Saturday 4 July 2009

Squabbling for the gay vote

I have found it a little amusing to see the Conservatives and Labour squabbling over the gay vote in the last few days. Today it has come to a peak with the competition for photo opportunities and media coverage in connection with the pride march in London.

The squabble seems to have rather begun with David Cameron's apology for Section 28. Seeing the forcefulness of pro-gay advocacy since the repeal of that legislation, I am of the view that it was in fact a very prescient piece of legislation. Admitting to being a supporter of Section 28 is now tantamount to publicly admitting to mortal sin - but I think the suddenness of the political and societal about turn over Section 28 should give cause for careful reflection on the nature of moral discourse in our politics and in our culture. Basically, there doesn't seem to be any - just wholesale pragmatism and the "2+2=5" morality of 1984. The term "dictatorship of relativism" comes to mind.

Gordon Brown's observation that "you can't legislate for love" is, of course, thoroughly superficial in its failure to show any real grasp of the meaning of the term "love" beyond sexual licence.

Sadly, I think that Labour claims that the Conservatives are not really supporters of the gay rights agenda is misplaced. It is the at least tacit complicity of the Conservatives in the gay rights agenda that has enabled "new Labour" to see that agenda through as thoroughly as they have, in the legislative field and in the wider field of culture. In a completely different context, I recall thinking that C P Snow's novel The Corridors of Power showed tremendous political insight by suggesting that it would only be when the political right turned against the holding of nuclear weapons that the left would be able to see through their favoured policy of nuclear disarmament. I have the view that the same consideration applied to the gay agenda - new Labour would not have been able to see it through without support from the political right.

4 comments:

alban said...

Not having lived in the UK during the life of Section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988, I did a Google search and read a couple of articles as well as the relevant section of the LG Act. I think that, even if the Act had remained in force, the move to greater protection of the GLBT community would have continued; it appears to be a phenomenon in several parts of the world.

One must also remember that the Church decries any unjustified discrimination against people who are attracted to the same gender. I am certainly against any exclusion of gays from our shared profession of teaching in secondary schools. Ephebophiles of any sexual orientation would need to be barred from secondary education as anything else would be unfair to all concerned (including the teacher - who could, in theory, work quite safely in a primary school setting).

David Murdoch said...

I think that there should be promotion of tolerance and respect for people who have homosexual tendencies, but that there shouldn't be a promotion of sexual behaviour of any sort. People who are against gay people having sex are demonized unfortunately... even if those people have homosexual tendencies themselves.

It's not so unlike jewish zionists who call every person who criticizes Irael an 'anti-semite' even if the person criticizing is herself jewish.

God Bless,

Joe said...

Alban and David Murdoch:

Thank you for these comments, which I think make helpful observations.

Unknown said...

I seem to recall that there were teachers who, whilst opposed to the spirit of clause 28, argued that it wasn't going to affect their teaching because the clause said you couldn't 'promote homosexuality' and their response was you couldn't promote a state of being, which is how they saw homosexuality.

But then that introduces the question of are people, 'being' homsosexual or 'doing'homesexual?

There again, that may be over simplyifying the matter. Hetrosexual men, for example, may perform homosexual acts (the term 'rough trade' derives from confirmed/'being' homosexuals paying sailors-usually hetrosexual-to perform sexual acts) and I suspect that in boarding schools and prisons some males indulge in homosexual acts but revert to hetro once the opportunity arises.

By the way, I was reading Leviticus the other day -as you do-and it says that if a man has sex with an animal (and it is usually a man though I believe Catherine the Great had an unusual penchant for horses)the man and the animal are to be put to death.

Seems a bit harsh on the victim. Unless of course Leviticus is anticpating the idea that somehow in sexual crimes such as rape the victim is complicit. I believe we find an echo of this in Hardy's Tes of D'Urbervilles.