I have already written that I watched British journalist Peter Hitchens on Q&A with disbelief on Monday night. I also explained how my disbelief quickly grew into raging, visceral anger. As unpalatable, and even crazed, as many of his opinions are, by far the most repugnant aspect to Hitchens’ performance was the disdain with which he treated his co-panellist Dan Savage.
Hitchens couldn’t look him in the eye. He didn’t once bother tilting his chair in Savage’s direction as is usually the case when another panellist speaks. He could barely let him finish a sentence without talking over the top of him. The most galling part, however, about Hitchens’ interactions with Savage was how openly he denigrated and denounced his sexuality. From his telling use of ‘they’ and ‘you people’, to his assertion that homosexuals wanting the right to marry is selfish and harmful, his intolerance for homosexuality was palpable. (There is no doubt Hitchens is ideologically opposed to much more than Savage’s sexuality, but it’s his attitudes about homosexuality that is relevant to this.)
Like gender or race, sexual orientation is not a personal choice. Condemning a man because he is attracted to another man, is as useful, archaic and merciless as condemning a woman for being a woman. Or an African for having dark skin. We all know that for centuries those denunciations prevailed. Thankfully progress, compassion and legislation eventually intervened. There was a time when supporting slavery in the United States was perfectly acceptable for even the President, just as it was acceptable to deny women the right to vote. It was only after a few bold individuals questioned the wisdom of the entrenched beliefs and attitudes that perpetuated systemic discrimination that momentum for change developed. As more people started to open their minds and fight for change, we got to be where we are now. In a place where the current US President shares his race with those enslaved for centuries. In a place where no political leader could survive denying women the right to vote. There might still be individuals who cling to a time when prejudiced rebukes on the basis of gender or race were tolerated. But largely they aren’t and shouldn’t be tolerated today.
It is time that discrimination on the basis of sexuality is abolished and that requires as many people as possible actively rejecting it. There will always be people, like Peter Hitchens, who believe homosexuals should not be entitled to marry. Just as there will always be men (and women) who believe women shouldn’t work outside the home, or occupy board seats, or lead countries. It is unrealistic – albeit optimistic – to expect otherwise but it is more realistic, however, in a country committed to affording its citizens equality, to expect beliefs repugnant to that right, be denounced.
Freedom of speech is predictably, and usually fiercely, wielded as the defence whenever someone promotes a view that others seek to silence. But, contrary to popular belief, here in Australia freedom of speech is not an absolute right. Here in Australia freedom of speech is not an excuse to harm others. Our laws explicitly limit speech. Those limits exist because our laws dictate that an individual’s right to have their integrity intact and their right not to be vilified for their culture, ethnicity or background supersedes the right for another to insult them.
That’s the broad litmus test that applies to most of Australia’s legislation and case law. We are a democracy that values personal liberties but one person’s personal liberties extend only to the point where they harm or infringe on another’s. At that point, the law intervenes. Simplistically, we are free to do what we want until the point when it hurts someone.
And Peter Hitchens words denouncing homosexuality as immoral do hurt others. Any notion that a person who is homosexual is not as right, as good or as equal as a heterosexual person hurts thousands of Australians – and their families and friends – every single day. It really, really, hurts them. If you don’t believe that I defy you to read this and conclude otherwise . It was written by the Sydney Morning Herald’s sports journalist Andrew Webster. For a long time, in his mind, he had only two options: to commit suicide or to come out. Hearing Michael Kirby speak at a public function gave him the courage to choose the former but he deliberated painfully over that agonising choice. That is not a hypothetical scenario; that was a period in his life that he endured.
And he was far from alone in experiencing it. The rate of suicide among young gay men in this country, and around the world, is tragic proof that for many people suicide remains an easier choice than coming out. Hitchens’ words directly contribute to that. Every time a man or woman explicitly or implicitly denigrates homosexuality it reinforces the notion to homosexual people that they are less of a person because of their sexual orientation. That notion is catastrophically harmful. To an individual equivocating over coming out or checking out that attitude, however it is conveyed, is dangerous.
The harm in Hitchens’ words is aggravated because he has a public profile and therefore reaches a bigger audience than he otherwise might. By inviting him on their show the ABC compounds the damage; by his mere inclusion they tacitly condone his beliefs. Beliefs that shouldn’t be sanctioned on a national stage.
Intolerance hurts people. Yet I can’t see a single person who is actually hurt by tolerance. Who is harmed by the acceptance of homosexuality? It’s a genuine question that I would have loved Tony Jones to put to Hitchens.