British gay-rights campaigners have criticized a legal amendment that will see an estimated 15,000 living men convicted of the “crime” of having gay sexual relations prior to 2003 be “pardoned.”
The campaigners say a “pardon” still implies guilt on the part of gay men, and that the pardon does not go far enough to apologize for centuries of injustice.
The new amendment, which will also automatically “pardon” deceased men convicted of now-abolished sexual offenses in England and Wales, is being dubbed the Turing Law, after the legendary British code breaker Alan Turing, who was posthumously “pardoned” for a conviction for gross indecency in 2013.
Turing’s horrific life story captured the attention of the British public after it was dramatized in The Imitation Game, which starred Benedict Cumberbatch as the code-breaker whose genius is widely credited with shortening the Second World War by several years and saving countless millions of lives.
Turing was convicted in 1952 of “gross indecency” after having consensual sex with a 19-year-old man. He was subsequently chemically castrated and died in 1954 after poisoning himself with cyanide.
Turing’s pardon followed a Private Member’s Bill introduced by a British peer, Lord Sharkey, who is also responsible for tabling the legislation that has been adopted today.
Peter Tatchell, the leading British gay-rights campaigner, told The Daily Beast that while most gay people supported the pardon, there also needed to be a public apology by British Prime Minister Theresa May and that compensation should be paid for “the incredible suffering these men went through.”
Tatchell added, “Many were imprisoned and abused by fellow inmates and warders, some lost their jobs and homes and were driven to alcoholism, mental illness, and suicide. The word ‘pardon’ has unpleasant connotations; it implies forgiveness for a crime committed. Most people in society would now agree that consenting adult same-sex behavior should have never been a crime in the first place, so no forgiveness is required.
“The crucial thing is a public apology on behalf of the British people. A pardon is waving a conviction without acknowledging that the conviction was wrong in the first place.”
Although it is often said that gay sex was legalized in 1967 in the U.K., Tatchell points out that the 1967 legislation in fact only represented the partial decriminalization of gay sex in certain very specific circumstances—specifically between two men over 21, and in private.
Those men caught having consensual sex with those under the age of consent, or with more than one other person, or in public, were subject to prosecution.
For many years, the age of consent in Britain was 21 for gay men, and 16 for heterosexuals (lesbian sexuality was not codified in law). It was equalized at 16 for all in 2000.
As recently as 1997, gay men were being incarcerated for consensual gay sex in the U.K.
“Aiding or facilitating a homosexual act remained unlawful, as did public displays of affection and men chatting up men in a public place,” said Tatchell.
Incredibly, in 1989, more than 2,000 men were convicted of consenting adult same-sex relations, which was almost as many annual convictions as in the years 1950-55.
These men will all now automatically be among those who are to be “pardoned.”
One prominent campaigner, George Montague, the 93-year old author of the book The Oldest Gay in the Village, who was convicted in 1974 of gross indecency, told the BBC that he would not accept the pardon.
“To accept a pardon means you accept that you were guilty. I was not guilty of anything. I was only guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he told the BBC’s Newsnight.
“I think it was wrong to give Alan Turing—one of the heroes of my life—a pardon.
“What was he guilty of? He was guilty of the same as what they called me guilty of—being born only able to fall in love with another man.”
He added: “If I get an apology, I will not need a pardon.”
However, others saw the move as a welcome first step.
Paul Martin OBE, chief executive of the LGBT Foundation in Manchester, told The Daily Beast, “It is an important day for all the gay and bisexual men who have been convicted under these laws, and their families. The gross indecency legislation ruined the lives and careers of many. For all those who have worked tirelessly to bring about this legislation, it is long overdue, and so we welcome today’s decision.”
Nick Duffy, editor of PinkNews, told The Daily Beast, “There is a whole discussion around semantics but the bigger issue, I think, is that men who are alive today now have the option to finally have it, on paper, that they didn’t do anything wrong, that these laws were a mistake and never should have been.
“It sends a message within our country that these laws were totally wrong, that we regret them, and that they should never have been on the books in the first place, but what’s important as well is the message it sends to the rest of the world, especially in the Commonwealth.
“We talk about British anti-gay laws like they are a thing that stopped existing 50 years ago, but around the world right now, more than a billion people still live under archaic anti-gay laws that were imposed by the British Empire and never repealed.
“Forty out of the 53 Commonwealth member states still criminalize homosexuality under colonial-era laws—including India, Uganda, Cameroon, and Nigeria—and today’s decision sends a very powerful message to those countries that we made a mistake by passing these laws, and they’re not something we stand by in 2016.”