How can something that is unnatural exist in nature? Everything that happens is natural. Unnaturalness is a nonsensical concept created by mere human projections on what ought to or should be.

Normality is subjective and shouldn’t be used to dictate what should be, otherwise the great scientific and civil rights successes couldn’t have occurred.

My first bristling thought while scrolling through the comments was to do with the means of reference. ‘The gays’? Really? Oh yes, those, them fags and dykes over there. Being ‘a gay’, this grammatical blasphemy really gets to me; you are either gay or a gay person. For the love of leather and motorbikes, please get it right, people!

I will not defend my sexuality or my choice of whether or not to make it publicly known [says she who posts it on the internet for all to read]. I was unable to attend the pride march because I was out of the country, which conveniently absolved me from stating the fact that I would not have attended anyway.

I understand that some members of the gay community have a lot to fight for, legally speaking; recognition, equality and so on. None of these issues affect me directly; I have no family to protect nor do I plan on having one in the near future, my employment is not jeopardized on the grounds of my sexuality and I have never been discriminated against or witnessed discrimination on the basis of which gender one prefers to get naked with.

Thankfully, I also plan to leave our beloved rock, so none of the politics will really matter to me in a year’s time. Me going to the pride march would be like a happily married and staunchly Catholic couple protesting divorce. The point is that those people who marched through Valletta had something to say about the way they are being treated. While those ideas may not apply to me, I recognise that to others, they are very important and the people in charge should listen. I can also empathise because as an atheist in Holier Then Thou-ville, my ideas are not heard either.

In truth, a pride march is needed because anything to do with the community, be it a gay-themed film, a demonstration or a book, is a political statement. For example, while media pertaining to straight love matches/mismatches/triangles/land mines can exist purely to entertain, LGBT-related media has a double duty; to entertain and to educate. This is simply due to the fact that there are many more straight folk than any others.

A gay pride march abroad [case in point; London, Amsterdam etc] is mostly a celebration i.e. yes we’re different: you know it, the politicians know it, we know it and now we shall dance on floats wearing very little clothing. Most of these countries have made great steps forward when it comes to serving the entirety of the population.

Locally, however, is a different story entirely. Here, the handful of demonstrators were less concerned with showing how comfortable they are with their sexualities and more so with the fact that mindless hatred and suspicion still determine whether or not a person is allowed to live the life they want to. The legalities are a much more pressing issue and frankly, I can see why feathers, glitter and tiny tiny thongs might detract from that statement.

Also, not all ‘the gays’ have style. We’re not genetically predisposed to perfectly matching those shoes with that pair of pants. Sadly, this stereotype just doesn’t hold up.

wasting real time about perverts and vulgar subjects. Let them stew in their own damnation.

1.a The inclusion of sexual orientation and gender identity within the remit of the Equality body (NCPE).
1.b Access to marriage for legally recognised transgender persons.
1.c The facilitation to Gender Identity Recognition.
1.d The inclusion of homophobic hate crime in national legislation.
1.e The provision of anti-discrimination legislation in the provision of goods and services to LGBT people.
1.f The recognition and protection of rights for same-sex couples.
1.g Non-discriminatory adoption provisions in terms of single parent, second parent and 3rd party adoption.
1.h Non-discriminatory recognition of reproductive rights.

I hope this clarifies matters.

[Daphne – I’m sorry, Gabi, but it doesn’t, because those really don’t look like rights to me. Unfortunately, if we get into an argument about this, we are just going to end up talking around in circles as always (not with you, but with others who also think those are rights). You fail to distinguish between the right to marry – which is indeed a right – with the ‘right’ to marry the person you love, which is not a right at all. Lots of people fall in love with others they cannot marry. It’s the same with the ‘right’ to form a family. You cannot interpret this as the right to adopt or the right to receive artificial insemination/IVF treatment off the state and so on – especially not when you are perfectly capable of conceiving in the normal biological manner but just refuse to do so. I’m going out on a limb here – and will probably be attacked on all fronts – but really, honestly, how much worse can a few minutes of sex with a man be than months of hormone treatment and IVF with all its attendant risks? I just don’t get it. If a woman wants a baby so badly, surely she can get herself to have horrible sex with a horrible man, for heaven’s sake? It’s not as though women, like men, have to be interested for the outcome to be successful. Maybe I’m being deliberately provocative, but I find these things so irritating, honestly. Big deals on all fronts, looking for hardship where there really isn’t any. Can you get a job? Can you make money? Can you live your life? Can you travel, visit family and friends, go out, have fun, go to the bank, eat in restaurants, drink in bars? Yes, you can. Where is all this discrimination you keep talking about. I think you’re probably a really nice person and I follow what you do through the newspapers, but I think you have probably been at the receiving end of far more discrimination and prejudice because you’re a woman than because you’re a lesbian.]

Daphne I would have to disagree with you. Not all gay men are whimpy and girly. There are plenty of butch masculine gay men. Plus it is unfair to say that just because a man may be effeminate then they are automatically going to be rejected by the army for that reason.

[Daphne – Edward, I didn’t write that all gay men are effeminate. I wrote that people do not walk into army recruitment interviews saying ‘Hi, I’m gay’ and that interviewers are not permitted to ask – therefore this is the only way it could be obvious, if the man is effeminate. Are effeminate men likely to want to join the army? I’d think not. But let’s say an effeminate man decides to interview for a position as a new recruit. Is he going to be turned down because he is gay or because he is psychologically and physically unsuitable? Meanwhile, the other gay man in the queue, the one who is not effeminate, is judged entirely suitable. And off we go. If we could stop being so touchy about this subject, we would be able to see the hilarity in that scene from Bruno, where Sacha Baron Cohen’s character joins the military. I laughed so much I had to be scraped off the floor.]

The army needs people who are going to do the job. A male recruit who is gay may be effeminate at first, but the training is there to make a soldier out of them. It might not change how they are out of uniform, but it certainly would change how they are when working.

[Daphne – Hardly. Soldiers fall into a very definite type, and the dominant characteristic is the willingness to suppress one’s individuality for the sake of the whole. Soldiers are trained to operate like machines, but there must be the raw psychological material to start with. The defining characteristic of effeminate homosexual men is their individuality and the need to nurture that. I can understand that entirely: wearing a grim uniform and being treated like a number/cog in the wheel on a daily basis would kill me.]

There are gay men in every butch occupation. Football players, Rugby players, machanics, etc. They are not effeminate. In fact you probably wouldn’t even notice they were gay. But this attitude of “all gay men are effeminate” makes life harder for those who are in traditionally masculine jobs to come out.

[Daphne – I think I’ve known that for about 30 years now. But the reason some people might think all gay men are effeminate (just as they think all lesbians are butch and masculine) is because those are the ones who can’t hide it, who are obvious. If all the rest creep around in the closet, what do you expect? The poster-boy for gaydom becomes the screaming queen hairdresser and the poster-girl the butch dyke warden slapping her ticket on your windscreen.]

However I don’t blame you for making that assumption. Many gay men are turned away from certain jobs or groups because the people running the show think that it s not the place for a gay man and want to keep it a manly place. (You think that is not discrimination? ) So all that is left for gay men is to go into a field that accepts them. That is why most gay men end up in stereotypically “gay men” jobs.

[Daphne – I’m afraid you’re wrong there. There are gay men in almost every organisation I have contact with in my working life, from the political parties to company offices. Nobody cares anymore. The gay lobby is out of step with reality. The fear is in themselves. You can’t hide homosexuality anyway. People can work it out. Fond mothers might believe that their son just hasn’t met the right girl, but everyone else knows what to think about men in their 30s and 40s who show no interest in women, or who go out on occasional ‘dates’ while keeping the woman at arm’s length.]

You have often said that people should get over the whole issue of sexuality and not make a big deal of it when a gay man or woman is successful in a field that is not known to be accepting of homosexuals. In fact I believe you have at times directed that at gay people themselves.

I have always thought this was wrong because a gay man can be a great footballer, soldier, policeman, etc, and still be gay and yet the norm is to send them packing when they try to enter such a field because they are not manly enough.

Therefore, a gay man in, say, rugby is a big deal, because it shows that actually there are plenty of gay men who are just as butch as straight men are, and in fact, their sexuality does not make them any worse at their job.

As far as I know an army recruiter is looking for someone who wants to do the job and wants to do the training. Their sexuality, or them being effeminate, has little or nothing to do with it. At least this is the case in countries like the UK.

So I fail to see your point.

[Daphne – You fail to see it because you don’t understand that the new rules have forced the military to take on people they don’t really want and who are entirely unsuitable, like women for instance. While women soldiers and sailors cannot be discriminated against, the reality is that men end up being discriminated against because when the first women soldiers who happened to be mothers were blown up on the front line, the public outcry was enormous. There is something primeval which makes people react with horror at the thought of sending young mothers to fight on the frontline. I think our instinctive reaction against this is correct, but equality is equality and you can’t have partial equality. The military had fewer problems when it was permitted to recruit only the people it wanted to recruit: tough young men mentally suited to regimentation. But nobody is allowed to say that this is a problem.]

Plus, you just proved me right. Oh look here s a gay man who is too effeminate for this so we re sending him on his way because he is not manly enough.

[Daphne – Edward, ‘manliness’ is an essential requirement in the army, if by manliness you mean physical toughness and psychological suitability for an arduous life. Even women recruits are required to be ‘manly’. So if an effeminate man is deemed unsuitable for army training, then it’s precisely because he doesn’t meet one of th4e essential requirements, and not because he likes to sleep with other men. The military is there to serve a purpose, and not for people to act out their Village People fantasies. Lesbians are not deemed unsuitable for recruitment on the grounds that they’re butch and manly. So what does that tell you? That homosexuality isn’t the issue here.]

That happens, not just in the army, but also in many fields. Who cares how effeminate you are?

[Daphne – An army recruitment officer for one. ‘This one isn’t going to struggle through a tunnel with muddy water up to his eyes in freezing weather with a 30kg pack on his back,’ he’ll think to himself. And he’ll be right. An army recruitment officer would say the same thing about me, and I wouldn’t go out complaining that he turned me down because I’m a woman. I’d say his assessment was spot on.]

So long as you do the job well enough then there should be no problem. But no! Businesses, employers, and organizations would not want to have an employee who behaves “like that” because they do not want to be associated with that kind of thing.

They do not deem it appropriate behaviour. No, I am not talking about a man walking into work wearing a pink bikini and heels. But even just the thought of an employee or member of an organization showing that they are gay puts employers off, not just because they are worried about their customers being put off by it, but because they are worried that it will threaten the masculine environment they enjoy.

[Daphne – Wrong, wrong and wrong again. Nobody cares. Believe me. Nobody does. The difference between you and me is that I actually work here. I know what I’m talking about.]

Yes, I know women are also pushed into fields that the straight men want them to be in. So you know what I am talking about. The difference is when you and other women voice your objection you are listened to. In fact there are also many songs empowering women, many female icons whose legacy is enshrined in history and celebrated.

When homosexuals voice their objection they are told to shut up and stop making an issue out of it.

[Daphne – The people who tell homosexuals to shut up and stop making an issue of it are right, I’m afraid. Homosexuals are NOT discriminated against and do pretty much as they please. Nobody cares. It is all in the mind, really. People worry about coming out of the closet in the same way that they do about leaving their husband/wife. Maaaaaaa! What will people think? The reality is that beyond the initial one week of gossip, nobody cares. Everyone is too busy with his or her own life to care about anyone else. X is gay? So frigging what.]

Any work of art that empowers homosexuals is seen as dangerous by many since it “promotes” homosexuality, and if a historical figure is shown to have been gay it is treated as slander. And what’s more the conservatives go around saying “ See they are out to turn everyone gay and bring civilization to an end- we must stop it” . How oppressive is that?

[Daphne – Oh come on. For centuries women were burned at the stake or drowned as witches, and we’re not still going on about it. I mean, who cares, really. Just live your life and stop bothering about what people say about paintings that ‘promote’ homosexuality.]

Cicio2010: I agree with you 110%

Daphne, I do not wish to be tiresome, but this discussion is lively and quite frankly I am looking into these arguments for the first time. I also admit that legal technicalities can be boring.

[Daphne – I wasn’t saying YOU are tiresome. What IS tiresome is the subtext: that homosexuals are a separate sex. They are men and women, like everyone else. Nobody gives a monkey’s what they do in bed – certainly not the law. Gender is the only thing that counts at law, which is why homosexual men were fully enfranchised persons when women were chattels.]

Whereas I agree with your point that gays or lesbians are (let me say generally in case I am missing something) men or women, this is only a physical issue (but which may imply some social consequences that may give rise to sexual discrimination, e.g. the traditional reason that women bear children and take leave from work to look after those children).

But, if two men apply for a job, and one is discriminated against because he is a gay person and is consequently not employed, the employer can argue that he did not commit any sexual discrimination, because both applicants were men and a man was engaged. Hence, no breach of the Equality for Men and Women Act.

[Daphne – You cannot prove discrimination in recruitment, not even between men and women, just as you can’t force a private company to employ somebody against their wishes. If they prefer the other person, for whatever reason, that’s their prerogative. The only thing the law does is force employers to conceal their preferences. All they’ll say is that the other person did better in the interview, and who’s to argue with that. You are looking into these things for the first time because you’re a man, and men in Malta remain blissfully unaware of just how blessed their state has been from birth. Your rights are assumed, and you have always been able to take everything for granted. I am not looking into them for the first time. I have lived with them all my life, as a woman born in Malta in the 1960s. Women of my age lived the first chunk of their lives in a position of legal, social and generally assumed inferiority to men. Up to 1993 – that’s right, 1993 – a woman could retain her rights only by remaining unmarried. The right to marry, in a supreme act of irony, became the right by which Maltese women LOST their basic rights. As for discrimination in the job market, don’t get me started. The last survey – last week? the week before? – showed that women in Malta still earn far less than men for the same work and the same job.]

However, the issue here would be that the gay person was not engaged not because of a gender issue, but because of a separate personal characteristic, namely sexual orientation. That is why I think it is important to give importance to the separation of gender from sexual orientation and to address them both in equality laws (with other characteristics, e.g. race, religion etc.).

[Daphne – All pointless. You might as well legislate to stop discrimination against tall people, short people, fat people, thin people, old people, young people, people with warts, people without warts…The only real historical discrimination in Europe has been men over women, whites over blacks and Christians over Muslims/Jews (and in Britain, against Catholics). Lesbians were discriminated against because they were women and not because they were lesbians, and homosexual men were not discriminated against because they were men. They got into trouble with the law only if they flaunted a relationship that included sodomy. But then heterosexual adulterers got into the same sort of trouble with the law – that was then, this is now. Homosexuals are allowed to have sex and so are adulterers. Nobody gets prosecuted or goes to jail for doing it. What exactly do homosexuals want except for marriage? I haven’t got a clue and nobody seems able to answer my question.]

The Equality for Men and Women Act deals with gender equality, not sexual orientation equality. Sexual orientation exists within the same gender, male or female.

[Daphne – For the millionth time, Maltese law is not concerned with sexuality. It does not give a fig for sexuality, which is precisely as it should be. It is concerned with gender. Malta does not need to legislate to end a situation of discrimination against homosexuals FOR THE SIMPLE REASON THAT THERE ISN’T, AND NEVER WAS, DISCRIMINATION AGAINST HOMOSEXUALS IN THE LAWS OF THE LAND. ON THE OTHER HAND, DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN WAS EMBEDDED IN OUR LEGAL SYSTEM AND OUR CONSTITUTION UNTIL RECENTLY. What you might have in mind is something different altogether: a law which makes it illegal for people to put up signs outside clubs saying ‘No gays’ or to advertise situations that are vacant with the rejoinder that no gays need apply. Nobody does that anyway. They wouldn’t, would they.]

Now I have since done some more research on this in Malta, and in fairness to them, MGRM did raise this subject already in 2008, ahead of the general elections. Here are their minutes from meetings with the political parties.
http://www.maltagayrights.net/politicalfront

As for the PN promise no. 235 referred to by the MGRM above, here it is below. It is vague on the one hand, but quite comprehensive on the other, and it is in line with my earlier thoughts. Where it may be limited is in its reference to the work place. Discrimination can take place anywhere.

“235. Il-Kummissjoni Nazzjonali dwar il-Promozzjoni ta’ l-Ugwaljanza tinghata responsabbiltà li tara li ma jkun hemm l-ebda tip ta’ diskriminazzjoni fuq il-post tax-xoghol u li thares kontra kull tip ta’ diskriminazzjoni fejn dan s’issa mhux kopert b’mod effettiv.”
So now it is a matter for MGRM to hold the PN to account to deliver on this promise.

[Daphne – Come again? What sort of discrimination in the workplace would this be? That homosexuals get 30 minutes for lunch while heterosexuals get an hour? Think about it: there CAN BE NO discrimination against homosexuals in the workplace. The potential for discrimination lies in the gender, not sexuality – like with the infamous factory case a couple of years ago in which women employees were made to notify their manager when they were menstruating. The last time I looked, lesbians menstruated too, but gay men did not.]

Then you’re homophobic, and any kind of phobia (an unexplainable fear of something) is a mental problem, and it is you who needs to see a shrink.

That’s what I meant to tell you on Monday, but I couldn’t write properly.

No matter how many articles and comments you write, homophobes will remain homophobes, especially those over the age of 35.

Last year I worked in what must be the most homophobic office in Europe and I got into countless pickles with my co-workers. I couldn’t stand their hypocrisy – listening to REM and Queen and Judas Priest all day long, but at the same time ending every single conversation (whatever the topic) on a homophobic note, usually instigated by the most major closet case I’ve ever met.

I would say nothing because I felt really sorry for him, but at times it got too much and I tried to make them realize what amazing things gay men have done for the world. They hated me for it. It shut them up for the day, but then it would start all over again.
I learned that with these people it’s really too late. They will not read your articles, if they do it’s only so that they can make fun of them. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.

I used to say, ‘Let them be, the next generation will be different,’ but then I overheard eight-year-old boys calling each other gay during a petty fight.

This is what activists need to do – educate children in primary and secondary schools, and get parents to collaborate. Think of that Some People Are Gay Get Over It campaign in the UK.

I was very lucky in that I never heard a single word against gays at home. The first time I saw Boy George on TV he was in amazing full make-up. When I asked my mum all she said was,’Yes, he’s a man.’

She did not tell me that he did nasty things for which he’ll burn in hell. When I was 10 I had the blessing of watching Maurice. When a year later our PSE teacher was telling us that homosexuality was a terrible deviance, it went into one ear and straight out the other.

With my friends it was different because they had not seen that beautiful love story.

So let the ultra-moralists on timesofmalta.com say what they will, what difference will it make? But those in their 20s – for whom marriage is the last thing on their minds – need to understand that if they’ll want to get a civil partnership at 35 or 40, then they need to show up in much bigger numbers at Pride.There’s no other way of giving politicians a run for their votes.