we address all of this? Because it’s not just our problem as a whole, but it is also a particular problem for me.
Because aside from being a recovering cynic and a suspecting neurodivergent, I also happen to struggle with hypersexuality … or so I thought.
Before we get to the meat of this video (no pun intended!) let me explain: For some reason, the Father General (my dad), when he was still a seafarer, has brought home some … suggestive content which, to the old man’s defence, was sent to him by his younger colleagues aboard the ships he called his workplace. Teenage me got hold of these contents and, like everyone else during my time, hid it away from the prying eyes of everyone and gooned on them before the word was even a thing. (Yes, Gen Z and Gen Alpha people: I’m not ashamed to call myself the last of the Millennials, and I am that old.)
This went on as I progressed through high school and even the first few months in university. I understand that this is part of growing up, especially when you have so much pent-up emotions inside that you just can’t release by crying (and mind you, caring for one’s mental health was not yet a thing in those days). And I was not the typical teenager back then; I was what I now suspect in retrospect a “nice guy” who always finishes last (in the race of life, okay, not during sexual intercourse!). I had a lull while I was taking my bachelor’s degree, perhaps because I was also discerning if I was called to not just finish it but to enter the seminary — a prospect I eventually veered away from.
But upon graduation, I relapsed so hard I lost count how many times I jerked off, and it ruined my morals and, indirectly, my career.
All of a sudden, the Pandemic hit. By then, I began realising how porn and masturbation literally and figuratively screwed me over. With small wins in habit-building and self-awareness, and a little divine intervention, I was able to control my gooning problem; but traces of it remain to this day, which I still definitely have to double my efforts in.
And I have to admit I was writing this during the concluding phase of what some people call “post-nut clarity.” Yes, I am still struggling with addiction to porn and touching what I have downstairs, so your help — in any way — is definitely appreciated.
With that necessary catharsis out of the way, allow me to connect my story to the topic I wanted to discuss:
This piece is not intended to be a deep dive about the history of sexuality in the Philippines, but it is safe to say that providing some historical context to all of the current things we are sorting out goes a long way.
Prior to the arrival of European powers, our Prehispanic ancestors can be considered a balance between civilised and promiscuous as several polities have been at war with each other, spreading their influence into smaller tribes and communities and spreading the legs of women (while some Prehispanic women intentionally do so in a suggestive manner).
When the Spaniards came, their religious friars intended to temper our sexuality with the Catholic doctrine of marriage as it was understood at the time (and that last phrase is important to note). This did not stop the natives from relapsing into their natural human instincts that produced not only marital and societal implications but also bastard children and orphans, depending on the situation. Hell, even the Spaniards themselves seem to flair up their sexual and marital prowess over each other.
But before we blame it all on the Spaniards, we must not forget that the fact we are facing a moral crisis in terms of sexuality and hypersexuality is a direct result of American imperialism and its modern side-effects.
When the United States annexed the Philippines in 1898, its Protestant work ethic and tendency to find a loophole in every situation became so ingrained in us that we still suffer the consequences of such to this day, but more of that later.
Before we continue with the American contribution to the Filipino sexuality problem, we must not forget that the Japanese were sadly credited for the trauma of using local women as sex toys to relieve the itch of Japanese soldiers for sex. That, though, is another can of worms I would rather leave to legitimate historians since I am merely a history enthusiast and not worthy of being called an amateur historian.
Our status as an independent nation post-war was then a blur. It started out fine, but then in the 1960s and 1970s, a series of strange events happened in the Philippines and across the world: namely, the Cold War, the Sexual Revolution, the Second Vatican Council, the rise of Ferdinand Marcos Sr., and the First Quarter Storm, which led into the Martial Law era.
During that latter stage of our nation’s history was when the sense of morality had been distorted, as several media content at the time (i.e. films) experimented on the seedy and the sensual. By the time the 1980s rolled in, and as the Marcoses were driven from power by the middle of the decade, all that pent-up emotions people had started to rear its ugly head in the form of “bomba” and “pene” films. The former focused on actresses who are considered to be “bombshells,” or very much attractive, to expose their naked upper bodies in front of the camera, thus the Tagalised term “bomba.” The latter, on the other hand, which is technically a subset of “bomba” films but is going the extra mile of making literal sexual penetration either by the actors themselves or by horny extras — thus the term “pene” — is … basically an early form of middle ground between softcore and hardcore porn.
Come to think of it, the Philippine showbiz industry, which could be considered an imperfect but graspable microcosm of Filipino society for this example, is full of celebrities who have relationships with each other, have kids with each other, get married and/or separate, and so on…. It only goes to show that the issue runs very, very deep.
You see, after our independence was recognised in 1946 (remember, we declared it back in 1898), the American influence steadily encroached on our Spanish-Filipino heritage. Por eso, no hablamos español. ¡Que triste! (That’s why we don’t speak Spanish. It’s so sad!) Alongside that cultural and patrimonial erosion is the fact that the United States itself is on the moral crossroads, and when the Boomers were in their physical and professional prime, they basically set a new groundwork on how things go, from the rise of feminism to the rise of the Rainbow Movement (of which, the first two waves of each out of four is already accepted as the norm, and for all intents and purposes, should have stopped at that).
Commercialism also grew its roots in America after the war, which became the economic framework of modern Japan. Gone are the days of bushido, martial arts, and banzai charges as they have been replaced with the same Protestant work ethic and loophole-finding behaviour the Americans influenced the Philippines with. The result is a population that works until they literally drop, and finds pleasure in anything (and I mean anything!) outside office hours. This includes, by the way, pent-up emotions of being able to “do it” with the opposite sex without the consequence of pregnancy, which in turn, becomes a population problem as no one is replacing the older generations no matter how horny they are, and the Japanese government had to prop it up with immigration from Peru, Brazil, and other Asian neighbours like the Philippines.
Back at home, “bomba” films eventually got driven out from the mainstream, but made its resurgence in the cable and indie scene, as well as the internet, which basically made them outright porn. Talk about love stories and dramas on Netflix and Vivamax, although there’s more sex scenes on content released on the latter. (I mean, it’s the same bloody company that brought together what Millennial Filipinos like me considered as a group similar to the MCU’s Avengers, the Viva Hot Babes!)
And in looking at the underbelly of this issue lies the most depraved, the most degenerate, and the most unfortunate stories of how people literally fondled around and found out.
In the first weeks of January 2025, I personally was involved in calling out fellow cyclists who happened to be absolute freaks, after a short vertical video of them stalking out females in active gear utilising the Car-Free Sundays at Ayala Avenue surfaced.
Backlash against Wilbert Luna and Ryan Betidos was swift, succinct, surgical, and most importantly, succulent. I do not wish them a bad life, but jail time must be part of the solution.
That was just the tip of the iceberg.
In the motorcycle community, the volume of riders presenting a sexually-hyped attitude seems to be very, very high. “Motovlogs,” similar to cycling vlog content from simps like Luna and Betidos, have a sprinkle (or a shower, depending on the creator) of sexual innuendos and suggestive content that originally came out of TikTok, which the Americans have already banned as of press time only for American creators in the platform to relocate to another Chinese app called RedNote — but that’s a story for another time.
Let this exposure of these simps on two wheels be a warning to the rest of the cycling and motorcycle communities to not be dickheads and to keep their dicks in their pants.
However, what makes this twisted is the fact that some people sell sex out of desperation.
An article from The Flame, the official student publication of the University of Santo Tomas Faculty of Arts and Letters, revealed that some motorcycle ride-hailing app riders resort to what they call “extra service,” a Filipino connotation for anything sex-related, to make ends meet.
Then, there is the subreddit r/AlasJuicy. (No, I am not going to link the damn subreddit here!) In fact, it’s the whole of Reddit that’s the problem! While I understand that the platform is helpful in some ways, other times, I am just repulsed with the fact that sexual and suggestive content find their place there that the platform became a humongous can of earthen worms in itself.
The problem with this, and other similar sex stories (prostitution or otherwise), is that it either goes three ways: HIV, pregnancy, or both.
And the powers-that-be in their high and mighty wisdom (that’s sarcasm, by the way) has recently proposed a bill introducing what they considered as “comprehensive sexuality education”. Needless to say, some progressive folks wanted to have children taught sexuality, “safe sex”, the concept of consent, all of the Rainbow Mafia stuff, and all the other regurgitations I have already considered BS since I was involved in the legal struggle against the passing of the Reproductive Health Act of 2012. (Although, I also understand the premise that this is proposed because of the fact that the age of pregnancy is becoming ever-so-slightly decreasing, which is absolutely alarming across the political and cultural spectrum.)
Obviously, conservatives are at the forefront of this recent pushback, led by a nonprofit group called “Project Dalisay.” (By the way, the Tagalog word “dalisay” means “pure”, implying the group’s mission to preserve the innocence of children as much as possible despite the constant assault of the algorithm.)
While I do not consider myself a hardcore conservative, I empathise with their efforts and I personally know some of the thought leaders of the movement. At the same time, I also befriend and appreciate some progressives I know who gravitate towards the centre to make compromises for the benefit of the common good, as it should be.
But the bottomline I wanted to share is this: Sex education should have begun at home.
After reading Dr. Jordan B. Peterson’s bestseller “12 Rules for Life,” I immediately remembered that several of his Rules apply to this topic. In fact, I think all of it can be related to this, and here’s a quickfire round on how I related this topic to the book, and I would like to apologise in advance if it is too direct:
Rule 1: Stand up straight with your shoulders back. Learn from the Parable of the Lobster and understand that gooning is one way of bending your spine in shame.
Rule 2: Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping. To remove yourself from sexual degeneracy, you must accept the responsibility to be a decent person and to no longer goon.
Rule 3: Make friends with people who want the best for you. Making friends may not be easy, but real friends tell their friends to stop jerking off.
Rule 4: Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today. Forget Andrew Tate or Destiny; be your own person!
Rule 5: Do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them. If you ever become a parent, never expose your kids to sexual content before their teenage years. In fact, take proactive measures once they hit puberty!
Rule 6: Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world. Clean your bloody room first. It reeks of semen and saliva.
Rule 7: Pursue what is meaningful (not what is expedient). E-girls and adult stars suck; you can do it better out there in the dating field.
Rule 8: Tell the truth – or, at least, don't lie. Be authentic to yourself and to others. You’re more than just a gooner.
Rule 9: Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don't. Get into a real conversation where no innuendos are allowed.
Rule 10: Be precise in your speech. Shoot straight; tell that special person you like him/her.
Rule 11: Do not bother children when they are skateboarding. Be kind to others and to yourself, especially if you and the other person are on your way to recovery.
Rule 12: Pet a cat when you encounter one on the street. The real one, okay? Not what ladies have downstairs.
In conclusion, sex education should have begun at home, but now it can be taught anywhere. With that said, we have the opportunity to sort out the mess the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s figuratively and literally screwed us over by doing our due diligence as the adults in the room.
If you’re like me who is struggling to stop gooning, there is hope. You have a friend in me. If you are a constant gooner, go get stuffed.
I would like to end this article with some passages from the Confessions of Saint Augustine. This man can be considered the poster boy of second chances because, just like most of us who aspire to become good men, he was once a “nice guy” who had his “gooner phase.” Now that he is venerated as a saint and doctor of the Church, may his wise words of prayer be also ours:
“Great art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and Thy wisdom infinite. And Thee would man praise; man, but a particle of Thy creation; man, that bears about him his mortality, the witness of his sin, the witness that Thou resistest the proud: yet would man praise Thee; he, but a particle of Thy creation. Thou awakest us to delight in Thy praise; for Thou madest us for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee. …
“Hear, Lord, my prayer; let not my soul faint under Thy discipline, nor let me faint in confessing unto Thee all Thy mercies, whereby Thou hast drawn me out of all my most evil ways, that Thou mightest become a delight to me above all the allurements which I once pursued; that I may most entirely love Thee, and clasp Thy hand with all my affections, and Thou mayest yet rescue me from every temptation, even unto the end. For lo, O Lord, my King and my God, for Thy service be whatever useful thing my childhood learned; for Thy service, that I speak, write, read, reckon. For Thou didst grant me Thy discipline, while I was learning vanities; and my sin of delighting in those vanities Thou hast forgiven. In them, indeed, I learnt many a useful word, but these may as well be learned in things not vain; and that is the safe path for the steps of youth. …
“I cry Thy mercy, my God. For these very sins, as riper years succeed, these very sins are transferred from tutors and masters, from nuts and balls and sparrows, to magistrates and kings, to gold and manors and slaves, just as severer punishments displace the cane. It was the low stature then of childhood which Thou our King didst commend as an emblem of lowliness, when Thou saidst, Of such is the kingdom of heaven. …
“Where was I, and how far was I exiled from the delights of Thy house, in that sixteenth year of the age of my flesh, when the madness of lust (to which human shamelessness giveth free licence, though unlicensed by Thy laws) took the rule over me, and I resigned myself wholly to it? My friends meanwhile took no care by marriage to save my fall; their only care was that I should learn to speak excellently, and be a persuasive orator. …
“Too late loved I Thee, O Thou Beauty of ancient days, yet ever new! too late I loved Thee! And behold, Thou wert within, and I abroad, and there I searched for Thee; deformed I, plunging amid those fair forms which Thou hadst made. Thou wert with me, but I was not with Thee. Things held me far from Thee, which, unless they were in Thee, were not at all. Thou calledst, and shoutedst, and burstest my deafness. Thou flashedst, shonest, and scatteredst my blindness. Thou breathedst odours, and I drew in breath and panted for Thee. I tasted, and hunger and thirst. Thou touchedst me, and I burned for Thy peace. …
“O Lord God, give peace unto us: (for Thou hast given us all things;) the peace of rest, the peace of the Sabbath, which hath no evening. For all this most goodly array of things very good, having finished their courses, is to pass away, for in them there was morning and evening. …
“For then shalt Thou rest in us, as now Thou workest in us; and so shall that be Thy rest through us, as these are Thy works through us. But Thou, Lord, ever workest, and art ever at rest. Nor dost Thou see in time, nor art moved in time, nor restest in a time; and yet Thou makest things seen in time, yea the times themselves, and the rest which results from time. …
“But Thou, being the Good which needeth no good, art ever at rest, because Thy rest is Thou Thyself. And what man can teach man to understand this? or what Angel, an Angel? or what Angel, a man? Let it be asked of Thee, sought in Thee, knocked for at Thee; so, so shall it be received, so shall it be found, so shall it be opened. Amen.”