Homosexual Law Change Urged

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31660, 22 April 1968, Page 20

Homosexual Law Change Urged

A change in the law so that private homosexual activity between consenting adults would no longer be a criminal offence would rectify a tongstanding injustice, according to the New Zealand Homosexual Law Reform Society. In one of two pamphlets which it has published for general distribution, the society says: “It is intolerable that nearly 50.000 men should be condemned as potential criminals on account of their emotional make-up.” Homosexual men in New

Zealand were among all classes and occupations. Your son. your brother or your friend might be homosexual. If so, he had a difficult problem to face and needed understanding, rather than persecution.

The pamphlet, which is in the form o' 50 questions and answers, argues that homosexuality is l not a disease, that the results of treatment are uncertain, and that the present law makes homosexuals easy victims of blackmail and more liable to suicide.

Dealing with New Zealand attitudes, it says that the Minister of Justice (Mr Hanan) has publicly disposed of some of the arguments against this law reform. How-

ever, the Government seems to have underestimated public opinion as reflected in many church reports. Entitled, “The Queer Law,” the other pamphlet is written by Mr C. J. F. Parkin, a lecturer in philosophy at Victoria University, Wellington, who is also an Anglican lay reader. He says that a change in the law, as in Britain last year, would encourage homosexuals to adjust themselves to society, and to seek advice and help without fear of being branded as potential criminals. “Unless the population of New Zealand is completely different from its counterpart in the rest of the world, the homosexual is just as likely to be a front-row forward, a university lecturer, a nurse, a truck driver, a shop assistant or a clergyman, as the male ‘pansy’ or female ‘horsey’ type of popular caricature.” Discussing whether homosexuals should avoid giving way to their sexual impulses at all, the question-answer pamphlet says: “Self control is a desirable virtue, and it is achieved by many homosexuals. “But it would be quite unrealistic to expect all of them to attain it all the time Many people find it very difficult to go through life without any sexual experience at all, and we must remember that the solution of marriage is not open to homosexuals as it is to the rest of us." The 'Homosexual Law Re-

form Society, whose officers include two Anglican bishops and three professors, as well as doctors and lawyers, plans to present evidence to the Parliamentary Petitions Committee next session.