Yes, those figures are very worrying

It only goes to show just how very shallow are our achievements here.

Still, you don't overcome 2,000 of christian homophobia overnight

The war goes on.

Ooops I meant you don;t overcome 2,000 YEARS of christian homophobia overnight

The shit may have been cleared up but the smell lingers for a long time afterwards

Tallskin, you may want to re-check your figures before you go all anti-Christian. A huge percentage of anti-gay rhetoric in Britain comes from the enormous Pakistani/Muslim community there.

While you raise an important point, Cam, the fact is that the overwhelming majority of homophobia in England comes from Christianity.

CAM, I was going to mention that indeed, but everytime I do on these boards I get torn to shreds by the anti racists and accused of racist /anti-immigrant bigotry.

So, I didn't mention it.

But yes you are totally correct but not 100%

Because great swathes of the white chav scum, (the great unwashed) what used to be the old white working class, are intensely anti-gay. Hence my comments above- cos their attitudes are a throwback to earlier times when christianity provided the moral and intellectual bedrock of english society.

Like I say religion is largely dead for whites in the UK but the lingering afterburn, the structures of the mind, are still present.

What about the migrant communities from the Caribbean and Africa?

I'm sure those also must be factored in when talking about anti-Gay/homophobic sentiment in the UK.

1. I think we need to be awfully careful about being too sensitive about possibly offending various groups when pointing out homophobia. Just because an ethnic or religious group is predominantly nonwhite should never shield them from condemnation for the ugliness of the anti-gay aspect of their belief system. Homophobia is wrong, whether something thinks jesus or mohammed told 'em so, and we should always feel perfectly free to point that out. The "cultural" argument doesn't work for christians, and it shouldn't be allower to work for muslims or hindi, or rastafarians or mor(m)ons or whatever.

2. I wonder how many of those 24% are closet cases just wishing someone would punish them for their guilty thoughts.

true churchill, but the survey isn't broken down and precise enough.

But if the survey did include effnik opinions, in a general population survey, then the muslims and blacks would def scew the figures on hostility to gays way upwards.

However, I have to confess that I would not be at all surprised if the entire survey was only of white natives and the 24% who want gay sex re-criminalised are all white. We have a lot of white scum here.

Churchill and Tallskin have identified a very real issue which (of course!) cannot be talked about. Ethnic homophobia. Remember the year Pride was held in a certain London Park in an Afro-Caribean area? No you probably don't, because it only occurred once - never repeated because of the number of serious muggings of innocent Pride goers by..well… And adoption agencies in a number of London boroughs (Hackney is the most notorious)simply refuse to reprimand homophobic born-again christian black social workers who act illegally in their dealings with gay potential adoptive parents.

Rob Haskell, even though I'm not from the UK I have heard a lot about how strong the anti-Gay sentiment is over there amongst the Afro-Caribean and Muslims. To be quite honest the true is same over here in the U.S. but I think its more pronounced in the UK due only to the size.
I myself have had a couple of close runs with Jamaicans and others from the islands and I know you are not joking when you talk about muggings of Pride goers, to say they feel nothing but contempt and hatred for us is an understatement.
What I don't understand is why would the authorities allow one of its employees(a social worker) to discriminate, its PC run amok. But yeah if you're a habitual reader of this blog you'll see how more often than not the Gays here are eager to give a pass to homophobes and anti-gay bigots especially if they are black.
Please just like Tallskin don't make yourself a stranger over here and feel free to post as often as you like, I always enjoy reading the comments from the UK. Though you might get some hate from some of the commenters here for telling the truth there will be some of us receptive to read it and understand it.