"One Attack A Week": Alai's Gay Hate Crim

Contents:

• ALAI GAY AND LBIAN SCENE
• MAN’S FURY OVER ‘PRAVED’ TOILET ACT SPARKS BATE OVER GAY BEATS
• GAY BEACH.TENNYSON DUN ALAI ATRALIA.
• "ONE ATTACK A WEEK": ALAI'S GAY HATE CRIM
• ALAI GAY BEACH
• MAN’S FURY OVER ‘PRAVED’ TOILET ACT SPARKS BATE OVER GAY BEATS
• CANBERRA, NOT SYDNEY, IS THE GAY AND LBIAN PAL OF ATRALIA
• WHAT I LEARNED WORKG A NAKED GAY BAR

ALAI GAY AND LBIAN SCENE

Alai Gay and Lbian Scene. Atralia has bee a very unbiased untry and Alai is a great place for gay and lbian visors to spend some time. It is worth notg that South Atralia was actually the first state the whole untry to legalise gay sex, which dit the forward-thkg non-discrimatory attu of this state.

MAN’S FURY OVER ‘PRAVED’ TOILET ACT SPARKS BATE OVER GAY BEATS

There are several LGBT venu and gay iendly bars to be found Alai, where typilly drag shows and karaoke tend to form the bulk of the entertament on offer. Gay and lbian newspaper, published on a fortnightly basis, full of LGBT rmatn.

Wh regular gay and lbian events on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights, cludg live mic, dancers and lourful drag shows, where dience participatn is somethg of a requise.

GAY BEACH.TENNYSON DUN ALAI ATRALIA.

Formerly a gay bar, wh an excellent beer garn. LGBT Gay and Lbian Events clu:Stonewall Celebratn - held June, this event featur a number of lectur and exhibns at var venu across Alai. The gay muny of Alai celebrat this three-week annual cultural ftival wh food and we, culture, dancg, films, talks, walks, theatre and baret acts galore.

For s, gay bashers operated wh impuny. But ltle is known about gay hate crim outsi those now wily documented NSW. NSW now has a task force, Operatn Parrabell, reviewg 88 aths cludg 30 unsolved s om the 1970s to the early 2000s as potential gay-hate murrs, most of which weren’t treated as such at the time.

Police didn’t keep stats and even if they did, they would have been worthls bee gay people didn’t go to the police. For their part, the police saw the homosexual muny as the crimals - bee they were. Even after homosexual acts beme legal across Atralia between 1975 (South Atralia) and 1997 (Tasmania), what went on at beats has remaed an act of public cency.

"ONE ATTACK A WEEK": ALAI'S GAY HATE CRIM

Even some of the out-and-proud gay muny looked down on what those men did the darkns. Acrdg to Profsor Stephen Tomsen om the Universy of Wtern Sydney, the crimologist who did a lot of the work intifyg the 88 NSW s, the only reason siar potential gay-hate murrs haven’t been found else where is that no one’s gone lookg. And so I cid to foc on the cy of church and bodi barrels – a socially progrsive cy wh a reputatn for twisted darkns – where even while they were leadg the way gay law reform, men were beg vicly bashed behd the bh.

ALAI GAY BEACH

And while other Alai crim like the disappearance of the Bemont children and the Snowtown murrs grabbed the headl and gave the cy s perhaps unserved reputatn, wh one notable exceptn the s I was lookg at – like most gay-hate crim – went by largely unnoticed. An graed culture whose legacy re-mas a fear of reportg crim and the “gay-panic fence”, whereby, two stat, you n still kill a bloke and have downgrad to manslghter by sayg, “He me on to me.

He nied that they went there to bash gay men.

MAN’S FURY OVER ‘PRAVED’ TOILET ACT SPARKS BATE OVER GAY BEATS

They nied havg heard anythg about the 1991 murr of another gay man, David Sat, the South Parklands.

“Who would have believed that South Atralia would, 1992, see a jury set ee two men who btally bashed a gay man wh a three-foot metal bar? ”The gay men – victim and wns – were all qutned at length about what was they were dog Veale Garns and about such germane matters as where they would have had sex had they met the right man. And then whether or not a homosexual advance was sufficient to expla the subsequent extreme vlence meted out.

The acqutal me as a shock to the gay muny. Activist Ian Purcell stood ont of a banner proclaimg “Gay Bashg isn’t self--fence”, as he addrsed the crowd: “Who would have believed that South Atralia – which proudly led the world gay law reform the 1970s – would, 1992, see a jury set ee two men who btally bashed a gay man wh a three-foot metal bar?

CANBERRA, NOT SYDNEY, IS THE GAY AND LBIAN PAL OF ATRALIA

Kenton Penley, spokman for the Lbian and Gay Communy Actn, said gay bashgs were on the rise and that acrdg to rmatn gathered by the muny, at least two homosexuals were hospalised each week after ser attacks. Om this cisn is that gay people are no longer protected by the law, ” Penley said. The Advertiser ran a letter om the secretary of the Moral Renewal Society, David W Griffhs, which agreed: “The signal beg sent to the homosexual muny [by the verdict] is one of: be warned, unnatural behavur, if advanced unwarranted to a normal person, n be nsted as offensive and retaliatn n be accepted as self-fence.

Comedian Julian Clary apparently once said the cy’s signer, Colonel William Light, mt have been gay for the way he set Garns ss at the southern end of the rg, while further north, near the top end of town and the River Torrens, is the “Number One Beat” which, 1972, had been Alai’s hottt gay pick-up spot sce before anyone uld remember.

As a vice squad officer, the diligent 22-year-old had a duty to uphold the laws agast gamblg, SP bookmakers and prostutn, to monor the nightclubs and to keep the “homos” check. He liked the homosexual work the least.

WHAT I LEARNED WORKG A NAKED GAY BAR

It’s been argued that the screw got turned particularly tightly on South Atralia’s homosexuals after the Woomera rocket range was built 1949.