Tar and feather talk

Press, 24 September 1987, Page 14

Tar and feather talk

It was probably inevitable that in the climate of fear occasioned by the acquired immune deficiency syndrome, A.1.D.5., some pretty way-out, not to say cranky, "remedies” would emerge. It was probably also inevitable that some people would seek to manipulate the climate of fear to their own ends. Thus the bizarre notion that by closing its ports to warships — apparently of all flags, though only the United States is mentioned by name — New Zealand would stem a plague of the infection. Jolly Jack Tars have a deserved reputation for an aversion to celibacy when in exotic and distant lands. It follows as night does day that sexually transmitted disease is not unknown in the sick bays of the fleet, and that the A.I.D.S. virus will also be found. But why ban just navy seamen? The polyglot crews of merchant shipping have no special immunity from libidinous liaison or from A.I.D.S. Indeed, the generally higher level of discipline and of medical care in the armed service probably means there is a greater chance of infection among the much more numerous merchant seamen.

Why stop with seamen? Any person engaging in unsafe sex anywhere is at risk. Testing every traveller or visitor to New Zealand for A.I.D.S. at the moment of entry to the country, even if such a monstrously costly programme was physically possible, would be no guarantee that further sources of infection could not slip in. The incubation period between infection with the virus and its being discernible in the tests available is too long. This delay, of course, actually reduces the chance of the virus arriving by sea unnoticed by comparison with faster air travel. The real purpose of the proposition becomes clear with identification of its source: an activist for “peace” of that singular variety obtainable only by ends prescribed by the activist. The real target of the proposal is not the A.I.D.S. virus, but visits by warships “nuclear or not.” The argument is perverted and lacks in frankness. The featherweight proposal furthers neither the containment of A.I.D.S. nor the securement of peace.