Life After Clause 28

Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 Afterword: Manchester March, 1988, Prof. Em Temple-Malt University of Staffordshire ‘SECTION 28’ HOLDS A CERTAIN mythical, symbolic power for sexual minorities of all generations. There are different stories to be told about Section 28 depending not just on who is telling the tale, but when the story is being told. Those living and writing about their lives during the 1980s recall decades of public moral censure which forced many to lead hidden lives to avoid becoming tainted by the glare of the stigmatising spotlight of homosexuality. Others joined political groups and critical communities which allowed them to confidently and unapologetically display their non-hetero sexuality in public. For some though, this carried the risk of becoming estranged from one’s family-of-origin. Living under a Thatcher-controlled Conservative government was especially grim. Key memories include a moral panic about the demise of ‘the (nuclear) family’, the HIV/AIDS epidemic that was decimating huge swathes of the gay community, mothers and fathers who could no longer pretend to be heterosexual, leaving opposite-sex partners to set up homes with someone of the same sex, risking the loss of their children. Stories told in later decades, with hindsight, are more optimistic in tone. The 1980s is the era where things began to more visibly change. Enduring decades of stigma and vulnerability was what seemed to galvanise and mobilise certain members of the lesbian and gay community to 394 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 campaign for equality of opportunity and relational rights. In 1986 Labour-led Haringey Council produced a manifesto that sought to prioritise ‘equality of opportunity’ and included a section on Lesbian and Gay Rights.1 The idea of ‘Positive Images’, referred to the need for all sections of the community to have access to a series of successful role models that young people could look up to, which would go some way to counter societal prejudices and derogatory stereotypes. Education was seen as a way of communicating positive messages about lesbians and gay people to ensure future generations of adults would know there were options other than heterosexuality and help end discrimination against lesbians and gay men.2 The Lesbian and Gay Unit within Haringey, wrote to local Head Teachers in the summer of 1986 to remind them of the commitment to ‘equality of opportunity’, and to include positive images as part of their education provision. This letter was leaked to the local press and government.3 Given the way social attitudes are these days towards LGBT people in the UK, you could be forgiven for wondering how on earth this seemingly simple act caused such controversy. Some sections of society (academics, parents’ rights groups, etc.) interpreted the ‘positive images’ policy and the suggestion that schools might teach young people about alternative ways of doing adult relationships as a real threat to morality and the heterosexual family.4 In the 1980s, there was a sense of alarm about the stability of ‘the family’; it was thought to be in crisis. The family wasn’t in crisis. Instead, the Conservative’s ideological perception that the family should be independent from state intervention and self-sufficient5 was at risk.6 Over two decades, easier access to contraception and the availability of ‘no fault’ divorce in 1971 had altered people’s attitudes to, and the way people were conducting their family relationships. This change in attitudes led to greater diversity of family relationship types. Alongside the familiar, nuclear family there were divorced and reconstituted families with step-children and lone mothers.7 More couples 395 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 EM TEMPLE-MALT were cohabiting (living together as a way of trying out the relationship before marrying). A rising divorce rate intimated that the taboo on ending marriages was lessening; women were less willing to endure unhappy marriages.8 That families might be undergoing transition and in flux in greater numbers, meant they might temporarily need support from the Welfare State which was alarming to the Conservative government.9 The Clause 28 bill emerged as a way to respond to the specific anxiety that the heterosexual family was under threat from the ‘positive images’ policy.10 It was thought that introducing this legislation would curb the actions of Labourcontrolled local authorities’ (e.g. Haringey, Brent, Lambeth, Manchester) plans for the introduction of ‘positive images’ in education. The bill was drafted by Lord Halsbury and submitted to the House of Lords in December 1986. A year later, Conservative MP David Wilshire introduced Section 28 in the House of Commons in the final stages of the preparation of the Local Government Act. It was during parliamentary debates about Clause 28 that some Conservative MPs grossly distorted the actions of Labour-controlled local authorities characterising their ‘positive images’ policy as promoting homosexuality, accusing them of giving lesbian and gay individuals ‘special treatment’ and misusing ratepayers money. David Wilshire for instance, specifically accused the Greater London Council (GLC) of misusing rate-payers money by funding the publication of books such as Susanne Bosche’s Jenny Lives with Eric and Martin (1983). Opposition to the introduction of the bill was taken up by Labour and some Liberal Democrat MPs. They tried to challenge the notion that schools were promoting homosexuality. An example can be seen in the parliamentary speech made by Mr Ken Livingstone in 1987: The survey showed that children who were homosexual felt that they had had no assistance at school. So talk of promotion is nonsense [...] 396 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 Much of what has been said has been deeply offensive to millions of lesbians and gay men in this country. It is particularly obscene to hear their relationships dismissed as pretending. I know several lesbian mothers who have struggled to come to terms with the discovery of their lesbianism after marrying and having had children. They have had to face the problems of the divorce that follows, and have had to fight to keep their children, because they loved them [...] To dismiss those relationships as pretence is incredibly unhelpful to the thousands of women who struggle to continue to be able to raise and care for their children. [...] The leadership of the Labour Party were criticised for not adequately challenging the Conservative government’s characterisation of the ‘positive images’ policy as promotion of homosexuality.11 Outside of parliament, lesbian and gay men came together in various ways to oppose the introduction of the clause. Examples, included lesbians and gay men creating political alliances in an effort to oppose the introduction of the clause.12 Negotiating and agreeing on which issues to campaign about was fraught13 because many gay men and lesbians were influenced by different political ideologies (e.g. socialism, feminism). We are given a glimpse of the tense atmosphere of these negotiations in Jacques’ story where the women activists ridicule the Clone Zone advert featuring the man with the ‘pineapple down his knickers’. Their particular problem was the explicit and seemingly flaunting display of gay men’s sexuality. A resolution of sorts was reached, where the groups would only campaign against issues that lesbians and gay men both experienced. Despite this, the final issues that were campaigned about were criticised because they seemed to be ‘elitist’, focusing on access to theatre, literature, the arts and charities which meant less visible and powerful group’s issues were neglected (e.g. LGBT parents).14 Other enduring examples that have entered 397 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 EM TEMPLE-MALT LGBT folklore, are the stories of lesbian protestors who abseiled into the House of Lords when the House voted in favour of including the Clause in the Local Government bill. And the now infamous invasion of the BBC’s Six O’ Clock news, during which one protestor managed to chain herself to Sue Lawley’s desk and was sat on by Nicholas Witchell. The impending threat of the introduction of Clause 28 encouraged many ‘ordinary’ LGBT individuals to come together in mass opposition rallies all over the UK.15 While the stories of the sexual minorities’ opposition to the introduction of the Clause leave a powerful memory, the efforts of those opposed to the Clause didn’t manage to halt the passing of Section 28 because it entered law in May 1988: 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or publishing material (1) The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the [1986 c.10] local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity) – ‘2A Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material 1) A local authority shall not – (a) Intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) Promoting the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. 2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease.’ Contentiously, the law that was designed to prevent local authorities introducing ‘positive images’ into education had little practical effect in that regard. Instead, the Clause had a major impact on the everyday lives of lesbian and gay men, 398 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 making people more cautious about displaying their nonheterosexual identities and funding for lesbian and gay services was dramatically reduced.16 The ending of Jacques’ story is compelling, in particular its pragmatic ambivalence and aspirational sense of hope: ‘Now things are…’ I hesitated. ‘I don’t know if they’re better, but they’re not getting worse. I guess they’re just different.’ ‘And they’ll change more once we finally get rid of that objectionable law.’ It took a further 15 years to repeal the ‘objectional law’. It is unlikely that the repeal itself led to change. The reverse is more likely. It became possible to repeal the legislation because social attitudes towards sexual minorities in the UK had transformed profoundly over the previous 15 years. Traditionally, same-sex relationships had been cast as illegitimate, inferior, a threat to the heterosexual family and were expected to be invisible. In the decade after Section 28 was introduced, the public profile of lesbians and gay people became more visible.17 LGBT organisations like Stonewall (founded in 1989 in reaction to the introduction of Section 28) were instrumental in bringing the private stories of lesbian and gay people out into the public domain. Stonewall’s strategy was to give visibility to particular lesbian and gay issues with their equal rights agenda and sought incremental change on the grounds of equality with heterosexuals.18 During their first-term, the ‘New Labour’ government initiated the repeal of Section 28 in 1999. It was finally repealed in 2003. Reasons for repealing the legislation included a commitment to ending ‘unjustifiable discrimination’, that the legislation was perceived to be offensive to lesbian and gay individuals and Section 28 was perceived as redundant.19 The repeal of Section 28 in 2003, in comparison to its 399 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 EM TEMPLE-MALT introduction in the late 1980s seemed to be a more dignified event, evident from the relatively benign treatment the repeal elicited from the national press and the absence of sustained public opposition. Rather cynically, that the repeal slipped quietly through, might be because the public and media were preoccupied by allegations that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Parliamentary debates where MPs supported the repeal were replete with examples of the routine everyday discrimination that lesbian and gay people faced. For example, in his 2003 parliamentary speech, Chris Bryant MP spoke of gay men and lesbians having to ‘think twice before booking a hotel room’, or ‘taking out a mortgage’, and think ‘three, four or five times’ when writing a will, out of fear of how others might react.20 Bryant’s ability to talk openly and compassionately about the daily lives of sexual minorities in parliament was indicative that attitudes towards them had changed. Also indicative of this change is the series of ‘equality’ measures introduced by the Labour government, designed to reduce discrimination and injustice (for instance, the Children and Adoption Act 2002, the Civil Partnership Act 2004, Gender Recognition Act 2004, and the Equality Act 2010). In the decade following the repeal of Section 28, there’s been a seeming shift in the way sexual minorities are represented in popular culture. Lesbian and gay people’s experiences are increasingly ubiquitous, becoming part of the ‘wallpaper’ of everyday life, feeling less tokenistic and more ‘ordinary’.21 Turn on the telly or tune into the radio, we have popular soaps on the telly all featuring LGBT people, and the story-lines in which they feature tend to be about regular issues rather than sensationalist, narrow issues around sexuality. Some of our best loved talk show hosts and radio presenters just happen to be gay. Pop songs and music videos in a similar way feel inclusive, portraying the everyday lives of sexual minorities such as Carly Rae Jepson’s ‘Call me Maybe’ (2012) where she pursues a lad she has a crush on, only to discover he is attracted to men. More recently, Clean Bandit and Zara 400 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 Larsson’s ‘Symphony’ (2017), depicts one man’s grief because he has lost his male lover. Take television adverts, we see that sexual minorities are being recognised and equally targeted as consumers. In March 2016, an advert for Lloyds TSB titled, Taking that Next Step depicted key phases of their customer’s everyday lives such as birth of a child, first days at school, first teen kiss, a surprise marriage proposal and grieving relatives at a funeral. In the months after this advert aired, giant billboard adverts followed up with stills from the advert, as well as variants on its theme: one version featured a man on bended knee proposing to his male partner; another showed the outcome of this proposal, with the tag-line: ‘He said “Yes”’. I noticed these particular versions on certain sites: on the London underground, on Princess Parkway in Hulme, Manchester, and so on. While these developments are cause for celebration and markers of inclusivity and progress, we shouldn’t be naïve, about their limitations. The representations of sexual minorities that are available for other’s consumption are not inclusive and are providing uneven opportunities for display. They only include people who fit strictly prescribed parameters of ‘homonormativity’. Whilst people in the UK may now be enjoying an ‘era of equality’ where non-heterosexual people no longer feel compelled to censor their sexual orientation in public, in other parts of the world this equality is still a long way off. Let’s consider just two examples. In Russia, in June 2013, an act of parliament was passed that was designed ‘for the purpose of protecting children from informal advocating for a denial of traditional family values’ - in common parlance ‘The Gay Propoganda Law’. Sound familiar? Since the passing of this law – the Western media have been keenly reporting the plight of sexual minorities living in Russia. Liz MacKean’s Channel 4 Dispatches documentary Hunted: Gay and Afraid (2014), for example, draws connections between the passing of this law and the increasing instances of gay people being ‘hunted’ and persecuted for their sexual 401 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 EM TEMPLE-MALT orientation. Presently, a lot of UK media coverage is focusing on the use of concentration camps for sexual minorities in Chechnya. There are also the accounts emerging from researchers studying the everyday lives of Polish sexual minorities (and well as Russian).22 Common experiences, their participants report, include the difficulties of daily life without recourse to legal and social protections, the threat of estrangement from families-of-origin, and a strong sense that same-sex desires and relationships should not be publicly displayed for fear of psychological, physical or sexual violence. The experiences of these Russian and Polish participants bear striking similarities to the stories that emerged in the studies carried out in the 1990s about the everyday lives of sexual minorities in the UK.23 Telling stories to different audiences about the everyday lives of sexual minorities over the last half century has played an important role in eliciting change. Indeed it remains a vital tool for disrupting heteronormative thinking and facilitating greater awareness about sexual minorities’ daily lives. Notes 1. Cooper, D., (1989) ‘‘Positive Images in Haringey’: A struggle for Identity’ in: Jones, C., and Mahony, P., (eds.). Learning Our Lines. Sexuality and Social Control in Education. London. Women’s Press. p50. 2. Ibid, p47. Weeks, J., (1991). Against Nature: Essays on History, Sexuality and Identity. London, Oram Rivers Press. pp. 137-138. 3. Cooper, 1989, op. cit. p50. 4. Durham, M., (1991). Sex and Politics: The Family Morality in the Thatcher Years. Basingstoke. MacMillan. Morgan, P., (1998). ‘An Endangered Species?’: in David, M.E., (ed.) The Fragmenting Family: Does It Matter? London. IEA Health and Welfare Unit. Haskey, J., (1998). ‘Families: Their Historical Context, and Recent Trends in the Factors Influencing Their Formation and 402 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 SECTION 28 Dissolution’: in David, M.E., (ed.) The Fragmenting Family: Does It Matter? London. IEA Health and Welfare Unit. 5. Segal, (1983). ‘The Heat in the Kitchen’: in Hall, S., and Jacques, M., (eds.) The Politics of Thatcherism. London. Lawrence and Wishart, p209. 6. Reinhold, S., (1994). ‘Through the Parliamentary Looking Glass: Real and Pretend Families in Contemporary British Politics’: Feminist Review. 48, p61. 7. Evans, D. T., (1993). Sexual Citizenship; The Material Construction of Sexualities. Routledge. London. p71. 8. Beck, U, and Beck-Gernsheim, E., (1995). The Normal Chaos of Love. Translated by Ritter, M., and Wiebel, J., Oxford. Polity Press. 9. Silva, E.B., Smart, C., (eds). The New Family? London. Sage. Jamieson, L., (1999). ‘Intimacy Transformed? A critical Look at the ‘Pure Relationship’: Sociology. 33. (3). Weeks 1991, op. cit.. 10. Levidow, L., (1989). ‘Witches and Seducers, Moral Panics for Our Time’ in: Richards, B., (ed.) Crises of the Self, Further Essays on Psychoanalysis and Politics. London. Free Association Books. Reinhold, S., (1994) ), op. cit. p62. 11. Thorp, A., (2000). The Local Government Bill [HL]: The ‘Section 28’ Debate. Research Paper 00/47. p87. Weeks, J., 1988. ‘Clause for Concern’: Marxism Today. February Vol. 78. Sanders S., and Spraggs, G., (1989). ‘Section 28 and Education’ in Jones, C., Mahony, P., (eds.) Learning Our Lines, Sexuality and Social Control in Education. London. The Women’s Press. ‘Clause for Concern’: Marxism Today. February Vol. 78, p2. 12. Healey, E., (1994). ‘Getting Active: Lesbians Leave the Well of Loneliness’. In Healey, E., and Mason, A., (eds.). Stonewall 25, The Making of the Lesbian and Gay Community in Britain. London. Virago Press, p95. 13. Cooper 1989, op. cit. p70. 14. Thorp 2000, op. cit. p10; Sanders and Spraggs 1989, op. cit. p102; Healey, op. cit. p95. 15. Smith, C., (1994). ‘The Politics of Pride’: in Healey, E., and Mason, A., (eds.). The Making of the Lesbian and Gay Community in Britain. London. Virago Press ltd. 403 9:19 PM Pa Protest - missing intro, proofs and final drafts (laura).qxd 5/15/2017 EM TEMPLE-MALT 16. Weeks 1988, op. cit. pp2-3. 17. Cruikshank, M., (1992). The Gay and Lesbian Liberation Movement. London. Routledge. p172. 18. Stonewall’s reliance on campaigning for equal rights with heterosexuals as a way of ending discrimination against sexual minorities has been met with criticism, suspicion and has not been welcomed equally by members of the LGBT community. Stonewall, (1998). The Case for Equality. London. Stonewall, (2003). Repealing Section 28 Parliamentary Briefing. London. See also: Rahman, M., (2004). ‘The Shape of Equality: Discursive Deployments during the Section 28 Repeal in Scotland’: Sexualities. 7 (2), and Bamforth, N., (1997) Sexuality, Morals and Justice, a Theory of Lesbian and Gay Rights Law. London. Cassell. 19. Hansard. HC-Deb-10-March-2003-c65. 20. Ibid, HC-Deb-10-March-2003-c64. 21. We haven’t quite reached that same level with bisexual and trans’ people’s experiences. See: Heaphy, B., Smart, C., and Einarsdottir, A., (2013). Same-sex Marriages, New Generations, New Relationships. Palgrave MacMillan. Houndsmill. 22. Stella, F., (2012). ‘The Politics of In/visibility: carving out queer space in Ul’yanovsk’: Europe-Asia Studies. May 2012. Ambramowicz, M (ed). (2007) Situation of Bisexual and Homosexual Persons in Poland 2005 and 2006 Report. Lambda Warsaw. Mizieli?ska, J., (2010). Between Silencing and Ignorance: Families of Choice in Poland. Dialogue and Universalism. 5/6. Mizieli?ska, J., Abramowicz, M., and Stasi?ska, A., (2015). Families of Choice in Poland. Family Life of Non-heterosexual Persons. Report. (Accessed 5.9.2015) Available at: http://rodzinyzwyboru.pl/wpcontent/uploads/2015/03/Families-Of-Choice_Report.pdf 23. Weeks, J., Heaphy, B., and Donovan, C., (2001), SameSex Intimacies, Families of Choice and Other Life Experiments. London. Routledge. Dunne, G., (1999). A Passion for ‘Sameness’? Sexuality and Gender Accountability in: Silva, E.B., Smart, C., (eds). The New Family? London. Sage. 404 9:19 PM Pa