{"id":8658,"date":"2021-09-03T22:20:54","date_gmt":"2021-09-04T08:20:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/?p=8658"},"modified":"2021-09-03T22:20:59","modified_gmt":"2021-09-04T08:20:59","slug":"manny-pacquiao-retired-ill-fight-him-for-lgbtq-rights-plus-my-filipino-afghan-thoughts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/2021\/09\/03\/manny-pacquiao-retired-ill-fight-him-for-lgbtq-rights-plus-my-filipino-afghan-thoughts\/","title":{"rendered":"Manny Pacquiao Retired? I\u2019ll fight him for LGBTQ-Rights; Plus, My Filipino\/Afghan Thoughts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Emil Guillermo<\/em>

Manny Pacquiao is the most unique Overseas Filipino Worker ever. He makes millions in his underwear right here in America, where he lives and trains as a boxer.

At the same time, he\u2019s a Filipino Senator.

It means I have a love\/hate relationship with Pacquiao. Because he\u2019s Filipino, I always want him to win. Or do better. But I abhor his homophobic stance on LGBTQ-plus issues. I\u2019m not gay, but I have LGBTQ family and friends. And I\u2019ve publicly denounced Pacquiao for his bigotry.

He could and should do a lot better.

That\u2019s why I don\u2019t see Manny ultimately as a politician\/holder of high office. Read that as \u201cpresident of the Philippines.\u201d

You can\u2019t govern even as a senator while being zealously bigoted against some of your people.

Quite simply, Pacquiao is a boxer. That\u2019s it. Or at least he was a boxer.

Now, he\u2019s merely the global ambassador\/metaphor for Filipinos all over the world. You can box your way out of the barrio.

He\u2019s kind of like an exhibitionist on a pedestal. You can\u2019t knock him down. Not like Yordenis Ugas did on Aug. 21.

That\u2019s why title fights are no longer in his future. Exhibitions are. Wouldn\u2019t you pay to see him go toe-to-toe with the Filipino drug vigilante, President Rodrigo Duterte?

Or maybe a 3-D hologram of Ferdinand Marcos?

So, here\u2019s my courageous proposal. I\u2019ll fight Manny. He can build up to Duterte.\u00a0 After Pacman\u2019s loss to Ugas in the welterweight title fight in Las Vegas, Manny\u2019s done fighting real boxers.

That\u2019s not to say the Ugas fight wasn\u2019t close. It was close enough that if the boxing judges and the boxing gods conspired, the flurries of past greatness that Pacquiao flashed throughout that night still could have justified a split decision for Manny.

But integrity reigned. (Not like it did in that first Pacquiao Bradley fight, remember?) This was for real. The judges and the fans saw the same fight. Ugas was bigger, stronger, and seven years younger. Ugas jabbed with his left and countered with right. Manny couldn\u2019t penetrate.

Pacquiao was still the best 42-year-old fighter that night. But he wasn\u2019t good enough to strap in the belt for the win.

Pacquiao said afterward, \u201che wasn\u2019t young anymore,\u201d and that he\u2019d take a while to decide his next move. So, I\u2019ll make it for him.

I\u2019m the same size as Pac-Man, based on standing next to him a few years ago in San Francisco. Better yet, I\u2019m also likely not as strong, and maybe a dozen years or older than Pacquiao. Perfect.

I\u2019m just what the doctor ordered Pacquiao. I\u2019m the ideal opponent\u2014a Pinoy Palooka.

I\u2019ve taken some boxing courses, online.

And I know the difference between a Philly shell and some shellfish. I\u2019m not a total boxing ignoramus. I just know I\u2019m Pacquiao\u2019s ideal payday. He could fight me, and three hours later, without a scratch, show up comfortably hit the karaoke bar.

Let\u2019s put it on pay-per-view. He\u2019ll get his big cut. I\u2019ll take a fraction of my hospital expenses and my own retirement. And then the bulk will go to help further LBGTQ-rights in the Philippines and in the global Filipino community.

I\u2019m serious. Manny as a competitive fighter is done. But Manny is still his own cash cow.

The fight against Ugas was originally against Errol Spence Jr. And that came with a $5 million guarantee. When Spence got injured Ugas stepped in. Manny might make a little more when all the pay-per-view is done. But whatever it is, it won\u2019t be like the $160 he made while dancing in the ring with Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2015.

He can still make good dollars fighting a nobody like me who has publicly called him a bigoted homophobe.

And what a weigh-in it could be. He could read the bible cursing me. And I would trash talk him on behalf of my gay brothers and sisters.

It could be part of his global \u201call-comers\u201d farewell tour fighting all principled palookas.

And then we can test Pacquiao\u2019s humanity. On Saturday, Manny and Ugas were hugging at the end like lovers, not fighters. We\u2019ll put his homophobia to the test and fight for gay rights.

If the deal is right, it\u2019s for Pride month 2022. In Honolulu even.

I\u2019ll start the rope skipping and road work now.

Politician in the ring<\/strong>
I admit being taken in by Pacquiao as he rose up in the ranks around 2009. It was the same time as Obama was flashing his smile and brand. And in one of my columns, I even said that Pacquiao was like the Philippines\u2019 Obama.

It was an audacious claim. His charisma fooled me. There wasn\u2019t much else. The other things a pol needs like good policy sense was not. I now readily admit I was wrong.\u00a0 Manny was just a figurehead. A hood ornament-type rock star. How good a policy person could he be? Depends on whom he surrounded himself with.

And then there was the homophobia.

Just watching him in the ring since before the Mayweather fight has made me wince. And then that Ugas fight. A public official during a pandemic with more than 16,000 people in an indoor arena? How responsible is that?

That was all Manny the exhibitionist, not the pol. He\u2019s got his priorities as a working multi-millionaire boxer.

Meanwhile, between COVID-19 and the power shift in Afghanistan, the world is in crisis.

Filipino\/Afghans<\/strong>
The crisis at the Kabul airport coincides with my memory of another crisis at the airport in Manila in 1983.

Sen. Benigno Aquino was assassinated on August 21 that year from a gunshot to the head as he stepped off a jet at the Manila International Airport.

Aquino was returning home after years in exile to facedown the dictator Ferdinand Marcos since sanfitized by Duterte as a hero.

But it was my cue to visit the Philippines as a journalist to witness the remarkable funeral procession for Aquino, a harbinger of the People Power to come.

That\u2019s why every August around this time, wherever I am, I feel the rainy season near and feel more Filipino than ever on the insides.

This year, the season coincides with\u00a0 Afghanistan and the \u201chandover\u201d to the Taliban that was not supposed to be a handover. The civil war never materialized and instead, we\u2019re left seeing our Central Asian brothers and sisters in Afghanistan left stranded trying to get out.

I can\u2019t help but think of Filipinos at the start of World War II.

That\u2019s when U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt called on Filipino scouts to join the U.S. and fight side by side in the Philippines. In exchange for their service, the U.S. promised citizenship and military benefits.

After the war, the U.S. turned the promise into a lie. President Harry Truman signed the Rescission Act of 1946, and that was that. No citizenship, no benefits.

That was way more formal than the current situation in Kabul.\u00a0 But ask any Afghan who risked their lives as a collaborator and interpreter for the U.S. these last twenty years, and the betrayal is about the same if all isn\u2019t done to get Afghans safe haven to America.

Right now, the suicide blasts this week at the airport prove that everyday life is a life and death matter in Afghanistan with the Taliban in control.

If Pacquiao were serious about being the president of an established democracy like the Philippines, he might have made a passing statement about World issue No 2. (He already whiffed on Covid with the massive, maskless indoor crowd).

Make no mistake, Manny is not really a political leader, nor a global leader. He\u2019s a boxer. Just not an elite one anymore.

Exhibition and karaoke tour, here he comes. Duterte can get in line. I\u2019m feeling that August sense of Ninoy\u2019s courage. I got next. For LGBTQ-Plus rights.

EMIL GUILLERMO<\/strong> is a journalist and commentator. He was a columnist at the Star-Bulletin, and a member of the Advertiser editorial board. In Washington, D.C. at NPR\u2019s \u201cAll Things Considered,\u201d he was the first Filipino to host a national news program. He vlogs at <\/em>www.amok.com<\/em><\/a>

Read More Candid Perspectives:
<\/em><\/strong>Diversity Like Hawaii\u2019s? Not Yet but The New America Is Here; Plus, Diversity Deniers\u2019 January Sixing\u201d of California<\/a>
American Filipina\u2019s Historic Gold but Are You Feeling The Olympics Yet? Plus: A Covid Conversation<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Emil Guillermo Manny Pacquiao is the most unique Overseas Filipino Worker ever. He makes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8623,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[29,20],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=150%2C150",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=213%2C300",213,300,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,true],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C640",455,640,true],"ultp_layout_landscape":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C570",455,570,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C640",455,640,true],"ultp_layout_square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C600",455,600,true],"covernews-slider-full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C640",455,640,true],"covernews-slider-center":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=455%2C500",455,500,true],"covernews-featured":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640",455,640,true],"covernews-medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=407%2C340",407,340,true],"covernews-medium-square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?resize=253%2C250",253,250,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Candid Perspectives<\/a> Featured<\/a>","tag_info":"Featured","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/CP_Pacman-color_09042021.jpg?fit=455%2C640","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8658"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8658"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8658\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8659,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8658\/revisions\/8659"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}