Jeremy Irons Gay Remarks
In an interview with the Huffington Post the 64-year-old actor, who stated that he didn’t “have a strong feeling either way” on the subject, mused: “Could a father not marry his son?”
When the interviewer reminded Irons about incest laws, the actor continued: “It’s not incest between men,” adding: “Incest is there to protect us from inbreeding, but men don’t breed”.
Irons looked genuinely flummoxed when Zepps posed the question of “How far does it extend?” regarding equality, saying, “I don’t know. It’s a very interesting one, and I don’t really have a strong feeling. but I see that what we had in England, which was not marriage but a union you could make if you were gay and you wanted to make a civil partnership. Same rights, not the name. It seems to me that now they’re fighting for the name and I worry that it means somehow we debase or we change what marriage is. I just worry about that. I mean taxwise, it’s an interesting one because, you see, could a father not marry his son? … It’s not incest between men. Incest is there to protect us from inbreeding, but men don’t breed so incest wouldn’t cover that. So if that were so, then if I wanted to pass on my estate without death duties, I could marry my son and pass on my estate to him.”
The Radio Times journalist, Andrew Duncan, who conducted the “bottom patting” interview two years ago, says he stands by his quotes: “I am surprised Jeremy Irons continues to insist he was ‘of course misquoted’ in a 2011 interview I wrote for the Radio Times, particularly as I sent him a tape of the interview and a transcript after he complained that he didn’t say ‘any woman worth her salt’ can cope with a man putting his hand on her behind.”
