Homosexuality and Public Space
Sex between homosexuals has always been public and sexual activities between them have taken place in public spaces such as bathhouses, parks and beaches for many decades. To find out why such private acts take place in public spaces it is essential to examine the past in order to understand the origins of homosexuality. We then need to consider the actions undertaken by society and the prejudices held by society because it is these actions and prejudices that have forced homosexuals to conceal their identities and sexual preferences and consequently turn to public sex in public spaces to satisfy their deviant desire to be with the same sex. In more recent years, acceptance or acknowledgment of homosexuals has increased, largely due to the emergence of lesbian and gay liberation movements in the late 1960s and 1970s, which challenged the previous negative understandings of “homosexuality?and emphasised positive self-definitions and the AIDS/HIV epidemic which swept the world during the 1980s and 1990s which forced society to become even more aware of homosexual sexual activities occurring in public spaces. Some scholars claim that the discrete identity of homosexuality is a very recent western construction, however it can also be argued that homosexual behaviour has always existed, but the acknowledgement of the large, highly visible and open "gay and lesbian community? ... The roots of the perception that homosexuality is negative derives from the Bible and most Christian traditions which claim that sex is inherently sinful, however it can be redeemed if it is performed within marriage and for reproductive purposes. Therefore homosexuality and sexual activities between them is considered to be “utterly repulsive, devoid of all emotional nuance? ... It is because of the fact that homosexuality is so controversial that naturally, the issue of sex between homosexuals be propelled in public to be scrutinize and condemned to be negative. ... Be it punishment through the legal system, resulting in the death penalty or prosecution or the political system; which may deny homosexuals privileges of the use of public amenities or public transport or the social system; where members of the public will take matters into their own hands and beat up homosexuals themselves. ... This in turn forces homosexuals to keep any kind of socially unacceptable gay sex to them selves and out of the public eye. In order to do this, gay men strolls the public streets and public spaces to meet other men for either companionship or sex.