Another Facebook (FB) page has made trans woman Gretchen Diez a victim of disinformation, this time claiming she is proposing that “gay language” be declared the country’s national language. The post is fake.
Year-old page Shitposting of Suitably Bored Bisaya 비 사야, which posts mostly memes, published on Sept. 6 a fabricated quote card of Diez. Juxtaposed with a screengrab of the trans woman from an Aug. 15 Rappler interview, the quote read:
“Gay language as pambansang wika ng Pilipinas (Gay language as the national language of the Philippines). – Gretchen Diez”
The post has gotten mixed reactions from netizens, with some taking the post seriously, while others called out the post as “fake news.”
Diez made no such statement during her interview. The quote also does not turn up in news reports nor in any other record, save for another netizen’s Sept. 4 post featuring the same fake quote superimposed on an Aug. 16 photo of Diez during a Quezon City Pride Council press briefing.
The meme page’s FB post is the fourth fake quote card on Diez that has been flagged by VERA Files this month, confusing netizens with claims like the trans woman supposedly wanting “exclusive schools” for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community in the country; “transgender names” for typhoons; and LGBTQ representation in online games. All of these are not true.
Shitposting of Suitably Bored Bisaya 비 사야’s fake post surfaced two days after the Senate held a public hearing on the Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression Equality bill. Diez recently made news reports after she was asked by a janitress in a Cubao mall on Aug. 13 to use the men’s restroom after complaints of her presence in the women’s restroom.
The fake quote card has gotten over 11,000 reactions, more than 2,200 comments and has been shared over 26,000 times.