I’ve often found it helpful to seek an outsider’s perspective on complex issues, and so while pondering the possibility of a gay mafia, I decided to take my sister out for a night at one of London’s hottest gay nightclubs. She confirmed my suspicions. In a heavy night of partying, she saw a happy, exciting community that thrives despite being oppressed. She saw the beautiful people, the cutting-edge fashion, the unadulterated fun; she went home in disbelief that we still picket parliament demanding more. A recent survey found that 65 per cent of gay people regularly lied about their sexuality to avoid being beaten up, but in spite of that we’ve adopted a lifestyle that heterosexuals envy. Pure genius or an own goal?
I believe that there is an explanation for the gay lobby’s lack of political progress, in changing both the statute book and the hearts and minds of the public. The responsibility lies with a small group of businessmen who have a major financial interest in keeping lesbian and gay people on the fringes of society – where they are most profitable. Welcome to the real gay mafia.
Gay business, or the “pink pound” as it has crudely become known, is big business. Richard Branson owns Britain’s largest gay nightclub, and hundreds of other investors are opening gay shops, restaurants and bars in the knowledge that fortunes have already been made by tapping into the gay market.
Many people believe these companies provide powerful examples of how integrated society has become; how successful and accepted gay people are in Tony Blair’s Britain. Not so. Homosexuals need so many exclusively gay businesses precisely because they are not an accepted part of mainstream society. Gay people voluntarily opt out of society in order to escape from homophobic abuse. By using gay taxi firms, gay doctors and even gay funeral directors (look under F in the Gay to Z business directory: there are a dozen in London alone), gays are able to live a life relatively free from prejudice.
A significant number of businessmen are trying to stall the progress of gay rights campaigners for as long as possible. A handful of companies are using their financial muscle to penetrate campaigning groups and subtly ensure that all their resources are focused on legal reforms so that social prejudice is left unchallenged. With prejudice left intact, segregation continues and gay businesses thrive and make money.
Stonewall, the leading gay rights organisation, has an annual budget approaching £1 million, much of which is raised through the business community. Sponsorship, advertising and corporate fund-raising deals bring in enough revenue to fund a slick campaign, a spacious suite of offices in central London and a regular stream of champagne receptions and events.
In return for their generosity, major donors are often rewarded with a place on Stonewall’s board of directors and, because the organisation has supporters rather than members, these positions are the only official way to influence Stonewall policy. A quick glance through the organisation’s literature will show that yesterday’s sponsors are today’s decision-makers; and most of those involved have financial interests in lucrative gay businesses.
By giving financial donors the only voice in setting the agenda, gay rights organisations have left themselves open to a serious charge of having a conflict of interests. Can it really just be coincidence that most groups are fighting exclusively for legal reforms and ignoring calls to tackle social prejudice, while accepting money from a business community that thrives because of social inequality?
In a survey by YouthSpeak, the gay rights youth group which I chaired for a while, it was found that 84 per cent of young people valued social changes over legal reforms, and that over 70 per cent thought that most gay rights organisations put too much emphasis on trying to change laws. This reflected a growing trend in the gay community which recently provoked the formation of several new organisations to focus on social campaigns. Existing organisations have famously clashed with these new groups, and maintain that their own, unsuccessful, attempts to lobby parliament have been the single greatest contribution to the gay rights cause to date.
One Stonewall volunteer, who has asked not to be named, said: “You have to bear in mind that gay businesses only exist because of the niche market which is created by gay people being a socially excluded group. If we managed to get ourselves accepted, the gay pubs and shops would probably fold, and Stonewall would lose a large proportion of its funding.”
The Pink Paper, the leading free gay newspaper, is funded entirely by advertising. One former editor, Andrew Saxton, remembers a series of occasions when advertisers’ interests were items for discussion at editorial meetings. “Although our news coverage was never substantially censored, I think there’s a fine line between censorship and honest journalism, and I had to fight hard to keep us on the right side of that line.”
This will not surprise those whose actions provide the gay press with regular stories. Duncan Hothersall is a pivotal figure in Scottish gay politics but has found the gay press to be reluctant to cover events north of the border unless there is a commercial link. “One example was the first Gay Pride march in Scotland which 10,000 people attended,” he said. “The Pink Paper only gave it a brief mention, and that focused on the launch of Quentin Crisp’s new brand of whisky which was only a small part at the end of the event.”
Gay Times is widely acknowledged to have far higher editorial standards than its rivals because the £2.50 cover price enables journalists to remain independent from advertisers. The editor, David Smith, believes that his magazine gives a more balanced view than any of the free gay newspapers, but cynics have pointed out that the publisher, Chris Graham Bell, also chairs the Gay Business Association. While Smith insists there is no conflict of interest here, it is surely no coincidence that the magazine features gushing tributes to gay businesses, while barely finding space for campaigns against homophobia in schools or for regional groups involved in the gay rights movement.
Perhaps it is naive to talk about a gay rights movement at all; a gay rights industry would be a more accurate description. While ordinary gay people yearn for a day when they can live without fear of violence and discrimination, the gay mafia seems to be profiting, in all senses of the word, from continued inequality.
The tragedy of modern gay politics is that those who sit on the gay rights platform are, for whatever reason, allowing their agenda to be dictated by a handful of people who have a vested interest in delaying progress.
While political parties must adapt to win the widest support, the role of pressure groups is to maintain an ideological stance and fight the opposition. This is simply not possible when the oppressed and the oppressors become entangled.
The ultimate irony of the gay struggle is that true victory demands that gays surrender their gay identity, and with it the gay taxis and funeral directors that provide them with temporary shelter from homophobia.
While gay companies insidiously continue to govern the policies of gay rights campaigners and the press, a temporary shelter is all it is possible to achieve.
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