Fridae

More Drag Race? The Philippines is getting towards the business-end of Season 2.

Let’s get into it.

The Main Challenge

This week was a music video – the song was Main Event by RuPaul.

The queens did their best but this all felt a bit messy and flat. A few backup dancers and a bit more time to work on the choreo might have helped things.

The Runway

This week’s category was two-faced.

Katkat gave us a teacher and a soldier, split down the middle. Hit the brief.

Arizona gave us superheroes – feminine and masculine, split down the middle. Hit the brief.

OV gave us non-binary chaos. It was an effective look but didn’t quite deliver on the two-faced spirit of the brief.

Hana gave us a front and back sun versus moon look. Very strong.

Jade gave us a prom look with both masculine and feminine – it was a successful look and really helped to tell her personal story about her prom experience.

Bernie gave us playing cards – king versus queen. Strong concept and strong execution.

The Judging

This was tricky to split the cast – everyone did a good job in the challenge.

The win went to Jade – that seemed fair enough.

That put Jade into the grand finale. Joining her were Bernie and Katkat.

That left us with a Bottom 3 of Arizona, OV, and Hana – that left us with a 3-way lip-sync to determine who would complete the Top 4.

The Lip-sync

The track was Dati by Sam Concepcion and Tippy Dos Santos.

This is a fun track that connects perfectly to the runway theme of two-faced.

In terms of outfits to perform this song in, Arizona had a clear advantage and she made the most of that – switching between her masculine character and her feminine character as the vocals switched. It’s not easy to do, but she did it confidently and effectively.

Hana and OV both gave good lip-syncs but were a bit hampered by their outfits and their performances felt a bit one-dimensional compared to what Arizona was serving.

It made total sense that Arizona stays and OV and Hana were eliminated.

Episode 9, done!

What's life like for LGBTQ people in the Philippines?

What’s life like for LGBTQ people in the Philippines? Let’s take a look at some of the key equality indicators.

Is homosexuality legal in the Philippines?

Yes. Same-sex sexual activity is legal.

Are there anti-discrimination protections in place for LGBTQ people in the Philippines?

There are some anti-discrimination protections place, but further work needs to be done to implement comprehensive protections against discrimination on the grounds of sexuality.

Is there Marriage Equality in the Philippines?

No. There is no legal recognition of same-sex relationships. Marriage is specifically limited to opposite-sex couples.

What’s life like for LGBTQ people in the Philippines?

In general, the Philippines is a fairly welcoming and accepting place in relation to LGBTQ people.

However, there is quite a lot of variation in the experience of LGBTQ people. Some parts of the country are very religious, and homophobia is frequently encountered.