Bakit may Women’s Month? and other Questions we keep asking instead of listening

Right now, somewhere online, someone is typing, “Bakit walang Men’s Month, pero may Women’s Month?”. It trends every March with predictable rhythm, as if the question itself has become tradition, and yet, the better question in 2026 is, why are we still asking it while the culture around us remains stubbornly unchanged?

Just days ago, headlines carried the words of Quezon City 4th District Representative Bong Suntay, who publicly shared his so-called “imagination” involving Anne Curtis—and let’s be honest, it was not harmless humor but entitlement spoken casually in a space of power, made more disturbing by how ordinary it felt and how quickly it was dismissed as “just making a point”.

When men in authority speak about women’s bodies as if they are playgrounds for fantasy, it reinforces an old message: that no matter how accomplished a woman is, she remains consumable; in that moment, Anne Curtis, the entrepreneur, advocate, and professional, was eclipsed by someone else’s imagination. That is not celebrity gossip, it is a demonstration of power. 

At the same time, we see a quieter pattern unfold in politics, where the language of feminism grows louder precisely when it becomes most strategic, where strength is suddenly reframed as resilience against attacks just as election cycles begin to take shape. With a high-ranking national leader recently declaring her intention to seek the presidency in 2028, narratives of female fortitude and being a woman under siege have become more pronounced amid intensifying political tensions. 

Misogyny against women leaders is real and must always be confronted—but feminism cannot be selectively activated as a political shield. Empowerment is not a campaign message to be amplified when convenient and set aside when systems remain untouched. Womanhood cannot be invoked as an insulation from accountability while patriarchal structures are preserved, tolerated, or reinforced. If feminism is to mean anything, it must be consistent and principled, willing to challenge power—not just protect those who hold it.

The truth is that systematic misogyny is not just a series of isolated remarks. It is a socially-made infrastructure with cracks in its foundation in the form of wage gaps and glass ceilings, in harassment cases laughed off, in victims scrutinized more harshly than perpetrators, in how strong personalities are pegged as an unnatural flaw in women but an ideal characteristic for men, in leadership models that still default to masculine templates, in comment sections, in barangay halls, and congress itself. 

And yet every March we risk shrinking this reckoning into purple shirts and curated posts; symbols matter, yes, but if Women’s Month begins and ends with an outfit, then we have mistaken aesthetics for action. 

This month is not a themed event, a marketing opportunity, or a photo op—it is a reminder of unfinished work, born from protest and struggle because history has been unequal and rights were fought for, not handed over. 

So when someone asks, “Bakit walang Men’s Month?”, perhaps the uncomfortable answer is that for much of history, every month has functioned as one: the structures were built by men, the rules written by them, the defaults designed around them; Women’s Month is not exclusionary, it is corrective, and correction requires honesty—honesty that misogyny can disguise itself as humor, that empowerment can be weaponized as rhetoric, that representation does not automatically equal liberation, and that the fight does not pause on April 1. 

So yes, wear purple, post tributes, celebrate the women in your life–but also call out the jokes, question narratives, demand consistency from leaders, and refuse selective feminism, because hindi ito costume, hindi ito trend, hindi ito seasonal branding; it is a reckoning. 

And if we are serious about building a future that leaves no one behind, then our commitment cannot be seasonal, it must confront the power imbalances, gender biases, and systemic barriers that continue to shape opportunity in this country. Until the question is no longer “Bakit may Women’s Month?” but “Why do we still need it?” the work of dismantling inequality—in all its forms—continues.