On 28 April 1954, the Commons briefly debated the state of the 1885 law, and the Lords followed on 19 May.
1954年4月28日,下议院对1885年刑法修正案展开辩论。5月19日,上议院也展开辩论。
Much of the Lords' debate revolved around the nineteenth-century concept of the homosexual personality: that of 'a certain school of so-called scientists whose dangerous doctrine has done more, and does more, harm to the youth of the country and many others than anything else.
上议院辩论的基调,基本上还停留在19世纪:有一群所谓的科学家,他们的学说已经或正在危害我们的青年。
Another Lord referred to 'other countries in the past, who were once great, but became decadent through corrosive and corrupting immorality.'
有一位勋爵提出,曾经有一些非常繁荣的国家,就是因为道德败坏,最终逐渐没落了。
But science had its defenders. Lord Chorley interrupted these adieux to Empire with the assertion that 'It is really much more a medical question than a criminal question.'
另一方面,也有人在为科学辩护,乔力勋爵打断了大家对帝国时代的留恋,他指出,同性恋问题并不是犯罪问题,而是医学问题。
Lord Brabazon, the pioneer of flight, also struck a medical note: 'There are the hunchback, the blind and the dumb; but of all the dreadful abnormalities surely abnormal sexual instincts must be one of the worst.'
布拉巴宗勋爵,也认同这是个医学问题:"这世界上有瘸子,有瞎子,还有聋子,但在所有的畸形中,性畸形无疑是最恐怖的一种。"