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PESSIMISM OF THE INTELLECT,
OPTIMISM OF THE WILL

Dear Opera North

4/7/2011

18 Comments

 
Just a few thoughts about your bewildering decision not to present Lee Hall's opera for fear of giving offence to homophobes.

Hold on!, you'll say. It's much more complicated than that. But is it? Because the way I see it, either you're frightened of giving offence, or you're actually homophobic. I'm going to be charitable and assume the former.

So what's the offence you could give, exactly? Acknowledging to under-11s that homosexuality exists? And what could possibly be wrong with that? Section 28 is long, long gone. We've surely moved on from the idea that one can 'teach' homosexuality. I can only conclude that our culture is stuck in a mindset that considers homosexuality something shameful, something that should be hidden for fear of frightening the horses. Don't mention your boyfriend on Radio Four, Simon - children may be listening. Nick and George, don't hold hands in public, Christians might be offended.

Well, I'm offended. I'm offended by the fact that many of my friends don't appear to have the same cultural freedoms as I do. As it happens, I don't particularly want to see anyone kissing in public - or on stage or screen. In life it's a private moment foisted on the public; on stage there's rarely much left at stake once it's happened. That said, I think there should be as much same-sex kissing on stage, on screen, and in public as possible, until middle England gets the fuck over itself. You, Opera North, could play your part in this gradual sea-change, by admitting to children that homosexuality exists. Or you can remain in the nineteen-sixties, sweep it under the carpet. You can refer to Uncle Paul's "special friend" instead of his husband, and write of him in his Times obituary as having been a "confirmed bachelor" when he was in a deeply loving relationship for the last forty years of his life.

Just yesterday I spent the afternoon with a friend who'd been at the recent Pride march. He pointed out that the very first of these, in the late sixties, had involved about twenty men, all of whom were beaten up and arrested by the police. Compare that with the joyousness we now see annually. Imagine how those twenty men, some of whom must still be alive, will feel, walking unmolested and joyful with a million members of their community. How far we've come! Then imagine how they must feel when they learn the very next day that we're still ashamed to talk about this to our children. How far we still have to go.

Opera North have presented some of the most wonderful productions of Britten I can imagine, and homosexuality is not irrelevant in his work. At this level, your decision is simply bizarre. You're clearly not homophobic, yet this decision makes it look that way. In your defence, you say you're not taking sides. Well why the hell not? If you can spend £15,000 on commissioning a writer, then commit to producing the work at great expense, you should be taking his side. If you can't stand by the work, you shouldn't have gone into rehearsals. And if you can't choose a side between homophobia and freedom of expression, quite frankly I'm astonished that you can hold your head up in the twenty-first century.

It's long been the job of artists to take people to places they didn't know they wanted to go. Of course there's still homophobia, and of course we sometimes have to fight it by gradual means. But by heading somewhere then panicking when the going gets tricky, you look cowardly and ridiculous. I beg you to reconsider your position. The work itself may by now be unsalvageable, but please, please make a strong statement of support for Lee Hall and a strong condemnation of homophobia. By not doing so, you tacitly endorse those who think it's ok to continue with their sly cultural homophobia on behalf of "others who may be offended". Everyone has a perfect right to be offended. What they don't have is the right for that to make the slightest difference to anything. As the posters say: some people are gay. Get over it.

Homosexuality has been found in over ninety species, homophobia in only one. This observation has been made so often I'd thought it a cliche. But obviously some people still need reminding.

Yours,

Dan

PS - special thanks to @mrthomashescott for a couple of the observations in here, and to Ian Shuttleworth for rescuing me from an infelicity in the penultimate par, now quietly edited. Any other cock-ups are, of course, etc.

UPDATE 13.30.

Opera North have released a new statement which goes some way to addressing these concerns. It very squarely places blame for the issue with the LEA and the school. And of course they're right to say that Opera North can't force the school to do anything. I'm prepared to accept this explanation, with a couple of reservations:

1) I'd be very curious to know whether the following option was explored: were individual parents given the right to withdraw their children if they had concerns? Surely this would be a much more delicate way of resolving the issue of potential sensitivity to the opera's themes. I had a similar issue with a youth theatre production I was directing five or six years ago. Rather than cancel the production for all the young people because of the concerns of one parent, one young person was withdrawn. This was a shame for them but at least that decision wasn't foisted on everyone. And then after a subsequent meeting between me and the parent, the young person was un-withdrawn.

2) I'd still like Opera North to make the statement I call for above: in support of the work they commissioned and against homophobia in any context, including schools. Especially schools. Instead their statement is mealy-mouthed: what it's against seems to be the perception of Opera North as homophobic. Yes, and some of their best friends are gay.

By the way, Opera North's work is bloody brilliant and I really hope this can be fixed.

18 Comments
Yewtree link
3/7/2011 10:28:24 pm

Very well said. I wish I had written this. Homophobia is <em>so</em> last century.

Reply
Ross Harvie
3/7/2011 10:41:48 pm

Well Said Dan. Interesting that at Saturday's London Pride there were many families showing support, including gay parents with adopted children. What message does Opera North send to them? Also, interesting that Pride London provided a family and Children's area as part of the event. It is totally Shameful for Opera North not to condemn Homophobia in it's statement. Just shows how outdated an organisation it is.

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TeenaW
3/7/2011 10:46:08 pm

And if it's the school that instead needs challenging, they're apparently at:

[email protected]

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Annie Rigby link
3/7/2011 10:47:36 pm

I feel really sad about this. It reminds me of similar (although much less serious) stand-off moments David Almond and I found ourselves in when we made 'Noah and the Fludd' as part of the Durham Mysteries Festival last year.

Bones of contention were a female God and the suggestion that God was more interested in making new worlds than our old messed up one.

I remember feeling like everything was rosy then stumbling into really difficult conversations, feeling like we might have reached an impasse, and then the gloriousness of finding a way to move forward together.

I am so sad that this hasn't been able to happen here. I'm sure Opera North are too.

So, in addition to Opera North's celebration event honouring the community's work over the last 2 years, I want to offer my support to find a way to share Lee's work too. Anyone else up for it?

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Annie Rigby link
3/7/2011 10:50:08 pm

Oh, and the bones of contention were with a school (who chose not to be involved) and members of the community cast - not between David and I...!

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only heard one side of the story
3/7/2011 11:21:23 pm

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Daniel Bye link
3/7/2011 11:27:28 pm

Thanks for the comments, all. Keep them coming.

@only heard one side... - if there's more to the other side, we'd all really like to hear it. Do post.

@Annie and everyone else who's interested in the idea of an artistic response/opportunity to show the work - there's a conversation going on about this on twitter. We seem to have three theatres already. But we're quickly running out of room in 140 characters for all the people interested. Hashtag?

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emma Adams
3/7/2011 11:32:10 pm

A good blog Dan.

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Jaye
3/7/2011 11:51:15 pm

Ah yes Dan, but can you imagine the conversation of individual parents and their children?

"I'm sorry Peter but you can't be in the play anymore."

"Why not."

"Because..."

"But Andy and Michael and Claire and Susie are still doing it. Why can't I? Have I been bad?"

"No, you haven't been bad I'm sure you would have been very good in the play but...."

"So WHY can't I be in it? I like doing it!"

"Because I said so..."

"That's not FAIR..." etc etc etc.

Much easier to say the show isn't happening in order to avoid any discomfort, right?

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only heard one side of the story
3/7/2011 11:57:13 pm

sorry - technical problems with first attempt: In "liberal" Britain, wouldn't you do well not to base your comments on an entirely one-sided piece by, possibly, an over sensitive artist. After all, two things seem clear. It's a "community" project. That's not just the artist's own project, right? So you'd expect some kind of sensitivity from him regarding the community in question. What happened to subtlety in art rather than this metropolitan liberal "elite" battering ram approach (I bet some agreement could have been reached if lee hall had agreed to tone down the language, retaining the sentiment - thus allowing the project to go ahead)? Secondly we're talking about a primary school. Children four years old and upwards. So homosexual, heterosexual, any kind of shove it down your throat sexual would be considered by a lot of parents to be inappropriate. And, incidentally, there's nothing in lee hall's piece which says the local authority would have accepted the lewd old man comments had they been heterosexual. The main point is though, that you cannot jump to the conclusions you seem to jump to without a bit of intelligent debate - Ie. evidence from both sides to defend your position. Whether on Twitter or elsewhere on the blogosphere, I am perplexed by this anti-intellectual Bandwaggoning.

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Daniel Bye link
4/7/2011 12:25:20 am

Hi Only Heard One Side

Thanks for your comment. It's a shame you don't feel able to post under your own name. We're all friends here.

I have a few questions about your comment:

I'm not sure what you mean by putting '"liberal" Britain' in scare quotes. Do you mean we are liberal or we aren't? Or we're pretending to be? Certainly this story is an example of Britain being pretty illiberal, which I for one deplore. But I don't see what your point is here.

But anyway, I didn't base my blog entirely on Lee Hall's article. I read statements by Opera North and various other people involved in the debate. Indeed, I refer to Opera North's statements in the piece. It doesn't really seem fair to accuse me of "jumping to conclusions". If anything, you've jumped to the conclusion that I've done no research or thinking. That's inaccurate.

When you describe Lee Hall as a "possibly over-sensitive artist", isn't there a danger that you're jumping to conclusions about him, too? On the same note, I'd resist the conclusion that either Lee Hall or myself are members of the "metropolitan liberal elite". He's from Newcastle and I'm from Middlesbrough. In any case, what metropolitan liberal elite? What do they run? Government? The newspapers? The education system? I don't think so.

Have you read the scene in question? It's fantastic writing and there's plenty of subtlety. The language and the sentiment are indivisible; that's sort of the point of good writing.

More to the point, I don't think it's at all "shove it down your throat sexual". Still, if parents consider it inappropriate, that's their right and of course they should be allowed to withdraw their children from the production. But a school and an LEA deciding on their behalf that it's inappropriate on the basis of mild references to a character's sexuality is not reasonable, now that Section 28 has been rightly repealed.

No, there's nothing in Lee Hall's piece which says the local authority would have been happy with the show if the comments had been heterosexual. But that they wouldn't have been is clear from various other statements around the episode that I've read, in an example of the sort of research you seem to assume I haven't done.

Finally - I cannot for the life of me fathom what makes you call this blogpost "anti-intellectual". I'm not pretending it's an example of the highest intellectual standards - it's a blogpost, not a peer-reviewed article - but to say it's actually *anti*-intellectual is just bizarre.

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Anna
4/7/2011 12:27:21 am

Having read the scene on Facebook (thanks Dan) https://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_237356502959048&id=237454806282551 I also wonder how many young children would know who Alan Bennett is, and what they'd be expected to make of the attitude that you can't hit someone solely because they're off the telly?

A lot of what young children encounter goes straight over their heads, and in the absence of adults running about armed with bubblewrap and cottonwool I suggest this scene would be one such. If they're too young to have learned about homosexuality, or any form of sexuality, a male character who prefers lads to lasses will make perfect sense as most kids' friends are the same gender. If the youngsters have encountered the work "queer" being used as an insult in the playground, even if they have no definition for it, then the teachers should already have addressed that.

Given the amount of excitement and the potential for learning in both structured and incidental ways that taking part in a project like this would generate in a child, are we honestly supposed to believe that at some point they'll pin down a parent or teacher and demand an explanation of this short scene?

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Stu
4/7/2011 01:32:52 am

Well said Dan

Opera North are much due derision for their handling of this incident. Firstly, they clearly had not provided Lee Hall or the school with support at the establishment of this programme - otherwise these issues could have been predicted and negotiated prior to the programme starting.

Secondly, failure to support Mr Hall speaks of a lack of integrity and courage within Opera North.

Thirdly, the intiial Opera North statement was wishy washy, bland and lacked any statement of support for equality or honesty or any sort of artistic integrity.

Finally, the update Opera North statement where it arrogantly suggests that any criticism of Opera North on grounds of homophobia are wrong fails to demonstrate any understanding, empathy or adherence to diversity. It devalues the LGBT communities and it (rightly or wrongly) suggests Opera North are not committed to equality.

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Lily E
4/7/2011 03:41:18 am

Well said. Their updated statement almost makes their position worse, negating, as they do, all responsibility. They have backed away by saying that the school is morally right to make their own minds up. This is just nonsense. If a school has a prejudiced and outdated educational policy this is not ok. If the LEA upholds that policy this is not ok. Opera North has to condemn this decision in the strongest possible terms to get back any semblance of credibility. Their tone is regretful, not apologetic. They should be feeling nothing but abject shame at their lack of support for Lee Hall specifically and equality generally.

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Robert DS
4/7/2011 04:30:21 am

Dan, well said. It is indeed poor on the part of Opera North not to take sides especially given (I admit I'm guessing here, but experience suggests...) the significant proportion of a) their workforce and b) their audience who are likely to be gay. The whole affair is absolutely baffling.












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Rachel Pearce
4/7/2011 09:06:41 pm

Surely some of the children will be gay themselves. Maybe don't know it yet, but maybe beginning to think about it. How will they now be feeling? Now that they have become aware that loving someone of the same sex is so shocking that they cannot even sing about it.

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Bonzai
20/7/2011 11:15:53 pm

You should be ashamed of yourself for jumping to conclusions. False allegations of homophobia are just as bad (and criminal in fact) as homophobia itself. Get over yourself and check the facts in future before attacking people like this...there is nothing liberal about the way you express yourself.

No wonder people post on here with no name - for fear you will attack them personally.

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Daniel Bye link
21/7/2011 05:08:47 pm

Hi Bonzai,

Although I can't agree that suggestions of homophobia are as bad as homophobia itself, I entirely agree that such accusations cannot be made lightly. But that isn't really what I've done here.

My point is that by getting into this position, Opera North allowed themselves to appear homophobic, and unintentionally aligned themselves with a tacitly homophobic culture.

So - as I've said elsewhere - I was absolutely delighted to see that the situation was resolved to everyone's satisfaction, and that Beached went ahead after all.

On your other point - I'm sorry you think I would ever make personal attacks. I don't and I wouldn't. I'm very glad that the tone of comments and discussions on this blog is always civil even when disagreement is fierce. It's just nice to know who you're talking to.

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