Lee Hsien Loong's views on homosexuality

In contrast to his father, Lee Kuan Yew's views on homosexuality, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, leader of the People's Action Party (PAP) is not in favour of repealing Section 377A of the Penal Code which criminalises sex between men, even if it is between consenting adults in private.

Lee has articulated his views on several occasions in public.

=Replay to Time journalist's question=

On 1 October 2005, Time magazine journalist Jake Smith, during a Q&A session with members of the Foreign Correspondents Association, asked Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong how he felt about gays and said that the Singapore Government gives 'every impression of being somewhat homophobic'.  

Rejecting this view, PM Lee said that he agreed with the view taken by his predecessor, Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, that homosexuals 'are people like you and me'.

But the question, he said, was this: 'How do we provide the maximum space without it becoming intrusive and oppressive on the rest of the population and without causing a backlash which will lead to polarisation and animosity?

'That's our responsibility and challenge. It's very hard to do.' A balance, he said, needs to be struck between two opposing forces. On the one side are the gay activists who want more space and feel entitled to it. On the other are those who condemn homosexuality.

'There will be those who say this is wrong, it's a sin, not just a crime but a sin, stop it,' he said. 'Therefore, it's a dynamic balance and one which we'll have to manage very carefully.'

Mr Lee replied that it was a question of what a society considered acceptable, and Singaporeans were still largely very conservative.

While accepting of gays, PM Lee drew a line against gay marriages and parades. The annual Nation gay party, usually held in August, was banned that year.

He said: 'You can do that in Sydney and London and San Francisco, but I'm not sure you're allowed to do that in Singapore, because I think it will be offensive to a large number of Singaporeans and it will be very divisive.'

=Parliamentary debate over Section 377A=

During the debate on 22 and 23 October 2007 over the Parliamentary petition to repeal Section 377A presented by Nominated Member of Parliament (NMP) Siew Kum Hong, PM Lee made the following concluding speech:  Transcript:

Mr Speaker, Sir, this parliamentary debate is on the amendments to the Penal Code, but the hottest debate is on one section which is not being amended - section 377A.Both Mr Siew Kum Hong and Prof. Thio Li-ann quoted me with approval in their speeches yesterday, so I think I should state my position and the Government's position on this matter.

Because of the review of the Penal Code and the amendments, I think the gay community and the activists have staged a push to get the Government to open this subject and to abolish section 377A. They have written an open letter to me as Prime Minister, they have also petitioned Parliament on this issue on the grounds of constitutional validity, and the constitutional argument was made by Mr Siew Kum Hong yesterday in Parliament. I do not have to go into the details. It was rebutted very cogently by Ms Indranee Rajah and very passionately by Prof. Thio Li-ann. They are not my legal advisers. I take my legal advice from the Attorney-General, and his advice to the Government is quite clear.

The continued retention of section 377A would not be a contravention of the Constitution.

The Government has not taken this matter lightly. We had a long discussion amongst the Ministers. We had an extensive public consultation on the Penal Code amendments and we decided on this issue - to leave things be.

Let me, today, focus on the policy issue - what we want the law to be, and explain our thinking, our considerations, why we came to this conclusion. I would ask these questions: what is our attitude towards homosexuality? "Our", meaning the Government's attitude and Singaporeans' attitude too. How should these attitudes and these values be reflected in our legislation?

Many Members have said this, but it is true and it is worth saying again. Singapore is basically a conservative society. The family is the basic building block of our society. It has been so and, by policy, we have reinforced this and we want to keep it so. And by "family" in Singapore, we mean one man one woman, marrying, having children and bringing up children within that framework of a stable family unit.

If we look at the way our Housing and Development Board flats are, our neighbourhoods, our new towns, they are, by and large, the way Singaporeans live. It is not so in other countries, particularly in the West, anymore, but it is here.

I acknowledge that not everybody fits into this mould. Some are single, some have more colourful lifestyles, some are gay. But a heterosexual stable family is a social norm. It is what we teach in schools. It is also what parents want their children to see as their children grow up, to set their expectations and encourage them to develop in this direction. I think the vast majority of Singaporeans want to keep it this way. They want to keep our society like this, and so does the Government.

But, at the same time, we should recognise that homosexuals are part of our society. They are our kith and kin.

This is not just in Singapore. This is so in every society, in every period of history, back to pre-historic times, or at least as long as there have been records - biblical times and probably before.

What makes a person gay or homosexual? Well, partly, it could be the social environment. If we look at the ancient Greeks and Romans, it was quite normal for men to have homosexual relationships - an older man with a young boy. It does not mean that that was all they did - they had wives and children. But, socially, that was the practice. So, I think, the social environment has something to do with it.But there is growing scientific evidence that sexual orientation is something which is substantially inborn. I know that some will strongly disagree with this, but the evidence is accumulating. We can read the arguments and the debates on the Internet. Just to take one provocative fact, homosexual behaviour is not observed only amongst human beings but also amongst many species of mammals.

So, too, in Singapore, there is a small percentage of people, both male and female, who have homosexual orientations.

They include people "who are often responsible, invaluable, and highly respected contributing members of society".

I quote from the open letter which the petitioners have written to me, and it is true. They include people who are responsible and valuable, highly respected contributing members of society. And I would add that among them are some of our friends, our relatives, our colleagues, our brothers and sisters, or some of our children.

They, too, must have a place in this society, and they, too, are entitled to their private lives. We should not make it harder than it already is for them to grow up and to live in a society where they are different from most Singaporeans. And we also do not want them to leave Singapore to go to more congenial places to live. But homosexuals should not set the tone for Singapore society.Nor do we consider homosexuals a minority, in the sense that we consider, say, Malays and Indians as minorities, with minority rights protected under the law - languages taught in schools, cultures celebrated by all races, representation guaranteed in Parliament through GRCs and so on.

And this is the point which Ms Indranee Rajah made yesterday in a different way.

This is the way Singapore society is today. This is the way the majority of Singaporeans want it to be. So, we should strive to maintain a balance, to uphold a stable society with traditional, heterosexual family values, but with space for homosexuals to live their lives and contribute to the society.

We have gradually been making progress towards achieving a closer approximation to this balance over the years. I do not think we will ever get a perfect balance, but I think we have a better arrangement now than was the case 10 or 20 years ago.

Homosexuals work in all sectors, all over the economy, in the public sector and in the civil service as well. They are free to lead their lives, free to pursue their social activities. But there are restraints and we do not approve of them actively promoting their lifestyles to others, or setting the tone for mainstream society. They live their lives. That is their personal life, it is their space. But the tone of the overall society, I think, remains conventional, it remains straight, and we want it to remain so.

So, for example, the recent case of Mr Otto Fong, who is a teacher in Raffles Institution. He is gay and he is a good teacher by all accounts. He put up a blog which described his own sexual inclinations, and explained how he was gay. He circulated to his colleagues and it became public. So MOE looked at this. The school spoke to the teacher.

The teacher understood that this was beyond the limit, because how he lives is his own thing. But what he disseminates comes very close to promoting a lifestyle. So, they spoke to him, he took down his blog. He posted an explanation, he apologised for what he had done, and he continues teaching in RI today. So there is space, and there are limits.

De facto, gays have a lot of space in Singapore.Gay groups hold public discussions. They publish websites. I have visited some of them. There are films and plays on gay themes. In fact, sometimes people ask, "Why are there so many? Aren't there other subjects in the world?" But since we have allowed it in the last few years, maybe this is a letting off of pressure. Eventually, we will find a better balance.

There are gay bars and clubs. They exist. We know where they are. Everybody knows where they are. They do not have to go underground. We do not harass gays. The Government does not act as moral policemen. And we do not proactively enforce section 377A on them.

But this does not mean that we have reached a broad social consensus, that this is a happy state of affairs, because there are still very different views amongst Singaporeans on whether homosexuality is acceptable or morally right.

And we heard these views aired in Parliament over these last two days.

Some are convinced, passionately so, that homosexuality is an abomination, to quote Prof. Thio Li-ann's words

yesterday.Others, probably many more, are uncomfortable with homosexuals, more so with public display of homosexual behaviour. Yet others are more tolerant and accepting.

There is a range of views. There is also a range of degrees to which people are seized with this issue. Many people are not that seized with this issue. And speaking candidly, I think the people who are very seized with this issue are a minority. For the majority of Singaporeans - this is something that they are aware of but it is not the top of their consciousness - including, I would say, amongst them a significant number of gays themselves. But, also, I would say, amongst the Chinese-speaking community in Singapore. The Chinese-speaking Singaporeans are not strongly engaged, either for removing section 377A or against removing section 377A. Their attitude is: live and let live.

So, even in this debate in these two days, Members would have noticed that there have been very few speeches made in Parliament in Mandarin on this subject. I know Mr Baey Yam Keng made one this afternoon, but Mr Low Thia Khiang did not. It reflects the focus of the Chinese-speaking ground and their mindsets. So, for the majority of Singaporeans, their attitude is a pragmatic one. We live and let live.

The current legal position in Singapore reflects these social norms and attitudes, as Ms Indranee Rajah and Mr Hri Kumar explained yesterday. It is not legally neat and tidy. Mr Hri Kumar gave a very professional explanation of how untidy it is, but it is a practical arrangement that has evolved out of our historical circumstances. We are not starting from a blank slate, trying to design an ideal arrangement; neither are we proposing new laws against homosexuality. We have what we have inherited and what we have adapted to our circumstances. And as Mr Hri Kumar pointed out, we inherited section 377A from the British, imported from English Victorian law - Victorian from the period of Queen Victoria in the 19th century - via the Indian Penal Code, via the Straits Settlements Penal Code, into Singapore law.

Asian societies do not have such laws, not in Japan, China and Taiwan. But it is part of our landscape. We have retained it over the years. So, the question is: what do we want to do about it now? Do we want to do anything about it now? If we retain it, we are not enforcing it proactively. Nobody has argued for it to be enforced very vigorously in this House. If we abolish it, we may be sending the wrong signal that our stance has changed, and the rules have shifted.

But because of the Penal Code amendments, section 377A has become a symbolic issue, a point for both opponents and proponents to tussle around. The gayactivists want it removed.Those who are against gay values and lifestyle argue strongly to retain it. And both sides have mobilised to campaign for their causes. There was a Petition to remove section 377A. It accumulated a couple of thousand signatures which were presented to this House.

Therefore, there was a counter-petition to retain it, which collected 15,000 signatures - at least, according to the newspapers. I have not counted the signatures - 16,000.

An hon. Member: 15,560.

The Prime Minister: 15,560 signatures. It has probably gone up since we last started speaking.There was also an open letter to me.The Ministers and I have received many emails and letters on this subject. I have received emails too in my mail box, very well written, all following a certain model answer style.

So it is a very well organised campaign. And not only writing letters, but constituents have visited MPs at meet-the-people sessions to see the MP, not because there is anything they want done, but to congratulate the MP on what a good Government this is, that we are keeping section 377A, and please stay a good Government, and please do not change it.

I do not doubt the depth of the sentiments and the breadth of the support but it is also a very well organised pressure campaign. But I am not surprised that this issue is still contentious, because even in the West, even where they have liberalised, homosexuality still remains a very contentious issue. They decriminalised homosexual acts decades ago, in the 1960s, 1970s, and they have gone a long way towards accepting gays in society. They not only have gays in prominent places, but if you want to have a complete Cabinet or a complete line-up when you go for elections, you must have some on your list so that you are seen to have been inclusive. This is certainly so in Europe, also true in America.

But still the issue is bitterly disputed. So in America, there are fierce debates over gay rights and same-sex marriages. And the conservatives in America are pushing back. President George Bush has been calling for a constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, and not between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman. This is in America. So the issue is still joined. Even within the churches, it is a hot subject. The Anglican Church, Church of England, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, had liberal views on gay issues. He became the Archbishop. He has moderated his views, because he has to reflect the Church as a whole.

And even within the church, the Church in England, and the Church in America have a very serious disagreement with the Anglican churches in Asia and in Africa, who almost split away on this issue of ordination of gay people as bishops. And they have patched up in a compromise recently in America and the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is head of the church, had to plead with his community to come to some understanding so that they maintain the Anglican communion.

So, this is not an issue where we can reach happy consensus and abolishing section 377A, were we to do this, is not going to end the argument in Singapore. Among the conservative Singaporeans, the deep concerns over the moral values of society will remain and, among the gay rights' activists, abolition is not going to give them what they want because what they want is not just to be freed from section 377A, but more space and full acceptance by other Singaporeans. And they have said so. So, supposing we move on 377A, I think the gay activists would push for more, following the example of other avant garde countries in Europe and America, to change what is taught in the schools, to advocate same-sex marriages and parenting, to ask for, to quote from their letter, "...exactly the same rights as a straight man or woman." This is quoting from the open letter which the petitioners wrote to me. And when it comes to these issues, the majority of Singaporeans will strenuously oppose these follow-up moves by the gay campaigners and many who are not anti-gay will be against this agenda, and I think for good reason.

Therefore, we have decided to keep the status quo on section 377A. It is better to accept the legal untidiness and the ambiguity. It works, do not disturb it. Mr Stewart Koe, who is one of the petitioners, was interviewed yesterday and he said he wanted the Government to remove the ambiguity and clarify matters. He said the current situation is like, I quote him, "Having a gun put to your head and not pulling the trigger. Either put the gun down or pull the trigger." First of all, I do not think it is like that, and secondly, I do not think it is wise to try to force the issue. If you try and force the issue and settle the matter definitively, one way or the other, we are never going to reach an agreement within Singapore society. People on both sides hold strong views. People who are presently willing to live and let live will get polarised and no views will change, because many of the people who oppose it do so on very deeply held religious convictions, particularly the Christians and the Muslims and those who propose it on the other side, they also want this as a matter of deeply felt fundamental principles. So, discussion and debate is not going to bring them closer together. And instead of forging a consensus, we will divide and polarise our society.

I should therefore say that as a matter of reality, the more the gay activists push this agenda, the stronger will be the push back from conservative forces in our society, as we are beginning to see already in this debate and over the last few weeks and months. And the result will be counter productive because it is going to lead to less space for the gay community in Singapore. So it is better to let the situation evolve gradually. We are a completely open society. Members have talked about it - the Internet, travel, full exposure.

We cannot be impervious to what is happening elsewhere. As attitudes around the world change, this will influence the attitude of Singaporeans. As developments around the world happen, we must watch carefully and decide what we do about it. When it comes to issues like the economy, technology, education, we better stay ahead of the game, watch where people are moving and adapt faster than others, ahead of the curve, leading the pack. And when necessary on such issues, we will move even if the issue is unpopular or controversial. So we are moving on CPF changes, we are moving on so many economic restructuring changes. We moved on IRs - it is a difficult subject, not everybody supports the Government, but we decide this is right, we move.

On issues of moral values with consequences to the wider society, first we should also decide what is right for ourselves, but secondly, before we are carried away by what other societies do, I think it is wiser for us to observe the impact of radical departures from the traditional norms on early movers. These are changes which have very long lead times before the impact works through, before you see whether it is wise or unwise. Is this positive? Does it help you to adapt better? Does it lead to a more successful, happier, more harmonious society?

So, we will let others take the lead, we will stay one step behind the frontline of change; watch how things work out elsewhere before we make any irrevocable moves. We were right to uphold the family unit when western countries went for experimental lifestyles in the 1960s - the hippies, free love, all the rage, we tried to keep it out. It was easier then, all you had were LPs and 45 RPM records, not this cable vision, the Internet and travel today. But I am glad we did that, because today if you look at Western Europe, the marriage as an institution is dead. Families have broken down, the majority of children are born out of wedlock and live in families where the father and the mother are not the husband and wife living together and bringing them up. And we have kept the way we are. I think that has been right.

I think we have also been right to adapt, to accommodate homosexuals in our society, but not to allow or encourage activists to champion gay rights as they do in the West. So I suggest, Mr Speaker, and I suggest to the Members of the House, we keep this balance, leave section 377A alone. I think there is space in Singapore and room for us to live harmoniously and practically, all as Singapore citizens together. Thank you very much. [Applause.]

=Views on same-sex marriage=

During the Ho Rih Hwa Leadership in Asia Public Lecture Series held in Singapore on 30 June 2015, PM Lee answered a question from a female member of the audience regarding the then recent legalisation of same-sex marriage in the USA and its relevance to Singapore.  Transcript:

"Audience member: Thank you, Mr Lee. So over the weekend the same sex marriage was legalised in the United States. Effectively nine citizens redefined marriage on behalf of millions of their peers, many of whom were opposed to the idea of same sex marriage. What is your view on the appropriateness of judges’ views overriding properly-passed laws?  Do you think a political or judicial solution is better to address such a thorny issue especially for countries like Singapore? Thank you.

PM Lee: Well, this is the way the American system works. They have created the Supreme Court. It is nine men and the nine men decide important issues and in this case, it was five to four. So actually one man decided the issue. But that is their system. They will not say that they made a decision on the issue, they will say that they interpreted the Constitution in its true sense and this is what the US Constitution has always meant. That is the way there. I am not a law professor but I think that is the way they explain their legal system. It is how they resolve social, political, economic, racial, all kinds of important issues. Congress, the Parliament does not have the last word. It goes to the Supreme Court. Things like abortion, things like racial discriminations, drugs, all sorts of things go to the Supreme Court.

It is not our system. In our system, the Parliament decides, the Executive through the Parliament, takes the lead, legislates and legislates on behalf of the population. On an issue like LGBT where there are very strong views in the society, I think the legislature has to act very cautiously. You can pass a law but will it be accepted? Will it be respected? Will people feel that it is legitimate? I think that we have to have a good sense of the ground, a good sense of how people feel and reflect the values and the attitudes of the population or rather than try to impose your own on them. Even in America, there are people who feel like that. I mean there are 40 percent of Americans who are opposed to same sex marriage and they say “well you decided this but I do not like this. I have to accept it but it is not my preference.” In Singapore, we have different legislative arrangements. We have a much more cautious approach towards social issues. On LGBT issues, I have stated my position. It is one where we move carefully because it is really a conservative population and I think we let the views evolve with time. The population has to decide collectively rather than the government decide that I am going to go one way or the other."

The full transcript of the dialogue is available on the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) website.

=See also=
 * Lee Kuan Yew's views on homosexuality
 * Singapore political parties' politicians' views on homosexuality

=References=
 * Archive of The Straits Times article, "Fear homosexuals? No, Govt sensitive to others too", 7 October 2005

=Acknowledgements=

This article was written by Roy Tan.