377A to be or not to be?

11 percent. That is how much suppourt for 377A has deviated by within 4 years according to IPSOS. From 55% in 2018 to 44% in 2022, this drop is certainly significant and serves to emphasise the shifting beliefs of Singaporeans.

377A is essentially a section under the Criminal Procedure Code(CPC) that criminalises gay sex basically making it a prosecutable offense.(Although no convictions have been made in the history of the law).It was a part of the old british law and was carried over here although it would be interesting to note the british themselves have actually repealed the law.(But of course we should not allow the actions of another nations dictate our own god knows the british are not the wisest people to trust particularly in our case). Its mother statute 377 criminalised any sexual act that went against the "order of nature".

This I believe is a problem. The government has no place in the intimate affairs of one life when there is no direct threat to one's well being and the security of those around them. What a man chooses to do in his own room at his own time should be nobody's business and even if one does know, they have no right to stop that action. "Order of Nature" very powerful language as it considers to be an abberation. An anomaly. Let us hold that assumption for a moment The question is so what if you believe it to be against the order of nature? How does it affect you? After all, Drinking harms your lungs yet it is widely accepted by the many of the same people who condemn gayness. It is even worse since it is proven that drinking is indeed dangerous to the body and yet why do we still allow people to do it?

The answer is simple. Its their life. Its their choice. If anything stripping someone of their right to choose should be considered "against the order of nature" particularly since this is not an issue of national security. The idea that you could prosecute someone for what they do in their own privacy that is harmless is truly horrifying and that is why there has no been no convictions so far. It would be a large step towards dictatorship.

Now the question is why has Singapore not repealed this section? They technically already have. Earlier this year the supreme court came to a landmark decision where they 'de-activated' the section. In other words, this section is not considered to be part of the CPC unless express signal is given by the AG.This is as good as it is going to get with the current government at least for the next decade. Anything further would merely be symbolic. You see the thing is the current government majority PAP has a strong conservative base. This base already considers the supreme court's ruling to be drastic and a huge change. Repealing this would have shaken the base and caused them to lose significant political capital.The trade-off is honestly not worth it to them. You can say that a politcian should do what is right no matter the opinion but that does not apply to this situation. They have already tangibly signalled their supourt for the LGBT community while not rattling their base too much. Anyone who hopes for more? Well, appreciate this change first and realise that your voice no matter how small does have an impact.

tl;dr You do you bro