Darkness from light
Sir: Why is homosexuality the one subject that leaves Spectator staff unenlightened? The otherwise sane Richard Ingrams is irrational about it, as I have pointed out before in your columns; Auberon Waugh is so obsessed by it he has developed a specialist vocabulary; and now you, sir, normally a man of reason and light, are led by it into wild inconsistency (Notebook, 14 February). . . . a person's openly proclaimed homosexuality,' you write, 'if he is for example a teacher, may be sufficient grounds for dismissal. And I wonder if that is so terribly wrong.' Yet side by side with that, on the subject of newspaper bias, you state: 'There is no reason why a person of strongly held political opinions should not be a reporter of irreproachable integrity.' Is there any more reason why a person of strongly held sexual tastes should not be a teacher (or anything else) of irreproachable integrity? This is a case of our old friend 'Only connect . . . ', isn't it?
Besides, if youare saying sexual tastes are the result of 'influence', then there should not be a single homosexual in the country, because the 'influence' is so overwhelmingly heterosexual. Conversely, there is no guarantee that a child who attends a school staffed entirely by 'openly proclaimed' heterosexuals will turn out heterosexual also. We are all (thank God) more complicated than that.
J. V. Stevenson 15 Olney Road, London SE17
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