12 Introduction Some Facts in the Case 13 which may not seem very many until it is seen in its context of prosecutions a year in the 1940s,rising to 400 to 500 prosecutions very widespread intimidation at a lower level,from wolf-whistles a year from the mid-1950s to the late 1960s.Great peaks and and shouted jokes to sexual harassment in workplaces.A number troughs (117 cases in 1966,1,204 in 1968,a lull in the early of the mothers we interviewed in Delia Prince's suburb will not 1970s)reflect changes in the intensity of policing.In the mid- let their daughters go out on the neighbourhood streets at night 1970s,when Sydney was well on the way to recognition as one because of the fear these assaults generate. of the 'gay capitals'of the world,the rate was rising again.In Homosexual men also have reason to fear assault in public 1975 NSW courts processed 300 homosexual prosecutions under places-and one of the main groups they have to fear are the the Crimes Act and Summary Offences Act (plus others,their police.There are no official statistics on these matters,but police number uncertain,under the Child Welfare Act). violence on a considerable scale has been carefully documented Police surveillance in pursuit of these laws merges into police for New York from 1960 through a twenty-year period in which harassment.'Decoy'squads on homosexual beats produce a stream the growing political strength of gays led to a decline in the of individual prosecutions;there were said to be two such squads attacks.The murder of Dr George Duncan in Adelaide in 1972 operating in Sydney in the mid-1980s,one in Adelaide.Much was almost certainly the result of an entertainment for off-duty more publicity is gained by large-scale police raids on homosexual police which consisted of bashing homosexual men and throwing bars and baths,such as the 1977 raid on the Truxx bar in them in the River Torrens;Dr Duncan could not swim. Montreal(146 arrested),the 1981 raid on bath houses in Toronto Other groups also are involved in attacks on homosexuals.A (304 arrested),or the 1983 raids on Club 80 in Sydney (over 100 1985 phone-in conducted by Gay Hotline in Sydney (sponsored arrested,though few charged).These patterns of intervention in jointly by the police)over two days received calls describing fifty- turn merge into the violence already discussed. three episodes of assault on homosexual men.In almost all these While there are clear patterns of domestic assault and sexual cases the attackers were groups of teenage boys or very young assault against women and of violence against gays,there are men,a fact that raises disturbing questions about the role of other patterns of violence which affect men more drastically than violence and homophobia in the construction of masculinity. women and heterosexual men as well as gays.The 1983 Australian These attacks occur in a context of general hostility towards national survey already mentioned estimated 113,000 assaults in homosexuals that ranges from discrimination in housing to legal a year against women and 278,000 assaults against men.In the danger.Antagonism to lesbians is less explicit than to gay men- same year there were 294 reported homicides in Australia:41 per there is a tendency to make lesbians socially invisible.Nevertheless cent of the victims were women and 59 per cent were men.In it becomes very clear in such cases as a lesbian mother fighting a the United States the 1978 rate of assaults per 1,000 people was custody battle in the courts.Lesbianism itself is liable to be offered 12 for women and 22 for men.In 1981 the United States had as evidence that a woman is unfit to have custody of a child.Gay 23,600 homicides:21 per cent were of women and 79 per cent men face the criminal law because of their sexuality.In most of were of men.In that year the rate of death by homicide per Australia it is still illegal for adult men to commit 'the abominable 100,000 people was 3 for white women,13 for black women,10 crime of buggery'or 'indecent assault upon a male person'.In for white men and 65 for black men. 1985 the state of Queensland even legislated to prevent hotels Those charged with or convicted of violent crime are overwhelm- from serving beer to 'sexual deviants or perverts',meaning gays, ingly men.For instance,in NSW in 1983 some 519 people were along with 'drug dealers'and 'child molesters'.This degree of convicted in the higher criminal courts of homicides,assaults and legislative stigmatization is exceptional;the attitudes underlying like crimes;93 per cent of them were men.A study of homicide it are not. in NSW over a 50-year period found that between 80 per cent Statistics on the operation of these laws are patchy but an and 85 per cent of those charged were men.In the United States indication is given by a study of Sydney court cases by the NSW in 1983,87 per cent of the people arrested for murder were men. Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research.This showed 100 to 200 In the same year men were 87 per cent of those arrested for