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4 — OUT IN HE MOUNTAINS —— NOVEMBER 1998

 

OP-ED:

BY GLEN ELDER

n 9th October 1998, the
new South Africa’s
highest court in consti-

tutional matters, the
Constitutional Court declared
the laws which crirninalized
sex between men unconstitu-
tional because they affected the
“dignity, personhood and iden-
tity” of lesbian and gay people
at a deep level.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and
transgender people, and their
South African heterosexual
counterparts have celebrated
this decision by the
Constitutional Court because it
affirms respect for diversity in
their society and equality for
all. But, it is sobering to note
that the criminal law punished
the expression of love for more
than 300 years. As the court
pointed out: “Equality delayed
is equality denied.” .

The ,presidi_ng Supreme
Court Justice stated on behalf

‘of a unanimous Court that the
common law offence on
sodomy, section 20A._ of the
Sexual Offences-‘Act, Schedule

I of the Criniirial;.P.rqcedureW' 5
Act and the Schedule of the
Security Officers Act were

unconstitutional. :
4- According .to_the ruling, any

personwho was charged, con-I

victed or suffered loss because
of committing consensual
same-sex acts under any of the
laws declared unconstitutional
has the right to approach any
High Court for appropriate
relief. 0 0 0
The Court held that the laws
that criminalize sam'e-sex»sexu-
al and erotic activity indepen-
dently breached the rights to
equality, dignity and privacy.
Judge Ackemiann said the laws
undermined self-esteem,
caused psychological harm and
legitimated violence and black-
mail against lesbian, gay,

_ bisexual and transgender peo-

ple. In addition the Court held
that: I

“The harm also radiates out
into society generally and*gives
rise to a wide variety of other
discriminations. which collec-
tively unfairly prevent a fair
distribution of social goods and
services and the award ofsocial
opportunities for gays. (para
36)

In its finding that the laws
breached the right to dignity,
the Court held that “at its least,
it is clear that the constitutional
protection of dignity requires
us to acknowledge the value
and worth of all individuals as
members of our society.”

The Court stated that the
“...[S]ymbolic effect [of the
law] is to state that in the eyes
of our legal system all gay men
are criminals. The stigma thus
attached to a significant pro-
portion of our population is
manifest. But the harm
imposed by the criminal law is
far more than symbolic. As a

~*resu‘lt‘-* o‘f~i~tl-re -'*-cr‘rrh'rr%al*o'fferrceg 1

Lessons on the pursuit of happiness

gay men are at risk of arrest,
prosecution and conviction of
the offence of sodomy simply
because they seek to engage...in
sexual conduct which is part of
their experience of being

of our privacy.

human. There can be no doubt
that the existence of a law
which punishes a form of sexu-
al expression for gay men
degrades and devalues gay men

in our broader society. As such
it is a palpable invasion of their
dignity and a breach of section
10 of the Constitution.”
Section 14 of the
Constitution states that “every-

Ifi in expressing our sexuality,
we act consensually and without
harming one another; invasion
of that precinct will be a breach

one has a right to privacy.” The
Constitutional Court made it
clear that its defense of the pri-
vacy rights of lesbian and gay
people was not an attempt ‘to

OP-

force gays, lesbians, and trans-
gendered people into the bed-
room or the closet. Personal
freedom and intimacy were the
cornerstones of defending the
right to privacy.

“Privacy recognizes that we
all have a right to a sphere of
private intimacy and autonomy
which allows us to establish
and nurture human relation-
ships without interference from
the outside community. The
way in which we give expres-
sion to our sexuality is at the
core of this area of private inti-
macy. If, in expressing our sex-
uality, we act consensually and
without harming one another,
invasion of that precinct will be
a breach of our privacy.

Equality, dignity and priva-
cy rights of lesbian, gay, bisex-
ual and transgender people are

now protected and enforced
through the Constitutional
Court decision

Today, South Africa joins
many countries that value free-
dom and equality in recogniz-
ing the dignity of lesbian and
gay people. But, as we cele-
brate, we remember Matthew
Shepard who died with the
knowledge that they were
denied the protection of the US
Supreme Court; we remember
the men and women in Iran and
Afghanistan who are routinely
imprisoned and punished
because of their sexual orienta-
tion; and, we salute the courage
of "people living in Zimbabwe
who are being blackmailed,
persecuted and charged under
the same common law offence
of sodomy. V

 .

ED:

0 BY JOY I). GRIFFITH

_ ?years of intervening
  ‘between Jesus :and
Matthew Shepard, how much
have we really learned?” stated

 you, in those 2,000

‘Rev. Roger Schmit of St. Paul’s

‘Newman Center University Parish

in Billings, Montana as he com-
pared the attack on Shepard to the
crucifixion of Jesus;

So many of us have been
thinking about the meaning of
being ‘Out viduring Matthew
Shepard.’ S final days_ that entered
our National Coming Out Week.
We have already taken important
lessons from AMatthew’s life of
being a strong believer in human-

ity and human rights in that all-

people should be ‘treated with
respect and dignity with the same
rights for pursuing happiness.

As I stood in the Ira Allan
Chapel October l0th talking to a
lesbian‘ friend about Matthew’s
fight for. life and. my" personal
pride in his openself-acceptance,
she said, “Yeah, I can understand
a lot about what he is going
through. I was gay bashed by two
guys last New Year-’s Eve as I rode
on my motor cycle in,Apache
Junction, AZ. They beat me with a
board‘ on my arm and leg,
knocked me off and continued
smashing my motorcycle with the
board!”

Matthew was 21 and my
Lesbian friend is 64. Fear is
always my ' innermost emotion
stemming from such shocking
revelations. Then starts the rea-
soning of how to grasp this inter-
nal attack and channel it into a
positive position. And then I
remember my life as a heterosex-
ual misfit transitioning into a new
life of becorrring a positive
Lesbian experiencing the joyous-
ness and acceptance that comes
with this deeper realization of self
worth. All of this happens within
seconds!

Coming out is an effective

apolitical ‘st-atemerrtu and: the‘: -most

Out

personally traumatic and yet the
most freeing event of our lives.
The energy released from self-
doubt, anxiety, self-resentment
and anger flows into strenghten-
ing the sense of well-being, the
heartfelt love-for humanity and
even an inner realization of (final-
ly) peace. Once we nurture our-
selves into an out healing, we
become our own leaders‘ in this
society along with the profession-
als in mental health, politics’, edu-
cation and religion to work
together against the social disease
created years ago by the misin-
formed and uneducated. The edu-
cational campaign has been start-
ed, but it will take more of us to
make our society aware that the
heterosexual conditioning,‘ propa-
ganda and violence against homo-
sexuals is what is truly sick and
damaging in our American society
today. A ’
My colleague in California
was visiting through an intemet
AARP (American Association for
Retired People) chat room. She
was chatting with an AARP
woman and asked if there were
any Lesbians in the. chat room.
Whereupon the woman she was
chatting with replied, “Oh no,
we’re older people and were not
into that kind of thing.” My col-
league responded to this stating

that she was aware that several

women she knows were going to
resign from AARP, because
AARP will not acknowledge
Gays and Lesbians. The AARP
woman said, “Well, I don’t know
enough about what it all means.” I
admired my friend’s open ques-
tioning and how she managed to
get the chatroom woman to
respond to her. What neither my
lesbian colleague or the AARP
woman knew was that “Lesbian
and Gay members of AARP had
complained about the heterosexu-
al presumption in the editorial
policy of its magazine Modern
Maturity.” One of their colurrmists

was ‘Gay; but he would never “

- 1996, American Families had a

cover story about a family who
loved and completely accepted
their lesbian daughter and her
lover Thenin 1997 AARP opened
its couples membership to
Lesbians and Gays, which entitle

them to a discount" on their
Medicare suppliment insurance
prerrriurns. And it saves treestoo,
since couples receive one copy of
AARP publications instead of
two! V

My Lesbian friend lived in an
apartment complex where their
mailboxes were in a single site.
One day, she invited one of her
neighbors, a gentleman, in for
cheese and wine and they discov-
ered that both of them had invited,
without success, his next door
neighbor for coflee. This was a
woman a few years younger...an
artist. During the course of the
conversation my friend suggested
that the artist might be Lesbian
“Oh, no,” replied the gentleman,
“she doesn’t look like one of
THOSE.” Of course my out friend
asked him if she looked like one.

He didn’t know what to say or’

how to react. It was sadly humor-
ous. He was on such a spot! He
stayed and chatted for a while, but
she never invited him back. When
their paths crossed in the complex
he was always friendly and just a
bit embarrassed.

We are handicapped by the
invisibility of g/l/b/ts. Census fig-
ures have a tremendous influence
on coverage of minority popula-
tions. In 1996, the Gay, Lesbian
and‘ Bisexual Officials‘ caucus of

eembfioutéofltheielbset«Eirral13titr’matlIei~.l}1aIi0Ra1a?1é€=33ll€2?a°f Cities

asked the Census Bureau to add a
question in the 2000 census which
would count Gay Americans in a
manner similar to that of racial
and ethnic groups. Many of you
already know that the Census
Bureau refused due to the non-

Coming out is an effective political  
statement and the most personally
traumatic, and yet the most freeing I
event of our lives. I

existence of any federal law per-
taining to a person’s sexual orien-
tation. This is why ENDA (the
Employment Non-Discrimination
Act) must be a priority issue.

In San Francisco, Gay and
Lesbian Outreach is partially
funded by Title III of the Older
Americans Act. They help over-
come isolation and homophobia
and promote social well—being,
but San Francisco isn’t the whole
country! We need to come out to
make these differences. The polls
continue to show that when- our
civil rights are challenged those
who know some of us personally
support us and those who have
never met any of us remain in
opposition. We need to change
prevailing social attitudes and
work to enlarge the liberties and

rights of the nation’s g/l/b/t com- .

munity. Harvey Milk said, “If a
bullet should enter my brain, let
that bullet shatter every closet
door.” But that statement is
Harvey Milk. As individuals, we
each have our specialty of who we
are and how we can let go of the
fear and find the path to keep nat-
ural balance in our lives. The bal-
ance of forces is Natural Justice
and her close companion is Truth.
Never shy away from Justice and
Truth again V

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