A THEORETICAL physicist who posted comments about a thesis poster exhibit on homosexuality drew angry comments from students, who called the professor out on his alleged homophobia.
Quirino Sugon Jr., Ph.D., an assistant professor from the physics department, wrote an entry in his blog entitled “Ateneo Psychology Department has an undergraduate thesis poster exhibit on homosexuality.” The entry was posted last February 18.
His post contained a notice from the psychology department, which announced a poster exhibit featuring this year’s senior theses. Two of the featured theses had themes related to homosexuality.
Sugon then commented that the Ateneo was being besieged by “homosexual propaganda,” a remark that drew the ire of one of the thesis groups he had pointed out.
Dark Ages?
The exhibit, held last February 21 to 24 at the MVP basement, showcased theses of senior psychology students presented in poster format.
The notice from the psychology department also contained a list of five nominees for the best undergraduate thesis. In his comment, Sugon highlighted two of the theses for their topics on homosexuality.
“If Ateneo de Manila University does not defend its Catholic traditions against the siege of homosexual propaganda, Ateneo shall become a Catholic-In-Name-Only just like other Jesuit schools like Georgetown and Fordham who caved-in to homosexual ideology. The Dark Ages are at hand,” Sugon wrote.
Such remarks did not sit well with Leia Erika Obias and Paolo Stephen Banaga. They, along with Joy Albertine Mae Valenton, worked on a thesis entitled “I Kissed A Girl and I Liked It: An Interpretative Phenomenological Study of Filipino Homosexual Men in Mixed Orientation Unions.”
Obias clarified that not all of the theses in the exhibit were about homosexuality. She also commented that Sugon’s note at the end implied that her group’s thesis was “homosexual propaganda.”
“This is what angered me… the most,” she addressed to Sugon in a reply to the blog post. “You have made assumptions without first getting the facts.”
“I might not be Catholic and have verses from the Bible at hand to strengthen my point, but I’m sure that there must be something there that tells you not to discriminate against anyone, homosexuals included,” she added.
Two ideologies
Obias found out about the entry when she saw a link to the blog site posted on Facebook. Upon reading the entry, she informed her thesis partners and their adviser, Mendiola Teng-Calleja. Banaga said the entry quickly gained notoriety in the department.
Obias explained that their thesis was about mixed orientation marriages, or marriages between homosexual men and heterosexual women. Banaga said they decided to work on this topic because most studies have been devoted to studying unions between homosexuals.
“We wanted to open the eyes of the people that it’s a reality that’s out there. We wanted to address it. We wanted to give the views of both spouses [so] people will understand,” Banaga explained.
Asked for comment, Sugon said care must be taken in the things that one chooses to work on or publish.
“They have to [read] it very carefully, [because it is like] a precipice,” Sugon said regarding the students’ thesis. “[Once] you work on [or] study something that the Church calls sin, ultimately, you [can be convinced] on the ideas and propositions of the [other ideology].”
“So without the guidance of the Church, it is perilous for an ordinary student to just [work on it] in a carefree manner.”
He added that the things that one publishes become support for or against an ideology.
In the wake of the issue, the psychology department released an official statement on the undergraduate students’ research on homosexuality.
“Psychology is the scientific study of human behavior and mental processes. As an empirical science, it seeks to describe, understand, and explain human phenomena, as these exist in society. Homosexuality is one such phenomenon that can be the subject matter of social scientific investigation,” the statement read.
With reports by Jam D. Paclibar
