homosexual
noun həʊ.məʊ ˈsek.sju.əl/, /ˌhɒm.əʊ -/ˌhoʊ.moʊˈsek.ʃu.əl/ [C]
a person, especially a man, who is sexually attracted to people of the same sex and not to people of the opposite sex
paedophile
noun ˈpiː.dəʊ .faɪl/ˈped.oʊ-/ [C]
a person, especially a man, who is sexually interested in children
Now, these definitions are from the online Cambridge Dictionary, and personally speaking I'm not convinced by the "especially a man" clauses, but I think it's pretty bleedin' obvious that the two nouns refer to very different things.
So why is it that the immediate response of a supposedly intelligent man - a man who is supposedly the standard-bearer for the modern Conservative Party in which knee-jerk discrimination is a thing of the past - to the luckless Phillip Schofield presenting a list of alleged sexual abusers of children within the Tory ranks is to claim such a list risks "an anti-gay witch hunt"?
For starters, the most prominent name doing the rounds among social media over the last few days was known for being avowedly heterosexual (as well as being a bigoted racist and misogynistic creep - I hope the brain tumour that killed him was agonising), but that aside - equating paedophilia with homosexuality is not only contrary to modern scientific knowledge (which asserts that paedophilia is a pathology, whereas homosexuality is not), it's also a socially irresponsible throwback to everything Cameron claims to have repudiated.
The mask just slipped again - and I genuinely hope that the gay men and women who were willing to give Cameron the benefit of the doubt in the last election have taken note.
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