Brody's Scribbles... Gay Liberation Front: Manifesto. Have We Made Progress Since 1971? (Part 20)

By Tim Trent (Dartmouth, England) MAR 25 | When I set out to analyse the Gay Liberation Front 1971 Manifesto I knew it would be a long series of articles. What I didn't know is that it would affect me as I wrote it. I had no idea it would bring back buried memories and insist that I confront them. It's a good thing I had no idea at the start, or I'd never have started. And it's a good thing I started, because I'd never have confronted them. It's been a very personal analytical journey.
If my own experiences growing up interest you please feel free to digress into them for a while. You may find some commonality with me, you may be nothing like me, but at least, if you choose, you know more about the bloke analysing the manifesto. When you've come back, if you come back, we'll look at the final segment:

CAMPAIGN 

Before we can create the new society of the future, we have to defend our interests as gay people here and now against all forms of oppression and victimisation. We have therefore drawn up the following list of immediate demands.

• that all discrimination against gay people, male and female, by the law, by employers, and by society at large, should end.
• that all people who feel attracted to a member of their own sex be taught that such feeling are perfectly valid. 
• that sex education in schools stop being exclusively heterosexual.
• that psychiatrists stop treating homosexuality as though it were a sickness, thereby giving gay people senseless guilt complexes.
• that gay people be as legally free to contact other gay people, though newspaper ads, on the streets and by any other means they may want as are heterosexuals, and that police harassment should cease right now.
• that employers should no longer be allowed to discriminate against anyone on account of their sexual preferences.
• that the age of consent for gay males be reduced to the same as for straight. 
• that gay people be free to hold hands and kiss in public, as are heterosexuals.

Those who believe in gay liberation need to support actively their local gay group. With the rapid spread of the ideas of gay liberation, it is inevitable that many members of such groups have only partially come to terms with their homosexuality. The degree of self-oppression is often such that it is difficult to respect individuals in the group, and activists frequently feel tempted to despair. But if we are to succeed in transforming our society we must persuade others of the merits of our ideas, and there is no way we can achieve this if we cannot even persuade those most affected by our oppression to join us in fighting for justice.We do not intend to ask for anything. We intend to stand firm and assert our basic rights. If this involves violence, it will not be we who initiate this, but those who attempt to stand in our way to freedom.

This gets right to the core. Most important it discards all the items that we've seen were a huge distraction - the tosh about getting rid of the family, for example, has gone.
The first two bullets are simple, direct and for the most part, happen in the UK and the European Community. The USA lags woefully behind. The third bullet is potentially controversial: That sex education in schools stop being exclusively heterosexual.
Even as a gay man I do not expect schoolchildren to be educated in the what-goes-where of homosexual sex. I view it as inappropriate. What I view as appropriate is age-relevant elements of sex education that both mention that homosexuality, male and female, exists, and that it is a normal but minority attribute of society, and then move on while answering questions in an age appropriate manner. We cannot ignore the simple fact that penis-vagina sex is the main topic of sex education. We must espouse that and validate it. We would not be here without it.

All the remaining bullets except the final one have been achieved in the civilised world. I need to mention that the USA lags behind, and that there is a very vociferous anti-gay lobby in action there, usually but not always founded on religious fundamentalism.

The final bullet we lack. We do not lack it legally, we lack it morally. And that lack is for men, not so much, if at all, for women.

It's usual to see two girls, two adult women, walk hand in hand, whether they are lovers or friends. It's usual to see girls and women peck on the cheeks, sometimes peck on the lips in greeting or farewell. Not so two boys, nor two men.

If you dare, and I don't care if you are heterosexual or homosexual, if you're a man, I challenge you to walk down your local shopping street holding hands with another man. You don't need to show affection, just hold hands. The reactions will not be universal approval. Depending in where in the world you are that is an understatement. In some nations you may get applauded, in others assaulted, and in others executed.

I'm not at all complacent, but I'd say we've come a huge distance. While you mull it over I've some background music for you:

We still need to stand firm, but the last 40 years have created a huge shift in society and in human rights. Tot the demands up. There are eight bullet points. Count them. We have at least six out of eight, probably seven. And the song says that Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad!