¹ Human Rights Watch, “This Alien Legacy: The Origins of “Sodomy” Laws in British Colonialism” (New York, 2008) http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2008/12/17/alien-legacy-0, [HRW]Google Scholar; Baudh, Sumit, “Human Rights and the Criminalisation of Consensual Same-Sex Sexual Acts in the Commonwealth, South and Southeast Asia”, (New Delhi: South and Southeast Asia Resource Centre on Sexuality, 2008), www.tarshi.net/downloads/Working_%20Paper_Sbaudh_16M08.pdf Google Scholar.

² Ottosson, Daniel, “State-Sponsored Homophobia: A World Survey of Laws Prohibiting Same Sex Activity Between Consenting Adults” (2008) ILGA, International Lesbian and Gay Association, www.ilga.org/statehomophobia/ILGA_State_Sponsored_Homophobia_2008.pdf Google Scholar.

³ France did impose anti-homosexual criminal laws on some French colonies, and versions of these survive in countries such as Benin, Cameroon, and Senegal. HRW, supra, note 1 at 4.

⁴ JrEskridge, William N., Gaylaw – Challenging the Apartheid of the Closet, (Harvard University Press, 1999), 157 gives the date as 1533 [Eskridge Gaylaw]Google Scholar; JrEskridge, William N., Dishonorable Passions: Sodomy Laws in America 1861-2003 (Viking, 2008) at 16 [Eskridge Passions]Google Scholar. However, Gorton is convinced that it was 1534. Gorton, Don, “Timing of Henry VlII's Sodomy Law Matters” The Gay and Lesbian Review (Jan-Feb 2004) 6 [Gorton]Google Scholar.

⁵ Compact Oxford English Dictionary, 2d ed., s.v. “buggery”.

⁶ Melminiak, Daniel, What the Bible Really Says about Homosexuality, Sacramento: Alamo Square Press, 1994) at 46-7Google Scholar. On page 48, the author explains that ‘abomination’ referred to “any violation of purity rules that governed Israelite society and kept the Israelites different from the other peoples.” This suggests that the prohibition of male-male sex in Leviticus was not linked to the issue of procreation but served to strengthen the persuasiveness of the ritual differentiation strategy. If the alleged Canaanite practices were true, they may have confined homosexual acts to special, religiously sanctioned occasions.

⁷ Crompton, Louis, Homosexuality and Civilization, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), at 43-4 [Crompton]Google Scholar.

⁸ Philo, translated by Colson, F.H. and Whitaker, G.H., 10 Volumes, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929-1962), 3:37-8Google Scholar; 7:499, quoted in Crompton, 2003, at 44. Crompton notes the anti-homosexual views of early Christian scholars, pages 117-118.

⁹ Bailey, Derrich Sherwin, Homosexuality in the Western Christian Tradition, (London: Longmans Green, 1955)Google Scholar; Boswell, John, Christianity, Social Tolerance and Homosexuality, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), 93–97 Google Scholar; Jordan, Mark, The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 30–37 [Jordan]Google Scholar.

¹⁰ Ezekiel 16:49-50 is explicit on the pride and greed of the people of Sodom.

¹¹ Crompton, supra, note 7 at 137.

¹² Jordan, supra, note 9 at 1.

¹³ Louis Crompton, in contrast, sees Paul's statements as highly influential: Crompton, 2003, 113-4. William Eskridge takes language from Paul for the title of his study Dishonorable Passions, supra, note 4.

¹⁴ Crompton, supra, note 7 at 34 and chapter 5.

¹⁵ Crompton, supra, note 7 at 142-147.

¹⁶ Canon law applied in Denmark until 1526. A prohibition of male-male sex was not, at that point, part of secular law, and a prohibition was not specifically enacted until 1683, although prosecutions occurred before that date. Rosen, Wilhelm von, “Sodomy in Early Modern Denmark”, in Gerard, Kent & Hekma, Gert, ed., The Pursuit of Sodomy (Haworth, 1988,) 177 [von Rosen] [Gerard and Hekma]Google Scholar. In Sweden, male-male sexual acts are mentioned in secular law for the first time in 1608. The National Law Code of 1734 contained no sanction, apparently a deliberate decision to avoid mentioning such activities to avoid publicizing their possibility, a recurring theme in European histories of the subject. Nevertheless, prosecutions occurred. Liliequist, Jonas, “State Policy, Popular Discourse, and the Silence on Homosexual Acts in Early Modern Sweden” in Lofstrom, Jan, ed. Scandinavian Homosexualities, (Haworth, 1998) 15 Google Scholar. An explicit prohibition was enacted in Sweden (perhaps in 1866) and modern decriminalization occurred in 1944. On not naming the sin or offence, see Jordan, supra, note 9 at 133, 146 and 147; Puff, Helmut, Sodomy in Reformation Germany and Switzerland 1400-1600, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003) 54 [Puff]Google Scholar.

¹⁷ Puff, supra, note 16 at 29.

¹⁸ Gorton, supra, note 4 at 6.

¹⁹ Quoted in Mills, Robert, “Male-Male Love and Sex in the Middle Ages” in Cook, Matt, et al, A Gay History of Britain (Westport: Greenwood Press, 2007) 1 at 14 [Cook]Google Scholar. Mills cautions that the elements that constituted ‘sodomy’ in the medieval period were notoriously vague.

²⁰ Coke, Institutes, 1644, 58-9.

²¹ Burg, B R, Boys at Sea: Sodomy, Indecency, and Courts Martial in Nelson's Navy, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007) [Burg] at 28 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The penalty was death. With slight alterations, the provision remained in force until 1866.

²² Blackstone's writings were very influential on United States law. Blackstone had taken the ecclesiastical law formulation of the offence and substituted “crime” for “sin”. See Gorton, Don, “The Origins of Anti-Sodomy Laws” The Harvard Gay and Lesbian Review (Winter 1998) 10 at 12 Google Scholar.

²³ HRW, supra, note 1 at 15.

²⁴ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 24-26, 157 and 328.

²⁵ It is the title of a documentary produced in the United States in 2000. See Paragraph 175, Telling Pictures, produced in association with Home Box Office, Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, narrated by Rupert Everett.

²⁶ Healey, Dan, Homosexual Desire in Revolutionary Russia, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001) at 80–81 [Healey]CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

²⁷ Skuy, David, “Macaulay and the Indian Penal Code of 1862” (1998) 32 Modern Asian Studies 513 at 523 [Skuy]CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

²⁸ Edited by Louis Crompton, (1978) Journal of Homosexuality, 389, also at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/eresources/exhibitions/sw25/bentham/#01. Mill, John Stuart, in On Liberty, 1859 Google Scholar, stated that “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.” It was quoted in the US case Commonwealth of Kentucky v Wasson, 842 S.W. 2d, 487 (1992) as supporting a non-interventionist role for the state.

²⁹ Wockner, Rex, “Early gay-rights writings found”, International News # 680, May 7, 2007, http://tobe.ca/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=142&cntnt01origid=68&cntnt01returnid=68 Google Scholar. An indictment of the book by Thomas Cannon, entitled Ancient and Modern Pederasty Investigated and Exemplify'd, was found in a box of unclassified legal documents from 1750. The book itself has not survived, but the indictment reproduces many of its passages.

³⁰ Skuy, supra, note 27 at 518.

³¹ Kennedy, Paul, The Parliament of Man, (Harper Collins Canada, 2006) at 283 Google Scholar.

³² For example, the buggery law was restated in the 1861 Offences against the Person Act 24 & 25 Vict. c.100.

³³ H.G.Cocks, “Secrets, Crimes and Diseases” in Cook, supra, note 19 at 107, 114.

³⁴ Proclamation by the Queen in Council, reproduced in Chaurasia, Radhey Shyam, History of Modern India: 1707A. D. to 2000 A. D, (Atlantic Publishers & Distributors, 2002), p. 208 Google Scholar.

³⁵ HRW, supra, note 1 at 10.

³⁶ Clarke, J.J., Oriental Enlightenment (Routledge, 1997) at 73 Google Scholar. Clarke quotes from Young, G.M., Th. B. Macaulay: Prose and Poetry, (London: Hart-Davis, 1952) at 722, 728 Google Scholar.

³⁷ HRW, supra, note 1 at 22-25.

³⁸ Hall, David, “Gay, Arab, American” The Advocate (19 June 2007) 32, http://www.advocate.com/issue_story_ektid45260.asp Google ScholarPubMed.

³⁹ As'ad AkuKhalil, a Lebanese-American scholar, writing in 1993 in the Arab Studies Journal, as quoted by Strubbe, Bill “Cruising the Casbah” Out Magazine (September 2002) 115 at 116 Google Scholar.

⁴⁰ Sofer, Jehoeda, “Sodomy in the Law of Muslim States” in Schmitt, and Sofer, eds., Sexuality and Eroticism Among Males in Moslem Societies (Haworth 1992) 131 at 133 [Sofer]Google Scholar. The author says that a new code was introduced in 1956 in the British territories of the Persian Gulf. He says that Article 171 made sodomy punishable by imprisonment for up to ten years.

⁴¹ Ottosson, supra, note 2.

⁴² Modinos v Cyprus, ECHR, 15070/89, April 22, 1993 Google Scholar.

⁴³ McLelland, Mark, Male Homosexuality in Modern Japan (London: Curzon Press, 2000) at 26 Google Scholar.

⁴⁴ Personal communications, Professor Peter Jackson, December 2002, and Professor Tamara Loos, November 2007. Siam's ministers of justice from 1892 to 1913 all had law degrees from England. See Loos, Tamara, Subject Siam: Family, Law and Colonial Modernity in Thailand (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002), Chapter 2, particularly 65–67)Google Scholar; Masao, Tokichi, “The New Penal Code of Siam” (1908) Yale Law Journal 85–100 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Professor Chalidaporn Songsamphan of Thammasat University has said the ban only applied to male-female anal intercourse: Svasti, Pichaya, “Sex through the ages” Bangkok Post (January 22, 2008) O1Google Scholar.

⁴⁵ See Xiao-fei, Guo, “Was there a De-criminalization of Homosexualities in Chinese History?” (Paper presented at the International Conference on Sexuality in China, 2007), www.sexstudy.org Google Scholar.

⁴⁶ Smith, Rupert, “That crucial day: The Labouchere amendment” Gay Times (September 2006) 21 Google Scholar.

⁴⁷ Cocks, H.G., Nameless Offences: Homosexual Desire in the 19^th Century, (I. B. Tauris Publishers, 2003) [Cocks Nameless]Google Scholar.

⁴⁸ Cook, Matt, London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885-1914, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) at 48, 49 [Cook]Google Scholar.

⁴⁹ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 26.

⁵⁰ Gupta, Alok, The Presumption of Sodomy, draft dated April 10, 2007, page 40, in possession of the authorGoogle Scholar.

⁵¹ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 19. Sweden repealed the offence to avoid publicizing such activities, though prosecutions continued according to Liliequist, Jonas, “State Policy, Popular Discourse, and the Silence on Homosexual Acts in Early Modern Sweden”, in Lofstrom, Jan ed, Scandinavian Homosexualities: Essays on Gay and Lesbian Studies (Haworth: The Haworth Press, 1998) 15 Google Scholar.

⁵² Toonen v Australia, UN Human Rights Committee, March 31, 1994, CCPR/C/50/488/1992.

⁵³ Quansah, E. K., “Same-sex relationships in Botswana: Current perspectives and future prospects” (2004) 4 African Human Rights Law Journal 201 Google Scholar. The law upheld by the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe in Banana v State, (2000) 8 Butterworth's Human Rights Cases, 345, was described as intentional sexual relations per anum between two human males.

⁵⁴ Darwin, Charles lived from 1809 to 1882 and published The Origin of Species in 1859 Google Scholar. Marx, Karl lived from 1818 to 1893 and published volume one of Capital in 1867 Google ScholarPubMed. Freud, Sigmund lived from 1856 to 1939 and published The Interpretation of Dreams in 1900 Google Scholar. From 1856 to 1882, all three were alive. Freud, in his Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, suggested that there had been three major intellectual challenges to the human view of its own uniqueness in creation: Copernicus (the earth is not the centre of the universe), Darwin (humans had evolved) and Freud (humans had unconscious drives). See Dean, Cornelia, “Science and the soul: Descartes loses force” International Herald Tribune (28 June 2007) 9 Google Scholar.

⁵⁵ Ferguson, Naill “Sinking Globalization” Foreign Affairs, March/April, 2005, 64 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁵⁶ It was the new bourgeousie that ran the British imperial project and they projected an ethos of middle class respectability, distinguishing themselves from the lower classes and what they saw as a decadent aristocracy: Mosse, George, Nationalism and Sexuality, Respectability and Abnormal Sexuality in Modern Europe (Howard Fertig, 1985) 9 Google Scholar. This view of the aristocracy as profligate libertines perhaps led to the rejection of homosexuality, seen as an elite vice. In contrast, in Siam and Japan, it was the aristocracy that handled the projects of modernization and the defense of the state against colonialism. Their attitudes towards sexual issues would not have been the same as those of the new British middle-class.

⁵⁷ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 94, 95.

⁵⁸ Indefinite detention, to be followed, possibly, by a lifetime parole, revocable at any time, was upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada in R v Klippert, [1967] S.C.R. 822. Klippert's sexual activity had been with teen aged males, but the decision made no reference to the issue of age. It logically applied to any homosexual acts.

⁵⁹ Randolph Trumbach, “Renaissance Sodomy, 1500-1700” in [Cook], supra, note 19 at 45, para 50. Prosecutions under the Laws of War were also slow to begin, starting in 1704 and 1706. Prosecutions were for sexual activity with teenage boys who worked on Royal Navy ships. See [Burg], supra, note 21 at Boys at Sea, Ch 2.

⁶⁰ H.G.Cocks, “Secrets, Crimes and Diseases” in [Cook], supra, note 19 at 110 [Cocks Secrets].

⁶¹ Kaplan, Morris, Sodom on the Thames (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005) 1 Google Scholar.

⁶² Cocks Secrets, supra, note 60 at 109. See also Cocks Nameless, supra, note 47 at 7, 8, 17.

⁶³ Cook, supra, note 19 at 11.

⁶⁴ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 3, 66 and 86.

⁶⁵ A study of Prussia indicated 44 charges between 1700 and 1730, including charges for bestiality. Nine individuals were executed for bestiality and three for sodomy. James Streakley, “Sodomy in Enlightenment Prussia” in Gerard and Hekma, supra, note 16 at 163, para 164. In the same edited volume, Wilhelm von Rosen refers to sodomy between men as “in practice a nonexistent crime in Denmark for more than two hundred years.” Von Rosen, supra, note 16 at 177.

⁶⁶ Puff, supra, note 16 at 5.

⁶⁷ Khanu v. Emperor, AIR 1925 Sind 286Google Scholar, Muhammad Ali v. The State, [1961] All Pakistan Law Decisions, High Court of Dacca 252 Google Scholar, and Brother John Antony v. State [1992] 124 Criminal Law Journal 1352. See HRW, supra, note 1 at 19, 20, 21.

⁶⁸ HRW, supra, note 1 at 28.

⁶⁹ “Introduction” to Narrain, Arvind and Bhan, Gautam, eds. Because I Have a Voice: Queer Politics in India, (New Delhi: Yoda Press, 2005) 7, 8 Google Scholar.

⁷⁰ Dudgeon v U.K. (1981) 4 E.H.R.R. 149 Google Scholar; Norris v Ireland (1991) 13 E.H.R.R. 183 Google Scholar; Modinos v Cyprus (1993) 16 E.H.R.R. 485 Google Scholar; Toonen v Australia (1994) CCPR/C/50/D/488/1992.

⁷¹ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 241, 242. Laws in some states had been broadened from anal intercourse to include oral sex. Bowers v Hardwick (1986) 478 U.S. 186 Google Scholar; Lawrence v Texas (2003) 539 U.S. 558 Google ScholarPubMed.

⁷² See Bhan, Gautam, “Queer Politics and Legal Reform in India”, in Narrain, Arvind, Bhan, Gautam, Because I Have a Voice (New Delhi: Yoda Press, 2005) 40 Google Scholar. Information on prosecutions in Singapore is provided later in this article, in a section on that country. Information on patterns in Malaysia comes from informal conversations with individuals connected with the PT Foundation in Kuala Lumpur, an organization that works on HIV-AIDS issues.

⁷³ Significant reforms occurred in the period. In 1790, primogeniture inheritance rights were abolished. In 1791, equal rights were granted to Jews and equal inheritance rights established for sons and daughters. In 1792, men without property were enfranchised and divorce allowed for the first time. In 1794, slavery was abolished. See Hunt, Lynn, Inventing Human Rights (W. W. Norton and Co, 2007) at 28, 61, 62 Google Scholar. Sofer writes that it has been suggested that the French decriminalization “was a result of Jean-Francois-Regis de Cambaceres, the head of the drafting commission, loving males. In fact, it should be seen as springing from the principles of the French Revolution.” See Sofer, supra, note 40 at 133. See also Sibalis, Michael David, “The Regulation of Male Homosexuality in Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, 1780-1815” in Merrick, Jeffrey and Ragan, Bryant eds., Homosexuality in Modern France (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996 Google Scholar).

⁷⁴ Sofer, supra, note 40 at 133, 134.

⁷⁵ Healey, supra, note 26.

⁷⁶ John Adington Symonds met Ulrichs and included a discussion of his theories in his reformist writings in Britain. Through Symonds’ collaboration with Havelock Ellis on the book Sexual Inversion (1897), Ulrichs’ ideas entered the literature of homosexual defense in England. See Steakley, James, The Homosexual Emancipation Movement in Germany (New York: Arno Press, 1975) 23 [Steakley]Google Scholar.

⁷⁷ Steakley, supra, note 76 at 92.

⁷⁸ Michael, Jerome, Wechsler, Herbert, Criminal Law and its Administration, (The Foundation Press, 1940)Google Scholar.

⁷⁹ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 121.

⁸⁰ Eskridge Gaylaw, supra, note 4 at 159.

⁸¹ Smith, Rupert, “The Wolfenden Report” Gay Times (February 2007) 29 Google Scholar.

⁸² British Broadcasting Commission, On This Day: 4, September, 1957: “Homosexuality should not be a crime”, http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/september/4/newsid_3007000/3007686.stm Google ScholarPubMed.

⁸³ The reform in the UK was important. It was not part of a reform package, as in Illinois in 1961 or the USSR in 1922. It did not have the elite backing of the ruling party or the Prime Minister in power, as in Canada in 1969. There was a public and parliamentary debate on the specific issue. The reform was a compromise, only applying in England and Wales and entrenching an unequal age of consent for the next three decades. Leo Abse, the Member of Parliament who moved the reform bill, said his reading of Freud convinced him that everyone was bisexual. But he was willing to portray homosexuals as a troubled minority in order to secure passage of the reform. In fact, he said, the bill was to protect everyone “from their own homophobia.” See Smith, Richard, “Against the Law” Gay Times (August 2007) 72 Google Scholar.

⁸⁴ Kinsey, Alfred et al, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (W. B. Saunders Co. 1948)Google ScholarPubMed showed homosexuality to be much more common than had been generally assumed.

⁸⁵ Hooker, Evelyn, “The Adjustment of the Male Overt Homosexual” (1957) 21 Journal of Projective Techniques, 18 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; Hooker, Evelyn, “Male Homosexuality in the Rorschach”, (1958) 22 Journal of Projective Techniques, 33 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed. Dr.Tripp, Clarence A., a psychologist, trained by Kinsey, , published The Homosexual Matrix in 1975 (McGraw-Hill)Google Scholar. On Tripp's death in 2003, the book was remembered as something of a breakthrough. Author and AIDS activist Larry Kramer commented that the book was the first from a reputable source that dared to openly speak of homosexuality as a healthy occurrence. Historian Jonathan Ned Katz added that before the book “you could count on one hand the books on the subject that had any intellectual substance.” See Martin, Douglas, “C. A. Tripp, 83, Author of Works on Homosexuality, Dies” The New York Times (22 May 2003) A29 Google Scholar.

⁸⁶ Nixon speaking to aides in his office, May 13, 1971, as reported by Weingarten, Gene, “Just What Was He Smoking”, The Washington Post, 21 March 2002 Google Scholar.

⁸⁷ Leung v Secretary for Justice, [2005] HKCFI 713 Google Scholar; Thomas McCosker, Dhirenda Nadan v State, August 26, 2005, High Court Fiji, Appellate Jurisdiction Google Scholar.

⁸⁸ In 1998, Human Rights Watch and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission jointly published a report “Public Scandals: Sexual Orientation and Criminal Law in Romania”, probably the first such collaboration between a general human rights NGO and a lesbian/gay organization. In 2003 the same two organizations published “More Than a Name: State-Sponsored Homophobia and its Consequences in Southern Africa.”

⁸⁹ Sutherland v United Kingdom, 1 July 1997, European Commission on Human Rights Google Scholar. The decision was not appealed to the Court.

⁹⁰ (2000) 29 E.H.R.R. 548.

⁹¹ Thomas McCosker, Dhirenda Nadan v State, 26 August 2005, High Court Fiji, Appellate JurisdictionGoogle Scholar.

⁹² Wockner, Rex, “Bush, Kerry debate why people are gay” October 14, 2004 (a wire service story for gay media), http://www.rodneycroome.id.au/other_more?id=1026_0_2_0_M Google Scholar.

⁹³ “Lebanon Gays Push for Law Change”, ILGA Bulletin, Issue 3 (2004) 5 Google Scholar.

⁹⁴ AFP, Anwar, , “Homosexuality laws must be amended” The Nation (11 November 2004) 5A Google Scholar.

⁹⁵ McCartney, Ian, “The Foreign and Commonwealth is developing a strategy for promoting and protecting the human rights of LGBT people overseas” (statement to the UN Human Rights Council, 17 May 2007), http://www.idaho.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=69&Itemid=20 Google Scholar.

⁹⁶ Sometimes the lid is quite repressive. India in 2009 seems to have only one full-time gay bar (in New Delhi), though there are occasional gay parties at specific bars organized by Gay Bombay.

⁹⁷ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 315.

⁹⁸ Ascription refers to recognizing on-going same sex relationships on the basis that they are factually like on-going heterosexual relationships (either married or de facto). Registration is involved in the various systems established for ‘registered partnerships’, ‘civil unions’, or the French pacts of civil solidarity.

⁹⁹ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 235.

¹⁰⁰ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 241.

¹⁰¹ This idea is reflected in Mr. Justice Stevens’ dissent in Bowers v Hardwick and Mr. Justice Scalia's dissent in the later USSC decision in Romer v Evans (1996) 517 US 620. See Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 266, 288.

¹⁰² Quoted in Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 326.

¹⁰³ The arguments in the case are canvassed in detail in Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4.

¹⁰⁴ Foreign Affairs Minister Seng, Wong Kan, The Real World of Human Rights, 16 Vienna 1993, Singapore Government Press Release No: (20/JUN, 09-1/93/06/16), [1993] Sing. J. L. S. 605Google Scholar. Some of this language was repeated by Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister S. Jayakumar in September, 2005, at the UN Summit. He repeated that most human rights were still essentially contested concepts.” But the penchant of some states to present their views as universal norms inevitably provokes resistance, unnecessarily politicizes the process and is ultimately unhelpful to the cause of human rights. Unless this deeper issue is squarely addressed, any changes will only be superficial.” Quoted in UFP, “U.N. assembly pressured over new human rights council” Japan Times (18 September 2005) 5 Google ScholarPubMed.

¹⁰⁵ Tan, Sylvia, “Allow space for gays but gay sex ban to stay” fridae.com (24 October 2007), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=2124&viewarticle=1 Google Scholar. AFP, “Singapore PM defends decision not to decriminalise gay sex” Bangkok Post (24 September 2007) 4 Google ScholarPubMed, quotes Prime Minister Lee at a student forum saying “I think the tone of the society should really be set by the heterosexuals, and that's the way many Singaporeans feel.”

¹⁰⁶ Other advances have seen counter strategies in the United States. The enactment of local anti-discrimination laws that banned discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation led to (a) popular votes to repeal such laws and (b) state-level laws or state-level constitutional amendments prohibiting such laws. When the possibility of same-sex marriage became legally credible in the US, many states passed constitutional amendments to define marriage as heterosexual, and Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act to bar the recognition of state-level marriages (or civil unions) in national laws. School desegregation decisions of the USSC had also led to local actions to preserve segregation through the use of private schools. Abortion, while a right in certain circumstances, was also countered by a lack of state funding for this medical service. So a “sodomy-revival movement”, as Eskridge puts it, after the decision in Lawrence v Texas, could have been expected, not simply an acceptance that the US SC had now settled the matter.

¹⁰⁷ Eskridge Passions, supra, note 4 at 379.

¹⁰⁸ Gay Marriage to End “Culture Wars”?, forwarded by Human Rights Watch, September 21, 2008, http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=8627.

¹⁰⁹ Povinelli, Elizabeth, Chauncey, George, “Thinking Sexuality Transnationally” (1999) 5 GLQ, A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 439 at 443 Google Scholar. In 1951, the British spies Guy Burgess and Donald MacLean defected to the USSR having betrayed American secrets, illustrating concretely that homosexuals could be security risks.

¹¹⁰ See Berube, Alan, Coming Out Under Fire, (Free Press, 1990) for the classic U.S. account of this phenomenonGoogle Scholar.

¹¹¹ Cook, supra, note 19 at 170.

¹¹² Cook, supra, note 19 at 168.

¹¹³ Cook, supra, note 19 at 168,169.

¹¹⁴ Cook, supra, note 19 at 169.

¹¹⁵ Cook, supra, note 19 at 170.

¹¹⁶ Interview by Hugh David quoted in Cook, supra, note 19 at 171.

¹¹⁷ Warner, Tom, Never Going Back (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002) 108–118 Google Scholar.

¹¹⁸ Displayed text, part of The History of Gay Montreal, an exhibit held at the time of the Out Games, Montreal, August, 2006. Customers had been charged with being a ‘found-in’ in a house of prostitution.

¹¹⁹ Mahapatra, Dhananjay, “UN body slams Indian on rights of gays” The Times of India, 24 April 2008)Google Scholar. The account is at variance with what we know of the drafting of the Indian Penal Code, but there may have been a link. State regulated brothels for British army personnel were established in India to prevent soldiers picking up “special Oriental vices” and becoming “replicas of Sodom and Gomorrah.” See Bhaskaran, Suparna, “The Politics of Penetration” in Vanita, Ruth ed., Queering India: Same Sex Love and Eroticism in Indian Culture and Society (Routledge, 2002) 15 at 17 Google Scholar.

¹²⁰ Leung v Secretary for Justice, [2005] HKCFI 494 Google Scholar.

¹²¹ Leung v Secretary for Justice, [2005] HKCFI 713 Google Scholar.

¹²² (1994) CCPR/C/50/D/488/1992.

¹²³ Leung v Secretary for Justice [2006] HKCA 360 Google Scholar.

¹²⁴ Secretary of Justice v Yau Yuk Lung Zigo [2007] HKCFA 50 Google Scholar.

¹²⁵ International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, “Singapore: Religious homophobia, gay activism and repealing the sodomy law” (10 September 2007)Google Scholar. Interview with three Singaporeans by Grace Poore, http://www.iglhrc.org/cgi-bin/iowa/article/publications/reportsandpublications/465.html.

¹²⁶ We have reports from the Straits Times newspaper and government figures on prosecutions. Mohan Gopalan has compiled a list of section 377A cases (the gross indecency provision), expanding an earlier list prepared by Lynette Chua. See Gopalan, Mohan, “A heftier list of s.377 cases” Yawning Bread (May 2007), http://www.yawningbread.org/guest_2007/guw-136.htm Google Scholar. Also see Au, Alex, “Why 377A is redundant” Yawning Bread (May 2007), http://www.yawningbread.org/arch_2007/yax-749.htm.Google Scholar In contrast, our information on India does not include trial level decisions. They are routinely not found in the law reports used by lawyers and judges.

¹²⁷ “Singapore TV station fined S$15,000 for showing a “normal” gay family” fridae.com (25 April 2008), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=2216&viewarticle=1 Google Scholar.

¹²⁸ Wockner, Rex, “Singapore censors Oscars”, San Francisco Bay Times, 5 March 2009, http://www.sfbaytimes.com/?sec=article&article_id=10222 Google Scholar.

¹²⁹ The author has written an occasional column for fridae.com since 2005.

¹³⁰ “Singapore to legalise anal, oral sex – but only for heterosexuals” fridae.com (9 November 2006), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=1800&viewarticle=1 Google Scholar

¹³¹ “Singapore's main opposition party declines to take up gay sex issue” fridae.com (9 February 2007), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=1853&viewarticle=1&searchtype=all Google Scholar.

¹³² “Council of Churches commends Singapore” fridae.com (12 March 2007), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=1874&viewarticle=1 Google Scholar.

¹³³ Law Society of Singapore, Executive Summary of Council's Report on the Proposed Amendments to the Penal Code, 2007, http://www.lawgazette.com.sg/2007-5/exec_summary.htm.

¹³⁴ “Retention of gay sex laws cannot be justified” fridae.com (12 April 2007), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=1895&viewarticle=1 Google Scholar.

¹³⁵ “ “No option” but to decriminalize gay sex, says MM Lee” fridae.com (25 April 2007), http://www.fridae.com/newsfeatures/article.php?articleid=1907&viewarticle=1&searchtype=all Google Scholar. “No prying on gays but no marriages either”, The Straits Times, 2 July 2007)Google Scholar.

¹³⁶ “Foreigners not allowed to be part of gay rights debate in Singapore” fridae.com (19 September 2007), online: Fridae, http://www.fridae.com>>Google Scholar.

¹³⁷ Sunil Babu Pant v Nepal, December 21, 2008, Supreme Court of Nepal, Balram, Justices and Ojha, Pawan Kumar, Order Writ No 917 of 2064 (2007AD), http://www.sxpolitics.org/mambo452/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=198 Google Scholar.

¹³⁸ Hinch, Brent, Passions of the Cut Sleeve, (University of California Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

¹³⁹ Change has been slow, for (a) homosexuals are a relative small minority, (b) they are dispersed among the larger population, (c) they have no natural institutions of their own that could support a leadership (such as their own schools or churches), (d) the ability to ‘pass’ gives individuals a way of dealing with stigma that runs counter to organizing for change, and (e) discussion of sexual issues or sexual variation seems difficult in all societies.

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