AND ANOTHER THING
From children to rent boys in one parliamentary vote
PAUL JOHNSON
Nothing is more disagreeable than hav- ing to write about male homosexuality. The editor of The Spectator is not at all keen I should do so and I don't blame him. Since Parliament made homosexual acts between consenting adults lawful, one of the most penetrative lobbies in British history has formed and made its weight felt. Editors who publish material critical of homosexu- ality are subject to all kinds of sanctions, from letter-writing campaigns to physical harassment. There is a violent group of yobbos and exhibitionists, a sort of Renta- sod, who specialise in breaking into offices and threatening anyone they regard as an enemy of the unlimited promiscuity they seek. Not long ago they attacked the Wim- bledon home of the Vatican nuncio, for instance. They are quite capable of making an editor's life hell. It is a disturbing thought that, in the space of a generation, a tiny minority who once went in fear of the law can now frighten even the powerful.
As a result of this campaign of intimida- tion, the current putsch to reduce the age of consent for male homosexuality to 16 has met with virtually no resistance in the media. I have counted a dozen articles in national papers written by members of the homosexual lobby, putting their case. I have not seen a single forthright statement of the case against, though some editorials have made caveats and one or two readers have managed to get letters of protest pub- lished. There is no question, of course, of broadcasting anything critical of homosexu- ality on radio or television. Quite the reverse. The duopoly puts out a constant stream of homosexual propaganda, from 'Gay Christmas' on Channel Four to argu- ments inserted, none too subtly, into the dialogue of sitcoms such as EastEnders.
The homosexual lobby thus has real power and there are plenty of people who, for a variety of reasons, climb on to its bandwagon. The Prime Minister is suffi- ciently desperate to solicit support from any quarter, including this one. He was the first to allow the lobby into No 10. Now his whips have privately put it about that he wants to reduce the age of consent to 18, and would look kindly on a backbencher tabling a motion to this end — 'Can't do it ourselves, old boy, what with Back to Basics and the constituency ladies not liking sodomy.' This characteristically sneaky approach has already won Major grateful backing from homosexual journalists. There are also self-publicists like Edwina Currie, whose motion in favour of a con- sent age of 16 neatly coincided with the publication of her flagitious novel. One of the many things the lobby is skilful at is boosting books.
Then came the clemarche of the agony aunts, who wrote a letter to the Times and waddled off to No 10, where naturally they got a genial welcome. They want the age of consent reduced because they can then publish (or invent) titillating letters from young lads with homosexual problems with- out fear of trouble from the law. Some of these aunts are less keen to line up with the lobby than others, just as some of them are more honest than others. But to stand out would have been noticed and possibly pun- ished. The word 'aunt' is facetious. It would be hard to imagine anyone less like the upright and lace-collared aunts of tradition than this shop-worn and bedraggled bunch. An investigation by Anne de Courcy in the Daily Mail noted that two of them are sin- gle parents, five divorced, two unmarried mothers, two are living with 'partners', one is a self-confessed adulterer, one is obsessed with plastic surgery and one had an abused childhood. Tough luck, I'm sorry for them. But who are they to give sexual advice to anyone more vulnerable than a neutered cat?
It is particularly disgraceful that, in this parliamentary move to expose teenagers to homosexual predators, the Labour Party should be baying with the lobby. The party was formed in 1900 to protect the working
`I'm a stubble designer.'
class, and that includes its children. Natural homosexuality, if one can use such a term, is almost unknown among working-class lads. They are the victims of corruption, the innocents who are seduced by middle-class teachers, probation officers, wardens of children's homes and the like. They then become the Piccadilly rent boys, the sol- diers and sailors who earn risky pocket- money in the parks, the human playthings bought and discarded by rich showbiz degenerates. Nowadays, all too often, they die of Aids while only in their twenties or thirties. Labour should protect these poor boys as it did in the old days, when there were plenty of trade union MPs prepared to speak out, in the authentic accents of working-class outrage, on behalf of their members and constituents. But nowadays Labour is a middle-class party controlled by pressure groups, and any MP who took on the lobby would be in danger of deselection.
There is not the space here even to out- line the serious practical arguments, but- tressed by overwhelming statistical evi- dence, against changing the law. Anyone who doubts this should read Stephen Green's sombre book, The Sexual Dead End, the best, most up-to-date and thor- oughly researched investigation into homo- sexuality. The dangers to which it draws attention are awesome and it is not surpris- ing that the lobby has worked hard to pre- vent it from finding a mainstream publisher or from being widely reviewed or stocked. But it can be obtained from the Conserva- tive Family Campaign, 26 Farm Avenue, London SW16 2UT.
Meanwhile, two points should be noted. First, the police find it difficult to enforce the age-law precisely and allow a two-year margin. So lowering the age of consent to 18 means in practice lowering it to 16, and a 16-year legal limit means that 14-year- olds will be fair game. Second, the public should know that 'Gay Liberationists' do not believe in an age of consent at all. As one of their publications puts it, 'For chil- dren between 10 and 18 there should be no legal restriction in cases which did not involve proven physical/psychological harm. Ten is the legal age of responsibility and if a child is deemed responsible for its crimi- nal acts then it should be responsible for its own sex life.' That is the ultimate aim, and a parliamentary surrender to the lobby now will be the first step towards securing it.
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