There is an article in the Internet that Identifies the Male Babaylan as Asog. And this article can be found at The Aswang Project. I have nothing against Jordan Clark which is the Author and Publisher of The Aswang Project, he is just a researcher and what he is sharing is just a research and made by other person.
The Aswang Project have quoted the works of According to Milagros Geremia-Lachica’s which is alsoa researcher that :
some of the Spanish friars managed to chronicle religious practices of our ancestors headed by women. Yet they also found male priests who preside during sacred ceremonies. These male were properly called Fray Alcina, one of the Friars who took a keen interest on the early religion of our ancestors, elaborated as follows:
Alcina also added that society might tend to have degrading outlooks towards a man who is found incapable of partaking his role as a male, for it is expected of him to take part in the practice of matrimony and to beget children. For “effeminate men” who found themselves in this kind of position, becoming an is an alternative way to claim what would be perceived at this moment in history as their lost honor. Their traits and life style which lean towards being a female categorically puts them appropriately to the woman-centered class of
I SEE THIS ARTICLE AND STATEMENT AS AN INSULT TO OUR RACE CALLING A MALE BABAYLAN AS ASOG BECAUSE OF BEING IMPOTENT AND EFFEMINATE.
OUR ANCESTORS DO PRACTICE GENDER EQUALITY, IT IS DURING THE TIME OF SPANISH COLONIZATION THAT HAD GENDER ROLES AND IDENTIFICATION THAT EVEN EXTEND TO OUR UTENSILS AND APPLIANCES SUCH AS OUR SPOON IS CALLED LA KUTCHARA FOR BEING FEMALE AND EL TINIDOR FOR FORK AS MALE.
If we can recall Lakapati, which is a Second Generation Divinity of our Land being known as Female Diwata but also have Male aspect so as the Famous Bathala who has been always depicted a Patriarch Divinity but actually has its Femine Aspect as well.
Now-a-days, people make gender of Titles such as for Male Religous leader they will call as Pastor and for Female they will call Pastora. Male Healer as Doctor and Female as Doctora. In the use of English Language Doctor is doctor whenther the practitioner is male or female. The Babaylan is a Babaylan whether ther are born male or Female.
It is sad to say that because of the influence of our Colonizer, the colonized Filipino have this mindset of identifying our selves in accordance to gender roles and pronouns.
Notice our Tagalog word, we do not have pronoun for He, His, Him/ She, her, hers. When i am going describe a male person in English such as He is Handsome whereas in Tagalog we describe him as sya ay gwapo. and for female as she is beautiful while in tagalog sya ay maganda.
Male pronoun= He in Tagalog is Sya
Female pronoun=She in Tagalog Sya
Hilot Academy of Binabaylan 