Det er klart at når lige netop homoseksuelles rettigheder er så magtpåliggende at deres tilstedeværelse skal flettes ind i matematikundervisningen og andre irrelevante steder, så skaber man en meget lav tærskel for diskrimination og nogle forventninger helt ud over det rimelige. Mere nidkære og temperamentsfulde individer vil i virkelighedens verden opleve dette som legitimering af deres indre rødgardist. Andre, mere svage gruppers velbefindende ligger ikke det rettighedsfikserede Storbritannien så meget på sinde. Det skønnes således at 667 ældre briter i perioden 2005 til 2009 er døde som følge af dehydrering og tørst (LFPC).

One week ago, I ­suggested on this page that some gay people were in danger of turning into the new McCarthyites by demonising and attempting to silence all who disagreed with the gay rights agenda. […]

For during the past seven days, I have been ­subjected to an ­extraordinarily vicious outpouring of hate and incitement to violence, via email, the internet and in the mainstream media, and much worse besides.

In my article, I expressed concern that attempting to bar a Christian GP from the government’s advisory council on drugs because of his views on homosexuality, ­bombarding the school curriculum with irrelevant gay references, and prosecuting Christian hoteliers for refusing to ­accommodate gay men in the same bedroom were ­examples of a frightening intolerance.

The response to this warning against an attempt by the gay lobby to silence dissent? An eruption of tweets on Twitter suggesting that I should be killed. Yes, really.

Apologies if the hideous and obscene ­language shocks some readers, but examples of such tweets included: ‘Someone just kill Melanie Phillips please’; ‘your homo­phobic rant equals that which comes out of a dog’s rectum. Kill yourself you ****’; and ‘throw her in the Thames’.

And emails to me included such epithets as ‘vile, poisonous, horrible old woman’, and ‘people like you should be silenced as you insight (sic) bigotry and fear. Go and suck a tail pipe, get cancer, GET RAN OVER BY A TRAIN. I hope your ******* house burns down’. […] Melanie Phillips: The calls for me to be killed this week prove the bedrock values of our society are in grave danger