# Gay Marriage and Prisoners **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 21, 2015, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254 "2015-02-21T10:20:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ctnguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@ctnguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ctnguy)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2015, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254/21 "2015-02-22T00:00:52Z")
Can you provide a citation for this claim? The buggery law is repealed, the 1967 act is repealed, and the 2003 act makes no distinction between heterosexual and homosexual acts. What acts are illegal for gay men that are legal for straight couples, and under what law would they be liable for conviction? [According to ICL:](http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/equality/sexualorientation/information/lgbtrights) > [@](#): > > On 1 May 2004 the Sexual Offences Act 2003 entered into force. It swept away all of the previous sex-specific legislation, including the 1967 Act, and introduced instead neutral offences. Thus the previous conditions relating to privacy were removed, and sexual acts were viewed by the law without regard to the sex of the participants. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2015, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254/22 "2015-02-22T00:10:36Z")
Isn’t heterosexual sex in the UK also only legal if it’s “consensual, in private and not with an under age person”? I’m not sure that that’s a big restraint of freedom there, or a way in which heterosexual and homosexual sex are differentiated. ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2015, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254/23 "2015-02-22T00:15:41Z")
> [@ctnguy](#): > > Can you provide a citation for this claim? The buggery law is repealed, the 1967 act is repealed, and the 2003 act makes no distinction between heterosexual and homosexual acts. What acts are illegal for gay men that are legal for straight couples, and under what law would they be liable for conviction? > > [According to ICL:](http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/equality/sexualorientation/information/lgbtrights) The 1967 Act is still in force. The age of consent has been reduced from 21 first to 18, then to 16. But the laws ‘in private’ restriction still applies. The police rarely invoke it, preferring to use general public order offences, but it remains the law. Essentially the 1967 law as amended still criminalises sexual acts involving more than two men who engage in sexual intercourse, ruling illegal bath houses and Troilus and such, or any homosexual male orgy. Straight people may legally engage with multiple partners, homosexual men may not. ---
**Author:** ![ctnguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@ctnguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ctnguy)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2015, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254/24 "2015-02-22T00:24:53Z")
The relevant part of the 1967 Act (section 1) was in fact repealed by the 2003 Act, [as you can see here](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1967/60), and it is no longer in force. ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2015, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254/25 "2015-02-22T08:32:32Z")
> [@ctnguy](#): > > The relevant part of the 1967 Act (section 1) was in fact repealed by the 2003 Act, [as you can see here](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1967/60), and it is no longer in force. My error. I had missed the later amendment and have been retired since well before that date. I was also misled reading articles on the subject that were written before the section was replaced. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-marriage-and-prisoners/713254.md?page=1)