Tag: sexual harassment

Deafening silence amongst #BabaeAko “activists” despite lewd text messages to Gretchen Fullido revealed!

Text messages sent to ABS-CBN News anchor Gretchen Fullido and published in a Manila Times report reveal the selective nature with which Filipino feminists regard sexual harassment.

Forget for a moment that the person involved is Fullido and the alleged perps are executives at a media organisations known to be disturbingly cosy with the Yellowtards. You’d think the following text message would, in a parallel universe, invoke the shrill ire of the militant Filipino feminist community and draw out no less than “women’s issues” advocate group Gabriela with guns blazing…

“What time are you coming to work? (Fullido: On the way to [ABS-CBN] now. What’s up?) Wala naman. Miss lang kita. Masama ba? Sungit.” (Nothing. I miss you. Is that wrong? Crabby.) “Kailangan mo rin ng konting lambing sa katawan.” (You need some tenderness in your body.)

Inappropriate, right?

Unfortunately in this instance, appropriateness is relative and negotiable. Indeed, according to the Times report, the text messages revealed to them are the same ones reported to ABS-CBN management in an earlier complaint filed by Fullido. But a “formal investigation” mounted by ABS-CBN resulted in the complaint being “dismissed as baseless”.

Normally you’d see women cheering on the latest victim of sexual harassment. But not in the case of Fullido’s plight. This is because of who and what she’s up against. This is ABS-CBN after all.

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Crowdsourcing allegations of sexual harassment seemingly perpetrated by Ateneo faculty members

Since the late September post on the Facebook page ADMU Freedom Wall #ADMUFreedomWall10175, chatter surrounding allegations of sexual harassment at the Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) continues to rage. The original post is cryptic and doesn’t name names.

I’m sick and tired of seeing that one “famous” professor on twitter gain a platform off calling out abusers and being woke, when he himself would make his students uncomfortable by randomly messaging them asking for pictures of their feet and inviting them to his f[..]king bedroom for individual consultations. It’s even worse because he would target the freshmen students that were struggling in his class and videotape his ICs on his f[..]king webcam.

But a thread on the ADMU discussion forum on Reddit had opened the floodgates and anecdotal detail on the subject has been bucketing in since. The following names (among possibly others) quoted by participants in the forum have thus far emerged ..

– Miguel Lizada
– Carlo Rivera
– Ben Chan

As this chatter rates, Netizens are also calling out prominent social media personality Nathania Chua who is a former faculty member of the ADMU and who, some Netizens assert, was a colleague and possibly a friend of Lizada. Chua has since tweeted this statement on the subject…

Let’s get this straight: Like other students and co-faculty, I heard the rumors regarding Miguel Lizada’s indiscretions but never had the evidence to call for an investigation. I had no idea of the EXTENT of his actions and those affected by them, prior to the issue breaking out.

The ADMU, in a statement, vowed to investigate the matter.

Maria Luz Vilches, vice president for the university’s Loyola Schools, in a letter released on Thursday said that the school administration is conducting an official investigation into the sexual complaints filed by students against one of its college faculty members.

Vilches said the evidence gathered so far have been elevated to the university’s Committee on Decorum and Investigation.

The story continues to develop.

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Is Bianca Gonzalez saying that “Girl Power” means girls sticking together to cover up sexual abuse at ABS-CBN?

In light of recent hints of a toxic corporate culture of sexual harassment at ABS-CBN News following charges of such filed by news anchor Gretchen Fullido, starlet Bianca Gonzalez issued this non-opinion on Twitter…

Yes, women should support women. But when its women involved in both sides, nawawala ang “babae ako” at nagiging “babae tayo”. Mahirap. Ang mga involved lang ang tunay na nakakaalam ng katotohanan. But still, we do our best so that women support women.

Translated to straight English:

“Yes, women should support women. But when it is women involved on both sides, it’s no longer ‘babae ako’ (‘Me woman’). It becomes ‘babae tayo’ (‘We women’). It’s hard. Only those involved can know the truth. But still, we do our best so that women support women.”

This could mean one or both of two things:

(1) Women should stick together no matter what.

(2) Trouble within female communities are internal to women and that the truth should sort itself out internally.

It’s hard indeed. Hard to tell what Gonzalez means. She likely struggled to squeeze this tweet out under pressure from Netizens who had called out the deafening silence of celebrities even as this case attracted more and more attention online.

Words chosen too carefully end up conveying nothing or, worse, revealing the opposite of what the message intended to convey.

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Ces Drilon failed the #MeToo “movement”

Not only did Gretchen Fullido blow the whistle on what could be an entrenched culture of sexual harrassment and bullying in the ABS-CBN News organisation, she went the whole nine yards and filed charges to back her complaint. That’s way ahead of the curve of most victims who only go as far as kicking up stinks over social media.

The #MeToo movement has been criticised as one that involves women revealing their victimhood usually years after the alleged assault of harassment was committed. Usually the subject of the complaint is a prominent person. This is the reason the movement gained traction — it did so on the back of the star power of the accused.

Indeed, Drilon’s account of her own #MeToo experience follows the same template going public over an experience many years ago that stops short of the setting off on the important last mile — filing charges.

Ces couldn’t scream at the time, and merely pushed the perpetrator away as she ran out. For the rest of the day, she pretended like nothing happened. “Well, I was just starting my career as a journalist then, and the person was my superior. I didn’t want to put my job on the line,” she admits. “And it seemed like it wasn’t right for me to make a scene, that was how I felt [then]. I didn’t want to disturb the goings-on of the newsroom, and so I pretended like nothing happened.”

The irony is that the #MeToo movement emboldened women to act on incidents like these and, more importantly, made authorities that are in a position to support and act on these cases more receptive to these complaints.

It is therefore quite disappointing that Drilon and the rest of the ABS-CBN leadership would now take the position of defensiveness, stonewalling and, even worse, silence on this matter.

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“All the allegations of Gretchen Fullido on Chair and Maricar, who is Chair’s partner are true”

I’ve been with ABS-CBN News for the past 17 years so I know the history of [Cheryl “Chair” Favila’s] rise to power. It started when @maria_ressa promoted Chair to take over the job Maria’s married partner @bethfrondoso vacated. Chair was different from Beth because she rubbed elbows with the anchors and upper management, while Beth kept to herself and just followed the direction of Maria.

Chair was loved by the Anchor like Kabayan, Ted, and maintained good relationships with Ces, Marie and Pinky Webb. This is the main reason why Ces and Marie gave testimonies on Chair’s character, without knowing that Chair altered their statements to suit her case.

All the allegations of Gretchen Fullido on Chair and Maricar, who is Chair’s partner are true. Even the lengthy months of internal investigation proved that, and ABS-CBN let her go. Chair’s press release was she left for “health reasons.” During the course of investigation, Chair maintained her innocence because doesn’t believe she did anything wrong. She didn’t see anything wrong with inviting Gretchen out, asking GF to send her a sexy video. Chair had an unhealthy obsession with GF. She loved her, yet tried to control her at the same time. Chair thought she would win her internal case because of her strong relationships with the Anchors and she had a tight grip on TV Patrol. She couldn’t imagine anyone running Patrol, with her years of experience, and with the company’s freeze hiring, she thought she was indispensable. She was wrong.

As for Ces and Marie, even when they knew before hand that Chair altered their statements, they never bothered to reach out to GF and clear their name. They both didn’t care about GF. While the allegations about them are untrue, they’re still at fault with not truly supporting GF with her cause by informing her of what Cheryl did to them. This is a lesson they are learning the hard way.

As for Management, the mandate was since cases is already filed in court, they will let law dictate what will happen to their people. Now don’t admire ABS-CBN for believing the process and rule of law. Reality is, they’re not worried because they don’t have any legal liability.

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