- “There was a series of gangs,” said Stephen Page, a former New South Wales detective who reopened some of the cases years later. “They wouldn’t just hit one beat, they’d be aware of all of them.”
Few victims would have gone to the police, Professor Tomsen said. Most gay men were closeted, and many would have feared being assaulted by the police themselves. After the city’s first gay Mardi Gras parade was broken up by the police in 1978, some marchers were beaten in their jail cells.
“Any gay who was attacked would be seen as a foolish risk-taker if they reported that attack to police,” Professor Tomsen said.
I spent a couple of years in Sydney - the mardi gras is such an amazing event. I'm still very fond of Sydney. I was there 90-92 and didn't notice or hear about any unusual attacks on the gay community there but I did live in King's Cross which was definitely more tolerant than many other places. With all the recent vitriol and hateful speech and actions, it's worthwhile to take a step back and see that as a society I think we are (generally) making some progress. Not to pat our collective backs but articles like these can make us fell there is no progress or justice. As disgusting as the article portrays some of the people in Sydney and the police force - and implicitly Australia as a whole - it's good to hear they are revisiting those cases because it does demonstrate some progress. No no no. it really, _really_ shouldn't be possible (or necessary) to say that the change from chasing people off cliffs because of their preferences to a situation one where it's abhorrent and no longer tolerated now, is actually progress. Like seriously WTF that we even have to consider that. Still that was how it was. There's still a long way to go, but I take heart that in a relatively short time frame the perspective in society has shifted and it gives me hope for the future that there will be more progress (and hopefully faster yet) in tolerating whatever differences there are, whether it's sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity or any of the other myriad of things that make us human.