'Walang Bayag,' 'Libog,' 'Luto ng Diyos': How Sexuality Keywords Reflect Filipinos' Thinking About Sex

Recent headlines involving the MTRCB have resurfaced debates on just how we Filipinos perceive and talk about things related to sex and sexuality. While some believe we’ve become more open and tolerant of slightly progressive views toward sex, the issues that the MTRCB and some television programs have found themselves involved in have led others to believe we’re still firmly stuck in the so-called “Dark Ages.” 

All this talk led us to unearth a 2007 paper by Dr. Michael Tan, a medical anthropologist by training and former chancellor of the University of the Philippines Diliman. Tan’s paper, entitled Filipino Keywords Related to Sexuality, attempts “to surface the ways in which Filipinos think of sex and sexuality, and influences or channels through which Filipino sexual cultures are developing.”

In short, Tan tries to discern the provenance of familiar words related to sex, provides context for their use in everyday conversation, and discovers just how much Filipino sexualities are deeply embedded in other spheres of life.

“We find the keywords reflecting the close linkages between food and sex, from perceptions of sexual pleasures being so sublime as to be called luto ng Diyos, to sex being a matter of tasting (tikim),” Tan says in the paper.

“The keywords also show the diverse influences that have shaped the way Filipinos think of sex and sexuality,” Tan adds.

Here are some words related to sex and sexuality that Tan mentions in his research paper, their corresponding origins and context, as well as some personal notes from Tan himself: 

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1| Titi

According to Francisco de San Antonio’s Vocabulario Tagalo, which was first published in 1624 and one of the earliest extant Tagalog-Spanish dictionaries “titi” used to mean to be “truly valiant.”

“Thus, to say titing tapang meant to be “valiantly brave” in the 17th century,” the paper says.

Of course, now it is the term we use for the male sexual organ.

2| Syoki

Syoki is a term used most commonly used before the 2000s that referred to effeminate men. According to Tan’s resources, the word is derived from a replacement of the lala in lalaki (male) with syo, or as a play on the Tagalog “suki” or regular customer. 

“It is more likely, as Manuel (1948) proposes, that syoki comes from Hokkien (Minnan) words syo and ki, meaning “with weak spirit,” which would make sense given the perception of effeminate men as “weak.”

3| Kantut and hindot

“The terms kantut and hindut are considered very vulgar, but kantut will often be heard in conversations, sometimes for the shock value,” Tan writes. “Kantutan, which gives the term a sense of mutuality, is also used often, together with a slang variation where the syllables are transposed to yield “totnakan.

“Kantut is not listed in Panganiban’s 1973 dictionary but there is an entry, hindot, described as “up and down movement of the waist in coition.” Panganiban lists a Malay word, enjut, which means “bob up and down,” as a possible cognate.”

4| Luto ng Diyos

Luto ng Diyos (“God’s cooking”) is often used to refer to sexual intercourse.

“The term seems to be more commonly used by middle- and low-income groups, and sometimes shocks people because it seems to border on blasphemy, considering the way sex is seen as so “sacred” that it should not be associated with religion,” Tan explains. “But the term should not be surprising considering the close association between eating and sex is found in many cultures. In the Philippines, the term “tikim” (to taste) is used to refer to sex, especially first sex.”

5| Metaphors for the male genitalia

The Filipino language has a wealth of names for the penis. Tan classifies them into the following categories: 

Those with connotations of weaponry, as in kanyon (cannon), baston (cane), batuta (stick used by the police);

Those taken from food terms, with phallic shapes, such as saging (bananas), talong (eggplant) and hot dog. “The use of food metaphors should not be surprising considering how sex and eating are so intertwined,” Tan says.

Animals, mainly the generic ibon (birds), ahas (snakes). “The usage here is flexible and playful, such as references to the anaconda to refer to a large penis.” 

Those with connotations of a little boy, as in totoy (a young boy) and pototoy (extension of totoy).

Names. “Manoy is one of many playful, sometimes affectionate, terms for the penis, as is Pedro, the local version of Peter (also used in American slang).”

6| Metaphors for the female genitalia

As in the male organ, the female genitals also have colorful words in the Filipino language. Tan categorizes them broadly into two: 

Flower. “No specific flowers are named, although it is interesting that the term pukinggan (like a puki) is used for a particular plant with flowers that do resemble the vagina. Its scientific name, Clitorea ternate, shows that botanists also noted the morphological similarity.”

Food. “The range of food items used as metaphors for female genitalia is much wider than that of males. There are pastries such as monay and bibingka (rice cake), quekiam (Chinese food made from meat), seafood (talaba), peanuts (mani to refer to the clitoris). Most of these terms suggest the form of the vagina, except for quekiam, which may be a play on the sound of “kiki.”

7| Supot

Supot can either mean a paper or plastic bag, or, in this context, with the stress on the second syllable, referencing an uncircumcised penis.

“To be “supot” is to be the object of ridicule and derision,” Tan says. “An uncircumcised male is believed to be physically weak and unable to produce children. Thus, when someone is playing basketball and is unable to shoot a ball, people will shout, “Supot!”, insinuating that this comes from weakness, and the weakness from being uncircumcised. Being “supot” also carries notions of being unclean. Peers will tease an uncircumcised man by wrinkling their noses when he passes by, to insinuate that being uncut, he smells from accumulation of smegma.”

8| Bayag

Bayag is the Filipino term for the scrotum. If in English, “balls” can sometimes relate to courage or daring, or nerve, the meaning is also carried over in Filipino.

“To say someone is walang bayag is to suggest cowardice, as in the English “no balls,” Tan says. “Curiously, in Tagalog, cowardice can also be described in terms of “puting bayag” (white balls), its origins now obscured but one is tempted to trace this to either the Spanish or American colonial period, where the white colonialists may have been the source of this derogatory metaphor.”

9| Burat

Burat is another term for the male genital, and is considered far more vulgar. But it has also come to mean “being upset.” Perhaps the most famous example is in one line in the Eraserheads song “Pare Ko.”

“Ako ay nabuburat na” is replaced with “Ako ay naiinis na” in the song’s radio edit as censors would not have allowed the song to air on radios with the original line.

10| Libog

Libog essentially means lust or the sex drive.

“Malibog is to be lustful, to be horny,” Tan says. “In Cebuano, nalibog means to become confused. It is tempting to speculate if at one time libog might have captured both concepts of lust and confusion. Libog is gendered. A man will boast about being malibog, but a woman would not. A man also uses the term “nakaraos” (relieved) to refer to satiated lust more often than a woman would.”

11| Terms for casual and transactional sex

Tan says too little attention is given to casual sex in the Philippine because sex work is more transactional. But casual sex has become more widespread through the internet and hookup apps. 

Unlike prostitution, which refers to sexual acts in exchange for money, transactional sex is sex in exchange for material favors. Tan identifies a few examples.

“In Baguio City, young people refer to chupit, a hybrid word taken from chupa or oral sex and gupit or a haircut. This happens when young men go to a bakla beautician who will give a free haircut, plus a beer or monetary compensation, in exchange for oral sex.

“In recent years there have been a number of terms referring to “easy to get” women. For example, bilat (etymology unknown) refers to adolescent girls who allow jeepney drivers to fondle them. 

In Cebuano, the term buntog has been used for a number of years now to refer to young girls, often homeless or stowaways, who engage in casual, transactional and commercial sex.”

12| Kabastusan

Tan writes about the words bastos and halay to kind of wrap-up his paper.

“Applied to sexual matters, the terms bastos and halay mean “lewd” and “obscene,” with the former used more often in daily conversations. Bastos is often used as a kind of blanket censorship to enforce a silence around discussions of sex and sexuality, i.e., any mention of sex runs the risk of a label of bastos.

“But the tensions remain. The term “bastos” makes sexual matters more alluring. Anyone knowledgeable about sex—in theory or in practice—is also called bastos in a tone that mixe(s) a bit of mock contempt with grudging admiration.

“The concept of “bastos” as lewdness tends to sidetrack a more important core meaning of bastos, which is that of disrespect. “Binastos ako” means that someone has been disrespectful to us, and this can mean both sexual and non-sexual matters, and could be through words, deeds, or even a whole demeanor, as when a child scowls at an elder.”

Tan cites an example involving the MTRCB, which suspended the critically acclaimed, award-winning TV show I-Witness for its documentary entitled “Hindi Ito Bastos: Lolas with Phalluses,” which featured elderly women dancing with wooden penises to greet newlyweds.

“The MTRCB’s decision reflected a cruder definition of bastos, a censorial term that sees anything sexual, including nudity, as lewd and obscene,” Tan says. “The decision lacked a contextual understanding of how the dancing is so much part of local culture, one which has been done for many years, out in the streets.”

You can read am excerpt of Dr. Michael Tan’s paper here.