Be careful what you wish for (Gleaner Letter)

The Editor, Sir:

Maurice Tomlinson's May 1 letter condemned the absence of sexual orientation non-discrimination specification in the Charter of Rights of Freedoms and alleged an obsession of some with "what consenting adults do in the privacy of their bedrooms". If private consensual behaviour were really the issue, the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender (GLBT) political machine would have won this issue globally four decades ago. The aims clearly go much further and are insatiable.

Is Mr Tomlinson suggesting Jamaican law would fail to defend the victim of a crime for the sake of sexual orientation? Isn't the point of the rule of law to protect individuals - and not fashionably favoured groups - from State excess? Are crimes against same-sex-attracted Jamaicans somehow worse than the same offences against anyone else? Is the next step hate-speech legislation to punish any who dare voice dissent against GLBT politics (thou shall not say 'no')? Isn't this a budding tyranny of the minority?

In the USA, court appointed criteria for true minority status qualifying for special civil rights protections specify that the entire class in question must meet three standards: they must have suffered a history of social oppression; exhibit obvious, immutable, or distinguishing characteristics; and demonstrate political powerlessness. Sexual orientation fails on all three counts.

(1) Social oppression: same-sex attracted people have a higher average household income, higher average educational status, and higher percentage in professional or managerial positions than most Americans; and housing discrimination are nearly non-existent.

(2) Immutable Characteristics: gays have none that are obvious or readily identifiable, and there is zero evidence for a gay gene.

(3) Political powerlessness: the GLBT lobby is potent with influence on every level of society - government, business, media, and education - guarded aggressively by an extremely well-financed lobby.

Mr Tomlinson noted "human rights [are] not the gifts of the State but were the birthright of every individual ... ." Does he know from whence that concept came? According to renowned English jurist and devout Christian, Sir William Blackstone, the source for common law was 'holy scriptures'. His Commentaries on the Laws of England sold more copies in colonial America than in England, and the Blackstonian phrase "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" served as intellectual premise for the introduction to the Declaration of Independence.

Yet Mr Tomlinson wishes the Lawyers Christian Fellowship to go away: "in an evolving democracy when they are long dead and gone." If Jamaica had hate-crimes and hate-speech legislation, would his own comments have violated such? Be careful what you wish for, sir; you just might get it.

I am, etc.,

ANDRE VAN MOL

andrev@charter.net

Redding, California

here is the original letter:
Guard against the tyranny of the majority