…but my office server wouldn’t allow the news link to open because the headline had the word sex in it. Apparently in some parts of the world there is still no freedom if the word sex is even whispered around it. And
it’s easy to see why this is such a huge victory. All you need to do is take a look at the knee jerk reactions from religious heads.
I’ve never really looked at the way the law is worded. Someone just pointed out to me today that it doesn’t specifically say you can’t have sex with someone of the same sex. It just says against the order of nature without specifying what nature intended and has just been misused by cops out to make a quick buck. Is that true or were they being far too simplistic? Anyone know more and care to explain?
This is what it says –
377. Unnatural offences: Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment of either description for term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.
PS: Just saw this as someone’s gmail status – India legalizes gay sex but bans Savitabhabhi ?!?
The Mad Momma 
Someone should tell those religious heads that the very reason they are able to practice their individual religions and shout dissent whenever they feel like it is because of the same constitution that upholds an individual’s right to equality.
They should be thankful the constitution is being upheld, otherwise whichever political party is in power would, depending on their agenda and inclinations, make their entire religion illegal to practice.
Some people just cannot see the bigger picture. Sigh!
I think it means that sex is legal only if done with the sole purpose of procreation. Who knew so many of us were breaking the law all this while! 😀
hahahaha!!
Me: Oh nice. so then they should ban birth control …
Something good finally! Now that the draconian law is dropped, hopefully, they will not be harassed and raped by the cops.
Me and my friends were working on a class project long time back. We had to make a small docu on discrimination faced by sexual minorities in Bangalore. Although the documentary didn’t turn out that well, we learnt a lot about the issue.
We took Sangama’s (http://sangama.org/) help and the stories shared by the members were real sad.
Many of them were disowned by their parents/friends when they choose to come out of ‘the closet’.
Most of them were unemployed. Many of them were beggers and prostitutes.. because they couldn’t get a job elsewhere. Some people we met were educated and highly qualified, they were fired from their job when their bosses found out they were ‘unnatural’!
Oh and the Hijras.. the ‘third gender’… they suffered the most. They couldn’t vote, get a ration card/passport, impossible to get rent/accomodation. Heck, they couldn’t even use public toilets…Cops would harass them, loot them, sometimes even rape them(their claim).
Now if only people who supposedly ‘follow the order of nature’, the so called religious leaders…. the imams, priests, pundits, et al would grow up and accept people for who they are.
Btw MM.. seen this video?
And we aren’t even talking about gay marriages here!!
I am going to do a post on this very soon!
“All our work, our whole life is a matter of semantics, because words are the tools with which we work, the material out of which laws are made, out of which the Constitution was written. Everything depends on our understanding of them.” – Felix Frankfurter
The phrase could theoretically encompass anything other than man-woman penile-vaginal intercourse, which is why it’s been a tool of harassment.
Me: right – it could, but it doesnt, right? i’m feeling rather cheated because I dont believe they actually used this all this while without it specifically saying so. and i can imagine how cheated the gay couples felt.
i also feel rather foolish having written this post. imagine caring and fighting for rights all this while without ever reading up on it. i really should have read more on it earlier. never too late i guess
The reaction from the religious right is no surprise. They’ve always reacted this way to any progressive step. Who the hell made them guardians of our culture anyway?
“…as long as there has been one true God, there has been killing in his name…”.
Me: okay between your quote and Suman’s I am getting more learned and more depressed 😦
Err…mine is just from Da Vinci Code. I am total pop fiction types!
BIG cheer for the new ruling coz even if the earlier law was not specific about the exact ‘nature’ yet it was being misused …
and we all know how much one has to battle to ‘understand” or even make the court understand the ‘correct’ meaning…
so for all the jerks who misused it and all the morons who now oppose this new ruling..take that!
and go and sit and pray to your gods that lightning strikes the rest of us 😛
that should do the trick 😉
“Against the order of nature” was just an old style colonial way of saying gay sex. This law is rather old-introduced by the British- and uses old-fashioned terminology, the same as was used in Britain.
happiest day of my life
if you think your post is bad….check mine. please.
even those this doesn’t apply to under 18s….i’m happy. VERY happy.
At last Lord Macaulay’s diktat will stop determining the fate of the people with alternate sexual preferences………I feel happy for the Gay community as this verdict will help them come out in the open….And, I hope that society will be more accepting of them……
In my opinion, stories of same sex couples are great examples of commitment against all odds….
This verdict will also help create better awareness against AIDS amongst homosewxuals ….Not that hetro-sexuals are a greatly awared lot……
On another note, do you know that 1935 amendment to this law banned “Oral Sex’ as well under this law! Crezy……….
Me: wow – we should have started a jail bharo movement for that one!
I am so happy that this ruling came about.. Better late than never..
As for the religious heads.. I guess they have no option but to protest.. Would they be able to retain their positions if they even dared to accept that the ruling makes sense.
Needless to say that whole world knows what these religious heads do in the name of religion…….We have still not forgotten the charges of sodomy against Church priests or cases of sexual abuse by so called Hindu Gurus or Muslim Maulvis………In my view these contractors of religion are worse than any other sexual offenders as they commit these attrocities in the name of religion…..
Me: true…
One small step for freedom.
Something that’ll never happen in Pakistan. Or maybe it will.
In about 400 years or so.
Me: chin up. i’m sure it wont be very long …
to me the key words would be ‘the order of nature’. If they are really talking of the “natural” order of things – that would make monogamy wrong in most species, and the institution of marriage doesn’t even exist in ‘the order of nature’ – BUT sodomy and homosexuality DO exist in nature – in mammals and specifically in primates. Is that why it’s ‘natural’ to us too?
pec
Me: hey!!!!!!!!!!!! I missed you. yes i know that is no response to your comment but still…
MM, did you hear about this Baba Ramdev declaring homosexuality as a disease??!!!!
Hahaha I can’t stop laughing at this! Apparently he’s going to come to Delhi and protest the rulings. Oh and get this- homosexuality can be CURED…..
……I seriously don’t know what to say. By what? Pranayam is it?? And what is his cure for rapists and murderers??
Man oh man!
http://trendsupdates.com/baba-ramdev-wants-to-come-out-now-that-homosexuality-is-legal/
I’m glad there’s so much support for the High Court decision here in the blogosphere!
Interestingly, the ban on Savita Bhabhi goes against a previous ruling by the Delhi high court in a matter relating to free speech and M. F. Hussain’s ‘offensive’ art. I blogged about it yesterday, but the ruling is easily googleable.
And Lalu makes me sick. What a s%$t-stirrer!
Hey MM, linked up to your post, just wanted to let you know.
Me: but of course!
And of course, my link was bad. Here it is.
“…but my office server wouldn’t allow the news link to open because the headline had the word sex in it.”
In my workplace too..mainly because some people resort to downloading porn in the office bandwidth 🙂
Me: 🙂 I know! but thats the point. If I were boss, I’d either shut off all web access so that people concentrated on work, wrapped up and left early (instead of playing scrabble, sudoku or blogging ;)) – or else I’d let it be. Why play moral police and say – okay you can waste time surfing the net but not if its adult content? unless they have child labour, right?
YAY!
(Better late than never – both the comment & the ruling.)