Okay, I realize this is an old issue and it's a very old story, but it's the first time I saw it in its entirety, and I just had to share it and shake my head at the amazing ignorance of some people.

Vancouver Sun
2003.11.27
Peter O'Neil
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Make it a crime to be gay: Alliance MP: Even Svend Robinson could become straight, party's family-issues critic says

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OTTAWA -- Canadian Alliance MP Larry Spencer, his party's family issues critic , says he'd support any initiative to put homosexuality back in the Criminal Code of Canada.

The U.S.-born former Baptist pastor also argues that the gay- rights movement's recent successes in areas like same-sex marriage stem from a "well-orchestrated ... conspiracy" that began in the 1960s.

The conspiracy included the seduction and recruitment of young boys in playgrounds and locker rooms and the deliberate infiltration of North America's judiciary, schools, the religious community, and the entertainment industry, he said.

The movement's progress in gaining public acceptance for homosexuality would have been slowed, however, had Pierre Elliott Trudeau not legalized homosexuality in 1969, according to the MP.

"I do believe it was a mistake to have legalized it," Spencer (Regina-Lumsden-Lake Centre) told The Vancouver Sun.

While he said no Canadian government would likely have the "courage" to reverse Trudeau's decision to remove the state from the nation's bedrooms, Spencer would support any bill that advocated such a move.

"If somebody brought a bill in the House to do that I'd certainly vote for it. Yeah, I'd like to see that [to] be the case. It's not that I would want spies in everybody's bedroom or anybody following anybody.

People who have been practising homosexuals for most of their adult lives, like New Democratic MP Svend Robinson, could transform themselves into heterosexuals.

"I believe he could. I believe he would struggle with it," said Spencer, pointing out that someone could hate long-distance running or weightlifting but then train themselves in that area and learn to love it.

"So the human body can be sensitized or de-sensitized. The mind or the conscience that we have can be sharpened against right or wrong. It can be de-sensitized to think that whatever wrong that's around us is nothing but natural and we begin to accept that."

"I just wish that there was some way that society could stand up and say, 'This is not right.' "

But Spencer said any MP, and especially someone from his party, risks being labelled "a redneck or a hate-monger or homophobic" if they even mention such views in Parliament.

Spencer's pronouncements come at a difficult time for his party, which is stickhandling a merger with the Progressive Conservative party.

Delegates from both parties are due to vote on a ratification of the merger Dec. 6.

He made his comments during an hour-long interview after The Vancouver Sun obtained a copy of an e-mail from Spencer to a Canadian citizen outlining his conspiracy theory. The Sun requested an interview so Spencer could elaborate on his views.

"I'm being very, very free here to talk with you against all advice probably that I should ever talk to any reporter to this kind of link," he said near the end of the interview.

"But you know I'm feeling very, very deprived, you know, of my rights in that I cannot say openly -- I dare not say it in the House of Commons, even -- the full extent of what I really believe on some of these issues."

Spencer said the conspiracy began with a speech by a U.S. gay rights activist in the 1960s whose name he couldn't recall.

"His quote went something like this ... 'We will seduce your sons in the locker rooms, in the gymnasiums, in the hallways, in the playgrounds, and on and on, in this land.'

"It was quite a long quote stating what was going to happen to the young boys of North America."

Spencer said one of the major steps was to encourage followers to enter the ministry of various churches and to infiltrate North America's schools and teaching colleges.

"The activists that organized in those days (encouraged) people of their persuasion to enter into educational fields, and to do this with the feeling of a mission, you know, of going out there as pioneers in a -- quote-- human rights area, and I think they were successful as we've seen."

He said those who sympathize with homosexuals in today's judiciary, educational system, the entertainment industry, and churches aren't directly linked to the people who launched the conspiracy.

"I would think that is so long ago that we're seeing the outworkings of it decades down the line. And to say there's a conspiracy now is going to raise eyebrows, and (people will) say, 'Well, I don't think so. It's just the natural evolution.'

"But there are things, like what we're talking about, that once you set in motion, it's like shoving a snowball off the edge of the barn roof. Once you set it in motion you don't have to keep pushing. It sort of keeps going. It's that slippery slope that we talk about."

Trudeau, while justice minister, announced sweeping changes to the Criminal Code in 1967 that included legalizing homosexual acts done in private involving consenting adults. The bill wasn't passed until 1969, when the late Trudeau was prime minister.

Previously, those convicted of buggery or bestiality could be sentenced to a maximum 14 years in jail.

"There's no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation," Trudeau said famously after tabling the bill.

Spencer said he wouldn't want homosexuals to ever go to jail as a result of their "choice" to engage in homosexual acts.

"I wouldn't even suggest that there would be a penalty. I just think it's so sad that we have to take an issue like this and be asked to put the Good Housekeeping seal of approval on it without being allowed to tell the truth and talk about facts."

He said one of those "facts" is that homosexuals, due to AIDS and other health problems, have a far lower life expectancy than straight men. (A search by The Vancouver Sun's library failed to find evidence supporting Spencer's statement.)

"Let's just say if ... anybody that used Colgate toothpaste, their life expectancy was lowered by 10, 15 years. What do you think would happen to Colgate toothpaste? It would be outlawed. Well, we know that's what happens to men living a gay lifestyle."

Spencer said some of his constituents fear the proposed Alliance-Progressive Conservative merger could make it more difficult for the merged party to take strong positions on social conservative issues.

"It may be more difficult to carry through with a strong family stand."

But he pointed out that most of the Tory caucus voted with the Alliance in opposing the Liberal government's plan to legalize same-sex marriage.

Spencer said he would welcome gay Tory MP Scott Brison, who supports the merger, but has voiced concern that the party could be perceived as socially intolerant, as a caucus colleague.

"He's a great guy and he's got a lot of great ideas. If he can live with us we can live with him."

Spencer, 61, was born in Missouri and moved to Canada in 1974. He became a Canadian citizen in 1999, a year before he narrowly beat former New Democratic Party MP John Solomon.

Among his other comments during the interview:

- He said there will soon be strong pushes to legalize polygamy and pedophilia.

"Polygamy is next on the list. More than one (spouse) ... We'll see that within the next very, very few years. Pedophilia is being pursued as we speak ... Some will say down to an eight-year-old, they think it's okay."

- He said he believes homosexuality, rather than being part of someone's nature, is something that is developed by young people who struggle with their identity in relation to a parent, such as an "overbearing mother" or cold father.