Robert: <"He answered a question during what seemed to be an informal and candid interview.">

Oh puhleeze. Your post is so patronizing. OF COURSE it's a political statement. The man is only being interviewed because he's a politician. He well knows that everything and anything that he utters to anyone in the media is for public consumption.

I'm sorry to be irritable with your post R0bert - but what annoys me deeply is your effort to appear middle of the road; reasonable and fair in telling gay and pro-gay folk that they must be tolerant to expect tolerance (I am furious I must admit) - in disregard of the fact that homosexuals hold limited power in comparison to those who prevail over government, law, education etc - over every social and cultural domain. They are vilified in so many ways by a dominant society where homosexuals are legally and illegally victimized in big ways and small. To expect the underdog to appease the basher is so unjust I can hardly stand it.

I have visions of your post directed at homosexuals in Nazi Germany; telling them as they're being labeled with a pink triangle (or whatever) that they need to demonstrate tolerance to get tolerance.

You know I think you're too intelligent not to know that your seeming 'reasonableness' carries horrible import. Sitting up there lecturing gays on how they should shape their argument - as if ANY proposal they make is going to be met with anything but contempt... but they can be shuffled off for a long time by constantly telling them HOW they should argue their case in order to meet the high and mighty bloody standards of their oppressors.

pffft.

Robert:

Re: Peterson's nasty diatribe. Here's an example. Peterson isn't being lectured on giving tolerance to receive it is he. That's because he neither needs nor seeks tolerance from homosexual and pro-homosexual people. He is comfortable in the personal assurance that he is already on the default (dominant majority) side of the issue.

We might disapprove of his blatant nastiness and crass delivery, but nobody has bothered to dismantle his ignorance.

Peterson: Clinically speaking (though it is an ongoing debate) paedophiles are attracted to pre-pubescent bodies, not secondary sexual characteristics. Their orientation therefore is not adequately described as primarily hetero or homo etc. People who will have sex with adults or children fall into the category of opportunistic child sex abusers who might be homo or hetero in their orientation; they might prefer adults or teens, but will use a child's body if it's available to them. Of that group the vast majority are heterosexual. The greatest amount of child sexual abuse is carried out by heterosexuals.

Homosexuality is not a mental disorder and was declassified as such in the 1970s.

"There were no peer-oriented homosexual males in our sample who regressed to children. Homosexuality and homosexual pedophilia are not synonymous. In fact, it may be that these two orientations are mutually exclusive, the reason being that the homosexual male is sexually attracted to masculine qualities whereas the heterosexual male is sexually attracted to feminine characteristics, and the sexually immature child's qualities are more feminine than
masculine ...
In any case, in over 12 years of clinical experience working with child molesters, we have yet to see any example of a regression from an adult homosexual orientation. The child offender who is also attracted to and engaged in adult sexual relationships is heterosexual. It appears, therefore, that the adult heterosexual male constitutes a greater sexual risk to underage children than does the adult homosexual male."
(Groth and Birnbaum, 1978, pp. 180-181

Pynchme

Well said, you managed to put into words what I had been thinking about R0bert's less than transparent claims.

R0bert

Mate, your attempt to be 'middle-of-the-road' frequently runs into the verges when you attempt to excuse the utterances of someone like Abbott. Like you, Abbott is intelligent enough to know the import of what he says when he claims to be 'threatened by gays'. An appalling example of doublespeak: on the surface; candid and honest, beneath; a call to all homophobes. As Pynchme has already pointed out, Abbott's statement has brought the likes of Peterson to the surface.

I had hoped that you would expand on an issue - that of bullying of males by males which is often homosexual in its nature and yet many of these bullies would not consider themselves to be gay. Similar behaviour can be seen on other all-male situations such as gaol or in the armed forces. Homosexual behaviour by heterosexual men - it is all about control, just as raping women is about control. However, this grey area of the human psyche is far more common than is ever discussed. People (male and female) are under more threat by these dominant types - irrespective of their sexual orientation.

Severin if I'm trouble for sticking up for Abbott then consider yourself in trouble for cheering on Pynchme. She rarely tries to be fair in her claims.

I think my point was clearly and fairly made, it really then gets down to world view. You appear to have a different view to me on this.

I really could not be bothered getting bogged down in this.

R0bert

Legal maxim: 'If you can't argue the facts, argue the law. If you can't argue either, slander the opposition.'

Commendable sentiments, Pynchme and Severin, and thanks for the backup, but I think the anger's a bit displaced. The nub of Robert's post is that you can't take people further or faster than they're prepared to go. This in turn is an acknowledgement that there's still a lot of progress to be made in achieving practical, as opposed to legal equality for sexual minorities.

In every conversation about harrassment, one of the biggest hurdles is the scepticism of otherwise sympathetic, well-disposed individuals. Because homophobic acts happen under the radar, it's a huge challenge to convince the average bloke on the bus that they are real. Oxford Street Darlinghurst looks like an ordinary inner-city thoroughfare, so it's difficult for most passers-by to grasp that it's also a magnet for people who want to vent abuse and violence upon gays. In my own case, before our attacker's behaviour became impossible to ignore, our neighbours thought I was delusional when I told them what was happening to us. The recurring question was "how do you know it's homophobia?"

The simple answer is that the victim always knows, because perpetrators of hate crimes always want them to know. However I am forced to concede that in the context of our legal system, assertions of homophobic abuse require a standard of proof that determined homophobes can easily evade. A simple response to Shane's implied question, whether Tony Abbott's utterances irresponsibly give succour to homophobes, is that the people best qualified to know are the victims of homophobia. Believing this will depend on how much you wish to insist on gilt-edged legal-standard proofs, as opposed to accepting the accounts of victims. My view is that since in this case no-one's at risk of being sent to gaol, erring on the side of victims is justifiable.

Robert has generously let us follow the evolution of his views here on OLO, and has shown himself to be open-minded on many issues, not just this one. His scepticism about the effect of Abbott's remarks is unsurprising, and in my experience, widely held. Give him a break.