If at first you do succeed...

Last week we published a copy of Gerald Wall's proposed Amendment to Venn Young's Crimes Amendment Bill. The reaction was instant outrage, and a meeting was held on Tuesday 27th, with speakers from a number of groups, to decide on action against it. Gerald Wall attended this meeting and replied to criticisms; the reception was vociferously antagonistic.

But just how do you counter something like this? To state pages of the obvious — inhuman, repressive, Mediaeval? It seemed so. A rousing call to arms, echo of Tuesday night's meeting; a demand that supporters and opponents of Venn Young's Bill join forces before Wall has padlocked out lips forever. "I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." Who could fail to respond to such a call?

Well, Gerry Wall for one. Which made me think again . . . after all, he can't be the only one, doubtless there is a large number of people who believe that he is sincerely responding to a social need, and these people are not going to be swayed by a catalogue of the obvious, since they must have recognized it already and, for some reason, rejected it.

No, The call-to-arms polarizes; convinces two sides that they are right — a trap into which many of Tuesday night's speakers, and all of the interjectors, fell, to Wall's delight. Making emotional pleas and puns on his name only has effect when there is no opposition present. So, instead, I shall attempt — as far as is possible without physically gouging out both my eyes — to study the problem from Wall's point of view.

First: strip off non-essentials. In response to questions, Wall said that the 20 year age limit was chosen because that was the age limit in the Select Committee's recommendations (i.e. you're not allowed to know about it until you can do it); and he also said that "parents" could be added to those permitted to pass on the facts of life, although he claims it to be unnecessary since parents are permitted by the Courts to get away with anything anyway (i.e. the law is so imprecise anyway that one more vague Amendment won't make much difference).

Anyway, we need therefore concern ourselves solely with Wall's central intention: that "minors" must be protected from learning, by any means, that some people believe homosexuality to be "normal" (or something like it), thereby inducing a similar belief in the said minors. Why does he believe this? Why does he think it necessary to protect young people from such opinions, while not protecting them from the inescapable facts that murder, violence, hatred, rape, extortion, corruption and other undesirable traits are rife in human society and may therefore be thought of as "normal"? Telling someone that homosexuality has been observed to occur in every known society (fact) is "likely" to lead some under under 20's to reach the conclusion that homosexuality is therefore "normal". Presumably Dr Wall is also saying that the fostering of such a belief is liable to make them think that there is nothing wrong with committing homosexual acts, and so they may act accordingly. Now, of course, many of us see this as a sign of normal, healthy experimentation which has no permanent effect and can do nothing but good. But it is not relevant to this case. Suppose you do think that homosexuality is to be avoided like murder, rape, and the rest; is telling someone that it is "normal", by publishing a book for instance, likely to lead a heterosexual youth into homosexual behaviour? Well, when you heard that 50% of U.S. farm labourers have at some time committed bestiality, did you rush off and screw a pig?

So why has Wall done it? (I mean produced the Amendment). At Tuesday night's meeting he gave his major reasons.

One: The Speijer Report which was good enough to convince the Dutch Parliament that homosexuality is harmless, is not good enough to convince Dr Wall. He doesn't believe it when it says that you cannot change someone's sexuality after a very early age.

And there, dear friends, we have the reason. The comment made at the meeting rings true: Dr Wall's mind is like an adding machine. Or perhaps a pinball machine which offers a three-year replay when you reach the total of 15,000 votes or so.

However, Dr Wall, among others, probably rests with an easy conscience, for those who do not like his measures are wont to attack him on two apparently contradictory grounds. Firstly, he is accused of neglecting the wishes of his electorate when he passes something they don't want; but on the other hand he is accused of vote-grabbing when he gives them something they do want, but is thought harmful by more educated groups. But there is no contradiction, for an MP has two broad duties. The first, the easy one, is to follow the will of the people who elected him whenever his decisions will be in the limelight. The second is usually reserved for the Minister of Finance, who is generally accepted to know more than the average bod about money: it is to use the research facilities available to him to find out whether public opinion is based on justified belief. And I think that even Dr Wall will admit that the belief that there is something wrong with a person, or something dangerous, if that person is homosexual, is a completely false belief — more, a harmful belief which is wrecking the lives of thousands of people.

Here is a reply to the above letter. It is the sort of reply Dr Wall would write if he were a man of courage rather than one fond of his job.