The ABC's Strange Report on the NSW Apology to Homosexuals

NSW Premier Chris Minns made a formal apology this week to people convicted under laws that criminalised homosexuality.

And fair enough. Regardless of one’s views on homosexuality, it ought not to have been illegal between consenting adults.

Just because something is regarded as immoral (as Christians, Muslims and Jews believe homosexuality to be) doesn’t mean it should be unlawful.

We’re not living in Gaza.

What interested me, though, was the way the ABC reported news of the apology …

The ABC headline read …

“Terry lost his job in the 60s after historic laws targeted men like him, but now he feels ‘validated’.

I kept reading …

“By the time Terry was 20 years old, he had been arrested twice for living freely as a gay man.”

Now that line got my attention.

The word “freely” seemed a little redundant.

The sentence could have read … ‘arrested twice for living as a gay man’.

The sentence could have read … ‘arrested twice for being a gay man’.

But “arrested twice for living freely” as a gay man was an interesting turn of phrase.

Intrigued as to what “living freely” meant, I read on.

“One time Terry was at Wanda Beach in Sydney’s south, where he said a “pretty police officer” baited him in 1965.”

Wait. What?

“I was lying down sunbathing and he came along and sort of laid some distance away and made ‘come here’ sort of gestures.

Okay. I’m reading on, but with trepidation …