http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20041212/focus/focus4.html

Kevin O'Brien Chang, Contributor

LIKE MOST Jamaicans I grew up scorning and laughing derisively at homosexuals as the lowest form of human life - disgusting perverts whose sexual practices were vile abominable acts to be stamped out by any means necessary. But age and experience have changed my outlook on life.

Now I believe that people are who they are. And as long as they are not hurting anyone else, what people who have reached the age of consent do with their bodies is their business and no-one else's. Ogden Nash quipped that "Sometimes with secret pride I sigh/ to think how tolerant I am/Then wonder which is really mine/Tolerance, or a rubber spine?" But my sine qua non is this: I don't like being told how to live my life. So how can I justify telling others how to live theirs?

Gay or straight, Sammy Davis' lyrics apply to all of us ­ "I've gotta be me, I've gotta be me. What else can I be, but what I am?" Christians are fond of quoting Leviticus 20:13 to condemn homosexuality ­ "If a man also lie with mankind as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death." But what about Leviticus 20:10 "And the man that commiteth adultery with another man's wife ­ the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death"? If every adulterer in Jamaica was put to death, this island would be uninhabited.

GAY GENE

The existence of a 'gay' gene remains unproven. But it is believed that at critical stages in the womb exposure to excessive male or female hormones can affect both sexual characteristics and inclinations. At any rate homosexuality likely has both a genetic and environmental component. Some persons would probably have become homosexual in any circumstance. But others might have tendencies that only manifest themselves in certain contexts.

So while I support the legalisation of homosexual relationships between consenting adults, I also believe in very strict laws to prevent anyone from trying to induce those under 18 into such behaviour. It is common for teenagers to go through periods of sexual confusion, and perplexed youngsters can be seduced by homosexual adults into making perhaps fleeting mixed up emotions into a permanent lifestyle. The law should make it as difficult as possible for this to happen. For all parents view the idea of their children being cajoled into homosexuality with horror.

MINORITY

Yet though not in such large quantities as gay organisations like to claim ­ American research has shown that only one per cent or so of men are exclusively homosexual ­ homosexuals have existed in every country on earth since time began. And everything I've seen and heard makes me believe gays are as instinctively attracted to other men as the majority of men are attracted to women. I don't think people 'choose' to be homosexual any more than they choose to be heterosexual.

Considering the prejudice and abuse gays face, it's hard to believe anyone would opt for such a lifestyle unless he/she were irresistibly inclined that way. Now I've always aspired to be as open minded, if not as misanthropic, as Mark Twain said he was ­ "I have no race prejudices, and I think I have no colour prejudices or caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. Indeed I know it. I can stand any society. All that I care to know is that a man is a human being ­ that is enough for me; he can't be any worse." But deep down inside I know I'm not.

No matter how I chide myself for my irrationality and small mindedness and lack of humanity, it's difficult for me to imagine being close friends with an admitted homosexual. I just can't conceive having any common point of interest with anyone who finds men more attractive than women.

WOMAN - LORD'S LOVELIEST CREATION

For I firmly believe that a beautiful woman is the strongest argument in favour of the existence of God, and that a spark of this beauty is to be found in all females. That a man could find another man more compelling than the Lord's loveliest creation is something completely incomprehensible to me. The illusion of beauty is probably necessary for the propagation of the species.

George Bernard Shaw was likely not so far off the mark in saying that "If women were as fastidious as men, morally or physically, there would be an end of the race". But the belief that women are somehow nicer and cleaner and purer than men is not only a biological imperative, it's perhaps one of those comforting lies which makes life on this vale of tears tolerable to most men.

It's no coincidence that arguably the two greatest works of literature, The Iliad and Don Quixote, are inspired by the idea of female beauty. It was Helen ­ 'fairer than the evening air clad in the beauty of a thousand stars' ­ whose face launched a thousand ships and burnt the topless towers of Troy.

While Don Quixote's quest is homage to the peerless flower of beauty Dulcinea del Toboso ­ "She fights in me and conquers in me, and I live and breathe in her, and owe my life and being to her". Or as Goethe ended Faust ­ "The eternal feminine draws us forward."

DISGUSTING

The fact is that both biologically and culturally most men make a very sharp distinction between the human female and the human male. To put it in its broadest generalisation, women are nice, pretty and sweet while men are smelly, disgusting and ugly. This is perhaps why most people have an instinctive reaction of repugnance to the idea of two men being intimate with each other. One filthy repulsive creature is enough, but two together ­ well yuck!

While I can't speak with any authority on the female mind, it always seemed to me that the way men feel about women is how women feel about babies. But there's no doubt that women also buy into this idealisation of the female. Perfumes and body washes and frilly slippers are all contrivances to somehow cover up and somehow deny the animal odours and excretions of women.

Partaking in these feminine rituals grants women a kind of special status whereby they are looked at and treated with a kind of deference, while men are deeply grateful to women for taking the time and effort to make themselves into gorgeous, luscious, alluring, almost other worldly beings. True, the time, money and discomfort costs of the high heels, make-up, and long hair can be very high. But it's a charade both sexes willingly buy into.

This glittering, glamorous facade perhaps explains why lesbianism is so much more accepted than male homosexuality. In fact, I don't understand how the two can be equated. For lesbianism is not only widely accepted by society nowadays, it's encouraged. For instance the constant replays of Britney Spears and Madonna kissing rejuvenated both their careers. Very few people seem to find the idea of two women being intimate with each other objectionable, for 90 per cent of pornographic films contain at least one scene of two women making love.

Women are certainly increasingly comfortable with openly expressing their attraction to other women. I don't get around much anymore to these places, but friends tell me strip clubs like Palais Royale are now hang outs for girls who like girls to strut their stuff for each other and link up. Far from objecting to the shows they put on, salivating male onlookers are said to encourage such behaviour, and the more brazen the better.

HYPOCRISY

Maybe the violent emotional reaction of so many men to male homosexuals is because gays by their very existence reveal the pretence behind all of this. To see a man treat and react to another man as we do to women is to see the illusion on which our emotional lives are based destroyed. I've sometimes wondered how I would view life had I been born gay. Would I feel the bitterness against God and fate that Edward Fitzgerald expressed in his translation of Omar Khayam's The Rubaiyat? "Oh Thou, who Man of baser Earth didst make,

And ev'n with Paradise devise the snake;

For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man

Is blackened ­ Man's forgiveness give and take!"

Surely I would demand to be accepted unapologetically as I am and feel as much right to freely express my thoughts and feelings as I do now. And as uncomfortable as openly displayed homosexuality makes me, in a way I admire the courage of organisations like Outrage in openly confronting the originators of violently homophobic lyrics like "Boom Bye Bye in a bboy head, rude bwoy know say nasty man haffi dead". Such hate-filled words would be unacceptable if directed at any other group, so why should gays have to tolerate those demanding their extermination whether figuratively or literally? And the human rights groups are certainly morally correct in demanding that sex between consenting men be legalised here.

POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS

As Pierre Trudeau said, the government has no place in the nation's bedroom. Yet I can understand our Prime Minister's stance on the issue. If this government legalised homosexuality it would not win a single seat in the next election. In the last poll I saw 96 per cent of Jamaicans were opposed to legitimising sodomy.

It's very strange really. When you consider the problems facing us - one of the world's highest murder rates, one of the globe's highest debt to GDP ratios, a failing education system, our vanishing beaches - you would think that what adult strangers do in the privacy of their own homes would be very low on this nation's list of priorities. But no issue so unites or excites Jamaicans. Why does homosexuality arouse stronger emotions in this country than virtually any other topic?

MALE CONFIDENCE

Some amateur psychologists attribute it to a widespread lack of real male confidence in a society where 85 per cent of children are born out of wedlock and the vast majority of boys grow up without full time male role models. There may be something to this. A man secure in his own sexuality is surely not bothered by the preferences of strangers.

It would certainly be interesting to see some serious research on the subject from UWI instead of the alarmist 'gay backlash warning' nonsense we hear emanating from our supposed centre of academic excellence.

I don't know if I will ever be able to overcome my own deep seated homophobia. But life has taught me not to condemn anyone without walking a mile in their shoes. "Judge not, lest ye be judged".