Based on an online survey conducted earlier this month (10/09), it showed that most of Singaporeans support a law against gay sex, despite a consideration whether Singapore would join India’s move and void similar British colonial-era legislation, Reuters has reported.
According to a survey by Ipsos, market research and consulting company, that was conducted in late July and early August this year, at least 55% of 750 Singaporeans aged 15-65 years old chose to ban gay sex. The Ipsos poll 12 percent opposed the law, while 33 percent were neither for or against it.
Section 377A of Singapore’s Penal Code stipulates a man found to have committed an act of “gross indecency” with another man could be imprisoned for up to two years. However, the law cannot be applied to homosexual women.
It is true that any social reforms have been cautiously handled in Singapore due to the religious and ethnic mix in the country. Moreover, the survey itself was not held out of political agenda, but more of to mark the 10th anniversary of Singapore’s annual LGBT pride parade, Pink Dot, an event that catches thousands of people’s attention.
A week before the survey was published, a Singaporean diplomat and lawyer Tommy Koh called for Singapore’s gay community, “I would encourage our gay community to bring a class action to challenge the constitutionality of Section 377A,” he wrote, as cited from Channel News Asia.
Another perspective came from Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam who conveyed, any legal actions on the gay sex issue depend on how Singapore society want to decide, yet the majority of them were still against to any change to the law, adding that “a growing minority want it to be repealed.”
Based on the survey, associate research director of Ipsos Singapore, Robert McPhedran concluded that the research indicated “the normative values of Singaporeans concerning LGBTQ issues are gradually shifting.”
“As has occurred in other countries globally, increased dialogue regarding same-sex relationships has contributed to higher acceptance among Singaporeans,” McPhedran told Reuters.
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong also commented on this issue, saying that actually, Singapore society is not that liberal on such matter. “Nonetheless, as PM Lee has previously noted, a social consensus remains far from being reached,” McPhedran added.