Gay Bias
The Guardian,
January 27, 2003 http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,883592,00.html
Despite the equalisation of the age of consent, the Home Office is refusing
to remove from the sex offenders’ register men convicted of consenting gay
sex with 16 and 17-year-olds (Gay men snared by old law, January 27). It is
also refusing to amend the homophobic bias of the Sex Offenders Act 1997.
A gay man convicted of the consensual offence of gross indecency in a park
or sauna is, even today, required to sign the sex offenders’ register if his
partner is aged 16 or 17. In contrast, a heterosexual man aged 19 or younger
who is convicted of unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl is not
required to sign. The forthcoming sexual offences bill is an opportunity to
repeal this homophobic discrimination.
Peter Tatchell
London
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