In correspondence with Lord Maginnis

Last night I saw someone tweet that Lord Maginnis has received a number of emails about his comments yesterday on the Nolan Show. He said that the majority had been in favour, but that most of those against has been rants.

I'm off the opinion that shouting and ranting at people with such opinions, especially when they called the gay rights lobby aggressors is certainly not the way to go.

That is why I emailed this to him this morning.

Dear Lord Maginnis,

I listened to your comments on equal marriage this morning on the Nolan Show.

I do not understand how you consider your marriage or Stephen Nolan's marriage to be any more private than mine or any other gay person's would be.

For a start the ceremony itself would surely be held with at least two witnesses and surely some family and friends would be invited, so hardly private. That would apply to both I see no difference there.

I doubt that you are your wife do not attend events, friend's houses, or even church separately so therefore there are times you are out in public as a couple. I'd like to feel able to do that with a boyfriend here in Northern Ireland as I do in Scotland, England or Wales. But as the equality commission report Do You Mean Me? showed this morning we would feel far safer being in a mixed religious marriage out and about in Belfast than a same sex one.

I can therefore only assume that the only event you think I might make more public than you and you wife would make would be in the bedroom. It may shock you but the reason I want to marry my boyfriend is that we will be faithful and monogamous one to the other for life, much as I suspect you promised to your wife on your wedding day.

You see I have actually come into contact with heterosexual couples, their weddings, elements of their married life. From when I was a young child they have been an every present element to my life. Indeed it seems that they are everywhere and I cannot seem to turn around without seeing a pair of them. Maybe holding hands, kissing in public, wrapping their arms around each other, pushing their children in pushchairs or whatever. For 365 days a year here in Northern Ireland they are aggressively pushing their heterosexuality in my face. By your argument this morning I should have been adversely influenced by them and heaven forbid become straight, as for only one day, and that only recently, has it been safe to see a large number of fellow gay people in Belfast being free to act in public like our heterosexual peers. For the record there are two Pride Parades in Northern Ireland one in Belfast and one in Londonderry (the second will be in its third year this year). Compared with parades for other organisations this is very few.

Most LGBT people [in Northern Ireland] do not brandish about their relationships in public because of the fear of being more treated less favourably than members of the other religious community. The reason for this is that people like yourself, many of who have been elected to represent all their constituents to not be protected by them but instead to have their safety put at threat by comments like yours on the Nolan show.

Regards

Stephen Glenn

I did receive a speedy response almost as soon as he came off air on The Nolan Show this morning. I publish it below in full.

Thanks for your considered comments Stephen.  I need hardly say that I disagree with you.

 

Nonetheless, I appreeciate the tone in which you have corresponded and wish you well.

 

Ken

 

The Lord Maginnis of Drumglass

I did sleep on what I had written and made a few minor changes to what I intended the write. Too often we send a message in the heat of the situation which can be ranty and not reasoning with the other person's objections. It is especially true in the political sphere where too often adversarial positions are brought to the fore.


Whilst I know that I have done little to change Lord Maginnis's opinion on this matter, I hope that by my tone and the way I laid out my arguments based on his own words he will realise that we are not all aggressive activists but intelligent individuals who are not swayed as he puts it into a lifestyle. But often we have struggled to come to terms and live with our homosexuality here in Northern Ireland, which to be honest is not the easiest place in the world to be born this way.

An Ode to Maginnis #LGBT

A poem based on Lord Ken Maginnis's comments on the 'Nolan Show' this morning, his speeches in the House of Lords on the introduction of Civil Partnerships and other actions of his and other Unionist opinions on the LGBT community in Northern Ireland.

I don't obsess about what you get up to with your wife
But as you now have grandkids I guess it's a love for life.
I don't prey on what laws you break if you are being lax
I mean only a fool protests Ireland by failing to pay UK car tax.
And while when you were at college the gays were closeted away
It's probably because before '82 here they'd too end up locked away.

I'd like to imagine that your next door neighbours haven't yet been civil partnered
Because they like you want marriage and they feel equality is what matters.
But then on matters of equality do you want Northern Ireland to be included
Or shall we keep those gays low down as they clearly are deluded,
With a need for medial assistance to sort out their feelings
Head to a nice psychiatrist for reparative healings.

I doubt you judge your marriage's worth on how you perform in bed
But on the love you have for your wife and other things instead.
But that's a private matter how your share you love with your wife
You didn't have to fight to recognise that marriage set for life
You don't have one in four fellow citizens not wanting you next door
Because of the sort of comments made by political dinosaurs.
You compare us to paedophiles or unnatural, call us deviants,
Thinks our blood's unclean, we're unsafe to adopt and repugnant.

It's alright for Unionists to march against Irish influence to say No!
But not alright for gays to march to highlight that equality has a way to go.

How come road blocks and civil disobedience is to be encouraged
While a joyous parade in summer is aggressive and participants besmirched?

Maginnis a dinosaur in our LGBT midst

Today we had a prime example of how Northern Ireland's political leaders are not the people to help overcome the negative image that the Equality Commission found the people of Northern Ireland have here.

Lord Maginnis the former MP  for Fermanagh and South Tyrone started the Nolan Show saying:

"It is unnatural and I don't think that society as a whole, requires to have imposed on it something that is unnatural.I certainly don't think there should be an obligation on my church to carry out gay marriage."

"I can't dictate how people live their lives. I would be concerned for young children that they would be influenced by these people. Remember this is not something private like your marriage or my marriage. This is something that is aggressive, that is demanding."

"All [relationships] are not equal in the eyes of many, many people."

He then went on to draw a comparison between homosexual love and bestiality. Calling equal marriage a rung on the ladder towards allowing man to marry his dog, or women her horse etc. presumably.

"I do not believe we should be doing anything to encourage this deviant practise."

He also when asked what people attracted to people of the same sex should do, he said he was not a doctor or psychiatrist.  Before saying he did not know if it was natural or a learnt condition, implying that there was some sort of cure.

He then equated homosexuality to pedophilia.

 As John O'Doherty of the Rainbow Project when he was allowed to come back went on to say that this is the level of debate that our political leaders which leads to 27% of the population saying they would mind a gay, lesbian or bisexual person living next door, compared to 14% in 2005, while 42% unhappy about them becoming an in-law, a rise of 13 percentage points over the last six years. Also, around a third of people (35%) would mind a transgender person as a work colleague, rising to 40% as a neighbour and 53% as an in-law.

So somehow according to Maginnis what happens between and man and his wife in their bedroom is private, yet between a homosexual couple, that is not!

The UUP have distanced themselves from Lord Maginnis's comments. But sadly there are others in the Unionist community who have expressed similar thoughts to him in recent times. Northern Ireland political leaders need to look up to their responsibility

Update as well as the UUP's statement the SDLP and Alliance. As well as the Rainbow Project's response.

Equal marriage = disestablishment of C of E???

So marriage equality will lead to disestablishment of the Church of England according to an article in today's independent.

Well they said similar stuff about Catholic emancipation, yet nothing so cataclysmic has happened since the Catholic Relief Act of 1829. It was the Church of England's superior outlook that led to the Acts of Uniformity in 1559 and 1662. Yet these were repealed in 1828 so that Baptists, Presbyterians, Quakers, Methodists and others became eligible for many forms of public educational and social benefits.

Jews were also expelled from England in 1290, and although in 1656 a small community was found to exist but no action was taken to expel them by Oliver Cromwell at the time. Their emancipation came at roughly the same time as those above. Either in 1829 or in 1858 when Jews were finally allowed to sit in Parliament.

Of course the Church of England has been disestablished in the past during the Commonwealth 1649 to 1660

You see the argument that the Church of England is under threat has been used in the past against other Christians, other believers, other people. To use it again in light of the history of the oppression of the Church of England of others through the year being as they were the established church and had, and still have a say in laws, is such a red herring and over the top desperate plea that it should be confined to what it is.

There is the other argument that allowing equal marriage will undermine marriage. But the same was said in, 1857 when ordinary people were allowed to divorce. Or 1882 when married women were allowed to own property in their own right. Again in 1923 when women were able to petition for divorce. Or in 1969 when a period of separation rather than have to prove unreasonable contact was all that was required.

So of course I'm still at a loss how anything that allows more people who are lovingly wanting to commit to each other in marriage is a threat to marriage.

Brad retains Dauphiné title

It is not every day that you see a British rider in the leader's jersey with the champions number 1 on his back celebrate this far down the field. But this in the moment that Bradley Wiggins knew he had defended the Critérium du Dauphiné.

It is seen by many as the ideal preparation for the Tour de France and indeed is the only other race that all the five time winners of the Tour de France have also won. Indeed on 10 of the 63 previous running the winner has gone on to win le Tour.

• 1955 Louison Bobet
• 1963 Jacques Anquetil
• 1971 Eddy Merckx
• 1973 Luis Ocaña
• 1975 Bernard Thévenet
• 1979 Bernard Hinault
• 1981 Bernarh Hinault
• 1995 Miguel Indurain
• 2002 Lance Armstrong
• 2003 Lance Armstrong

Having crashed out of last year's Tour with a broken collar bone as a result of a crash on the flat Wiggo's palmarès (results) have been impressive. He came 3rd in the incredibly tough Vuelta a España, the first Britain to be on the podium at the end of a Grand Tour. He then this year has won Paris-Nice and the Tour de Romandie before retaining the Dauphiné title he secured last year. Not even Merckx,. or anyone else has managed those three plamarès in one season.


With Andy Schleck having to retire this week after a crash in the time trial but after already appearing to struggle, and with Cadel Evans apparently unable to shake Wiggins in the Dauphiné, things may well be looking good for Brad ahead of the start of the Tour.

Why are West Lothian MSPs silent on Equal Marriage?

There are a lot of things you could say about West Lothian's constituency MSPs Fiona Hyslop (Linlithgow) and Angela Constance (Almond Valley), but one of them is not that either of them are shy.

Over the years I have known them they have both been forthright about their views and expressed their opinions in an open and public way. Therefore when the Equality Network published their list on which MSPs were supporting equal marriage I was somewhat shocked to see that neither of the them had expressed an opinion.

I know it was a question that came up in the hustings in the lead up to the 2010 Westminster elections, because I seem to recall being the only one in a church based hustings to come out in support of equal marriage rather than playing to the crowd. Of course I wasn't there to hear the questions in the 2011 hustings for Holyrood but I cannot think that it wasn't posed again there to a different set of candidates.

Of course the fact that neither have answered the Equality Network's letter or signed their pledge does not necessarily mean they are against. But you would have thought when the leadership of their party SNP is so strongly behind the notion of equalising marriage rights that they may have added their voice to the majority of others.

Other MSPs representing West Lothian on the list have been more forthcoming. Labour's Sarah Boyack, Kezia Dugdale and Neil Findlay have all signed the pledge in support as has the Green's Alison Johnstone. It is only the Conservatives David McLetchie who has written to the Equality Network to record his opposition while his party colleague Gavin Brown is also in the unknown category.

If anyone from West Lothian has asked their directly and received a response I'd be interested to hear the outcome, please add it in a comment below or email me using my contact details.

1988 Summer Olympics Seoul: XXIV Olympiad and VIII Paralympics

Ahead of the 84th IOC Congress everyone knew that the Games of the 24th Olympiad would be going to Asia as the two candidate cities were Nagoya, Japan and Seoul, South Korea. The vote in the end went 52 to 27 in favour of the South Korean capital. This was also the first time that the Paralympics were directly linked to Olympic host city as part of the remit from the IOC.

Nations 160 (+20)
Competitors 8391 (+1562)
Sports 27 (+6)
Events 263 (+42)


17 September to 2 October 1988 hosted by Seoul, South Korea


Paralympics


Nations 61 (+7)
Competitors 3057 (+157)
Sports 16 (-1)
Events 732 (-171)

15 to 24 October 1988 at the same venues as the Olympics

Making their first Olympic appearances were Aruba, American Samoa, Cook Islands, Guam, Maldives, Vanuatu, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines and South Yemen. It was to be the only ever appearance of South Yemen at the Games as unification with North Yemen would occur before the next Olympiad.

Although none of the new nations made a mark on the Games this time they took part in Athletics, Boxing, Fencing, Judo, Swimming, Synchronized Swimming, Weightlifting and Wrestling.

New to the Paralympics were Bulgaria, Iran, Macau, Morocco, Oman, Philippines, Puerto Rico,  Singapore. Soviert Union and Tunisia.

Going for medals of saving others

In the fifth race of the Finn Class of the Olympic Sailing Regatta  Lawrence Lemieux was lying second about halfway through the race when the wind escalated from about 15 knots at the start to 35. He noticed that two sailors in the 470 class on an adjacent course were in difficulty. He went to the aid of the injured Singapore sailors Joseph Chan and Shaw Her Siew. He then waited for the official safety boat to take the two sailors on board before carrying on with his own race.

He was 22nd boat across the line but the unanimous decision of International Yacht Racing Union was to award him with the 2nd place he was in when he went to the rescue.In the end he finished 11th but was awared the Pierre de Coubertin medal with the citation from IOC President Juan Antonia Samaranch

"By your sportsmanship, self-sacrifice and courage you embody all that is right with the Olympic ideal."

 He was the first living summer Olympian to recieve the reward as the previous summer recipient had received it posthumously in 1964 for his exploits in 1936 and the second Emil Zatopek wasn't to win it for his 1952 achievements until 2000.

Gold for Suriname

Suriname had entered the Olympics in 1960, though due to a mistake in the time of heats their first competitor hadn't represented them until 1968. They sent their biggest team thus far to Seoul a total of 6 athletes. Including one swimmer who had failed to progress in the 100m freestyle or butterfly in 1984.

Matt Biondi of the USA was the favourite for the final, along with Olympic Champion West German Michael Groß and GB's Andy Jameson who had qualified fastest for the 100m butterfly final. But in between their qualifying heats and third fastest had come Anthony Nesty the first Suriname Olympian to reach a final.

Biondi turned at 50m well ahead and inside the World Record split with  Groß in second. But the American tied in the final 25 metres he took three agonising long strokes to hit the wall including a long glide, still leading on the first two but the Surinamese swimmer who had only been about fifth at the turn set the Olympic record of 53.00s an one hundreth of a second ahead of Biondi.

He became the first black man to win a medal in the Olympic pool, only Enith Brigitha of the Netherlands with two freestyle bronzes in 1976 had preceded him. He also made the 200m Butterfly final but only managed to come 8th. He attempted to defend his title in 1992 in Barcelona but only managed bronze.

Seven time for this lady

Sweden's Kerstin Palm picked up her foil for a seventh consecutive Olympic appearance in the Games. She had first competed in Tokyo in 1964 as an eighteen year old where she finished 6th. She was 5th in Mexico City (which turned out to be her best performance), 6th again in Munich, tied for 9th in Montreal, 29th in Moscow, 12th in Los Angeles.

Here in her farewell Olympic appearance she only managed to come 29th. She managed to win a total of 23 Swedish national titles the last of which was in 2008 at the age of 62.

Also at those games were athlete Merlene Ottey Jamaica (later Slovenia) in the third of her seven, French cyclist Jeannie Longo in the second of her's and canoeist Josefa Idem Guerrini West Germany (later Italy) in the second of hers. Japan's Seiko Hashimoto was at the first of her three Summer Games as a cyclist having earlier in the year taken part in the second of her four Winter Games as a speed skater.

Guerrini has qualified for her eighth games in London and will beat the record established by Palm in 1988.

Supreme Soviet Paralympian

Seoul saw the first participation by the Soviet Union in the Summer Paralympics. They were to take 21 gold, 20 silver and 15 bronze medals. Given the way history was about to unfold Seoul along with the Winter Paralympics in Innsbruck would be their only appearances in the Paralympics before the independent states arose out of what was the USSR.

It therefore means that the greatest Soviet Paralympian turned out to be Vadim Kalykov with gold in the B2 high jump, long jump, triple jump and pentathlon (the only four events he was entered for) is their greatest of all time.

The golden slam

Image from The Official Olympic Report

After a 64 year absence tennis return to the Olympic programme in Seoul. With four events men's and women's singles and doubles.

Having already won the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open that year lined up against Gabriela Sabatini who in New York less than a month before she had beaten to the be the first woman since 1970, and only third ever to win a calendar Grand Slam.

In the final the German won through yet again 6-3 6-3. Therefore beating Chris Evert in Australia, Natasha Zrereva in Paris, Martina Navratilova at Wimbledon and Sabatini twice to run up an impressive array of greats as scalps in a feat that has not been repeated a Calendar Golden Slam. Four years later she would reach the Olympic final again but lost to Jennifer Capriatti. Pairing up with Claudia Kohde-Kilsch she also took doubles bronze in her golden year.

The other champions on the reappearance of tennis to the Games were

• Men's singles Miloslav Mecir Cze
• Men's Doubles Ken Flach and Robert Seguso USA
• Women's Doubles Pam Shriver and Zina Garrison USA

Japan no longer top in Judo

For the first time since 1964 when it was introduced Japan failed to top medal table if they were at the Games. Indeed they only managed a solitary gold in the heavyweight division through Hitoshi Saito's defense of his title. Another defending Japanese champion Shinji Hosokawa was one of the three Japanese golds in their martial art.

Diane Bell

There was also a demonstration of women's judo before it became a full sport in four year's time. There wasn't much relief for Japan here. They only took the middleweight -66kg medal with Hikari Sasaki.

In the extra-lightweight -48kg division their judo player Fumiko Esaki lost to China's Li Zhongyun. At half-lightweight -52kg GB's Sharon Rendle triumphed over France's Dominique Brun. In lightweight -56kg that was a win for Australia's Suzanne Williams over China's Liu Guizhu. Britain also took the half-middleweight -61kg when Diane Bell beat USA's Lynn Roethke.Half-heavyweight -72kg went to Belgian Ingrid Berghmans, while heavyweight +72kg went to Netherlands fighter Angelique Seriesse.

When it became a full Olympic event of the demostration winners only Li Zhongyun, who moved up a weight, along with Shraon Rendle took medals both the bronzes in half-lightweight.

My brush with Paralympian medalist

As I mentioned before bowls while not an Olympic event was a Paralympic sport. I've also mentioned that I have played against some of the those wheelchair or otherly disabled bowlers.

Well in 1988 the pair of Willam Behan (pictured) and Frank Bell of Ireland took silver in Seoul in men's pairs 2-6 in the Paralympics.

Whilst I never met William, Frank would later end up playing in the same clubs both indoor and outdoor as me when I was last living in Bangor. Indeed he was one of the four players from that club that ended up playing in triples and rinks with me in Civil Service competitions. So I have won quite a number of trophies on the same team as a Paralympic Silver medalist.

When in Japan Korea

Image from The Official Olympic Report

As with the first Asian Games in 1964 there was a martial art that the host nation wanted to showcase to teh world. In this case it was Taekwondo. But unlike Judo in 1964 it was only to appear as a demonstration sport, something it was to do again in 1992 before becoming a full sport in Sydney 2000.

Unlike judo it started with both men's and women's contests. South Korea dominated the men's events winning all by the heavyweight, and that was lost to American Jimmy Kim of Korean descent.

The the women's contests the golds were spread a little more widely with USA winning 3,  Chinese Taipei and  South Korea  taking two, with Denmark winning the remaining gold.

Spain however, had managed 3 silvers and one bronze in the men's contests and a further silver and four bronze in the women's events which may account for why it was kept on as a demonstration event for Barcelona.

Head banging in the pool

During the preliminary rounds of the 3m springboard diving Greg Louganis stepped up to attempt a reverse 2½ pike in the ninth of the 11 rounds. He was taking part in his third Olympics having won silver in the 10m platform in Montreal 1976 and then double gold in platform and springboard in 1984. Without the USA boycott of 1980 he may well have be going for an historic double threepeat.

Though first he had to get through this preliminary round though he was leading by 8 points from Tan of China.

Then disaster struck. Coming out of the pike position to prepare to enter the water his head hit the board (pictured). As the dives were getting more difficult he managed only a 6.3 but he was also nursing a concussion, and  unknown to anyone at the time had been diagnosed with HIV 6 months before the Games. Because of the bloody nature of the head wound when he finally came out as gay and living with HIV in 1994 there was some outrage that he hadn't made this known at the time of the incident in Seoul.

He got himself patched up and got ready to carry on, his next dive was the best of the preliminaries, by anybody scoring 87.12. He had one more dive and although not scoring big marks was comfortable enough for the for the following day's final.

He took the lead in round one and although he briefly lost it from round 3 he ended up winning by more that 25 point. On dive 9 when he was back in the lead he pulled off the reverse 2½ pike scoring 76.5 the second highest score of the round.

A week later he had added his second gold of these Games and his fourth in all with a lead of just 1.14 on 638.61.

He had been the first man since 1928 and the early says of diving Olympics to pull off the individual double, and in 1988 he became the only man to successfully defend the double. Indeed it was only ever done by one other diver Pat McCormick in the 1950s.

See also my full list of blog posts about past Olympics