homosexuality in Northern Ireland and the concern that any relaxation in the law would tend to erode existing moral standards cannot, without more, warrant interfering with the applicant’s private life to such an extent 77. [emphasis added] The judgement in Dudgeon’s case was repeated in the Norris’ and Modinos’ 78 cases involving similar facts and concerning Ireland and Cyprus respectively. It was also followed in Toonen’s case with the same reasoning applied. Toonen’s case is particularly relevant since it was determined by the Human Rights Committee which considered the provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Zimbabwe is a signatory. Given that the right to privacy protects intimate conduct in private between two consenting male adults, are gay rights sufficiently protected through the reestablishment of a right to privacy in Zimbabwe’s new constitution? This question has already been partly answered. Dudgeon, Norris, Modinos and Toonen all concern judgements which rule that blanket prohibitions on homosexual conduct, which include in their ambit sexual act between consenting adult males, violate human rights. However these judgements are concerned with sexual acts, and not sexual orientation as a whole. Sexual orientation falls more naturally and conveniently into a provision providing for equality. Furthermore, to rely exclusively on the right to privacy to protect gay and lesbian rights is inadequate. Cameron notes: The privacy argument establishes only that criminal punishment of private consensual adult homosexual conduct is unconscionable. Recognition of this truth alone barely begins in process of legal protection which proper recognition of the rights of gays and lesbians to equality would entail. In addition, the privacy argument has detrimental effects on the search for society which is truly nonstigmatising as far as sexual orientation is concerned. On the one hand, the privacy argument suggests that discrimination against gays and lesbians is confined to prohibiting conduct between adults in the privacy of the bedroom. This is manifestly not so. On the other hand, the privacy argument may subtly reinforce the idea that homosexual intimacy is shameful or improper: that it is tolerable so long as it is confined to the bedroom – but that its implications cannot be countenanced outside 79. THE IMPLICATIONS OF SEXUAL ORIENTATION RIGHTS Opposition to sexual-orientation rights often stems from a mistaken belief that such right will mean that “anything goes” that if rights are given to gays and lesbians that there can likewise be no control placed on those who rape or abuse children80. Rights of sexual orientation in no way imply that this is the case. Society nonetheless retains the right to legislate its morality. All law is in a sense the legislation of morality. A law which punishes murder is an enactment of the society’s moral abhorrence of the act. But there is an important distinction. The legislation of morality, where the legislation intrudes upon a fundamental right, can only be justified where the proscribed act causes palpable harm to a third person. The rights of equality and privacy are fundamental rights. That does not mean that the law may not discriminate against a rapist. The actions of the rapist cause palpable harm and intrude upon the rights and freedoms of others. None of the cases referred to above suggest that gay men have the 77 at para. 60-61. 78 Norris v Ireland (1988) Series A, No 142 and Modinos v Cyprus (1993) Series A No.259. 79 op. cit. p. 464 80 cf the facetious article Coming Soon: A Constitution to Accommodate All Manner of Weirdos in the Daily News, 20th August, 1999.