the abuse of human rights;

a clampdown on freedom of expression;

inciting a rabble to burn down a newspaper building, because that newspaper carried editorials critical of government policy, and with no regard for the people still working inside;

inciting another rabble to ransack the archbishop’s HQ, because the archbishop had resisted government policy on church schools;

arresting people on trumped-up charges because they did not agree with the government and failed to keep their head below the parapet;

allowing corruption to become rife at every level of the public service;

using thugs to control and terrorise ordinary people;

giving people passports and allowing them to buy plane tickets, but then restricting the amount of currency that could be taken out of the country to a sum so small that only those with access to bank accounts overseas, or those willing to smuggle currency out of the country, could actually travel;

restricting entrance to the university with the 20-points system that favoured anything but brains, intelligence and academic aptitude;

introducing an import substitution policy that kept all but the privileged few in a permanent state of relative want and deprivation (not actually starving or naked, but….).

I can add to that list but I have to write my column for tomorrow. The point is that when the chips are down, most people would opt for what this government has put into practice over divorce and abortion any day. The Labour government made have legislated for civil marriage, but then it went on to wreck the country and deprive us of some of our most basic rights. Please, no selective thinking.

Before the election, I pointed out to a dear friend who is a homosexual man that if homosexual people keep banging on with their single note they are in danger of being seen as bigoted as those they are most critical of. There are no rights that gay people need that heterosexual people do not also need. The mistake gay people make is to insist on ghettoising themselves: gay people need this, gay people want that, defining themselves by their gayness. Wrong.

If gay people want the right to marry, then please remember that there are other people who want the right to marry too, and that this is not a function of gayness or otherwise. How is a gay person in a less privileged position than somebody who cannot marry because he is separated? So you can argue that he could marry in the first place. Big deal. Gay people should realise that the only way forward in this country is to leave the psychological ghetto and stop talking about gay this and gay that. It is exactly as offputting and as alienating to everyone else as separated people ranting on about being separated.

As I also pointed out to my gay friend before the election, there is nothing that gay people have to put up with now that straight women haven’t had to put up with since the dawn of time. But check us out: we don’t bang on about it all the time. We deal with it.

cheers

Do you have a dead cert guarantee that the vacuum created as a direct consequence of the erosion of the church’s influence will be for the better and not for the worse as far as gays and womens rights are coincerned? There are worse things that one may carry in one’s hands nowadays ,apart from a santa.

I could go down the path of a debate about the historical accuracy of your list, the practical effects rather than the theoretical effects, bring into perspective the abolition of laws not enforced (mixed feelings on this one!) and so on.

I could also comment that one should be in favour of something because one believes in it, rather than to spite someone else.

But I won’t bother. The fact is that the labour party has been in a downward spiral since Mintoff took over from Boffa and now combines the worst of both ‘old’ and ‘new’ politics.

Labour may pay lip service to ‘progressive’ issues, but only as part of its sometimes effective strategy of telling every lobby what it wants to hear, including those in contraposition to each other. You may rest assured that the Labour santa wavers will be doing their best to counter act that lip-service.

Labour will do nothing, irrespective of whether or not it is ‘the right thing’ simply because it is the right thing, but only because it stands to gain more votes then it can lose. For labour, winning elections is not a means to an end any more, but an end in itself. The PN is not a hell of a lot better in this regard, but it IS better.

As I have had occasion to mention in other posts, the Santa wavers are all over the place, because the santa worshippers VOTE! They are a lobby, and a bigger lobby than most.

So the main point of my argument is that your money is not wisely spent. I am not suggesting you should have sent it to the PN instead. Quite apart from the fact that in view of the MLP’s financial state and management capability, sending money to the MLP is like giving money to a gambling addict, your money would have been much better spent by an organisation dedicated to raising awareness of the personal cause you justly support. If there is no such organisation, your 300 euros could be a start. But there IS an organisation, isn’t there?

When there is enough of that awareness, when one party arrives at the conclusion it has more to gain than to lose, then something might happen.

My conviction is that that party will not be Labour, even more so if it is done as a matter of principle.

That being said I am heartened to note from parts of your post, the confirmation of the idea that intolerance and bigotry are not the sole preserve of the straight white male category of which I form a part.

It strengthens my belief that all vices and virtues are equally distributed across race, gender, religion and sexual orientation.

The fact that I saw numerous gay persons frantically waving PN flags before and after the elections supports my theory that political allegiance (vice or virtue?) is also equally distributed across race, gender, religion and sexual orientation. Of course I’m not about to start attending labour functions to verify my statistics but maybe you can do that in five years time and we can compare notes? (AND you can keep an eye on your 300 euros, assuming it hasn’t been spent paying a fine for a libelous billboard!)

Now I take it Daphne is close to being past child bearing age and not thinking about having an abortion anytime soon or getting divorced from Peter, does that mean she has no right to speak up on the issues? I also take it that she is not interested in marrying a transexual in this liftime either? Does that make her opinion not worthwhile. I think not.

The reason I support divorce and abortion is that they will further erode the influence of the church in this country which for gay people is a good thing. The less influence the church has over peoples minds the less we are marginalized and denigrated by the tas-santa f’idejhom crowd. Similarly I want to see more women in positions of power and authority because they are far more sensible and sensitive when it comes to gay rights and don’t feel threatened by gay men. Plus straight women are in general more intelligent then straight men for the most part.

As for the cheque, Corinne, put yourself in my place or in the place of gay people if you can for one minute. Is anyone else offering us hope and the prospect of change other than Labour? My cheque is an investment in hope based on a proven track record of the MLP doing the right thing in the past. Some of the MLP’s accomplishments:

– Support for trade union rights.
– Votes for women
– Votes for young people
– Equal Pay for men and women
– Abolition of criminal statutes re adultery and homosexuality
– Civil Marriage
– Refusal to enforce criminal abortion statutes against women.
– Open minds when it comes to divorce and abortion
– Pledge to give partnerships rights to gays
– Support of legislation on progressive issues generally.

Based on this track record do I have cause for hope that the MLP will deliver for me and other gay and lesbian Maltese? I think so, don’t you?