Plebiscite - They Must Be Afraid They’ll Lose

What is the matter with the gays? They want same-sex marriage, don’t they? Why don’t they want a plebiscite? Why are they so afraid of it? Are they scared they’ll lose it?

This is a very common sentiment to be read in the marriage equality debate in Australia. Here's why it's wrong.

While there are some very sound arguments against holding a marriage equality plebiscite, including cost ($160 million), the fact it is non-binding (politicians can ignore it and some have said they will) and the fact there will still have to be a free vote in the Parliament after all the trouble the nation has been put to, LGBTI people have another set of concerns. To suggest that the LGBTI community is fearful of a plebiscite because we're worried we’ll lose it is very wide of the mark. There are some important reasons why we oppose it, including philosophical, social and personal, but none of them include the idea we're worried we'll lose it.

1.      The plebiscite was created by opponents of marriage equality. It is not part of the national debate because we all thought it was a great idea to get the conversation going. Far from it. Put simply, the plebiscite was conceived, birthed and nurtured by Tony Abbott, the implacable enemy of marriage equality, whose antipathy to gays is well-known and documented. Supported by a cabal of ultra-conservatives fighting to keep their ascendancy in the LNP (Abetz, Andrews, Bernardi and Christensen), they have stamped their names all over this debate and have openly stated they will ignore the vote if it goes against them. They instituted it for one reason and one reason only: in order to delay a vote in the Parliament as an interim strategy so they could kill it off totally further down the track. 

  

2.      The LGBTI community does not want this plebiscite. It's about us and we don’t want it. A recent poll shows that almost all LGBTI people oppose having the plebiscite. How would you feel if you didn't want to be evaluated but it was forced on you? You'd probably feel like us: upset, angry, frustrated, devalued. We were told by the Government that it was a plebiscite or nothing. But as we moved forward in the debate, many of us realised that this was a false dichotomy. It’s not a plebiscite or nothing. There are alternatives, political and social. You have to remember that the LGBTI community is a minority, and a minority that has a long association with persecution. It is very easy for the majority to jackboot over the group with fewer numbers or less power. This can be done with any minorities: LGBTI, disabled, ethnic, religious, unemployed, youth, the aged etc. But a modern society does not do that; or at least aspires not to do that. The way we treat minorities is often held up as the criterion by which a society is judged as being fair and sophisticated. To the extent it treats its minorities poorly, it is deemed a less compassionate and sophisticated society. The way we treat minorities is the way that we ourselves can be treated by others should circumstances be different.

3.     Marriage equality is about equal treatment under the law. And equal treatment should never be at the whim of a popular opinion poll. It should be enshrined in legislation. Our push for marriage equality is not hard to understand. We are good citizens, we make a huge contribution in every field of endeavour, we pay our taxes, we keep the social contract and we want to be treated equally under the law. This means we want to be able to have the choice to marry and have the social affirmation that such a relationship brings should we want to. Equality under the law. That’s it. Nothing else. We see equality under the law as a human rights issue, not an opinion poll issue. So does the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. The proposed change to the Marriage Act to extend the right of marriage to same-sex partners so that we can be treated equally with everyone else is for the Parliament to decide as the High Court has already pronounced.

4.      The question of marriage equality is not appropriate for a public opinion poll. The worth of our relationships should not be up for evaluation by the Australian populace. Australia is made up of many and varied opinions with many vestiges of homophobia, gay bigotry and even gay hate. The ACL and other fundamentalists believe that being gay is a sin, an abomination and against nature. It is not right that they be given the opportunity to evaluate gay relationships when they could not possibly understand them and are implacably opposed to them. No. It is no-one’s business whether two people get married apart from the couple themselves. It is their business alone. Two straight people contemplating marriage would be aghast if they had to pass a national plebiscite test to obtain permission. In fact, a recent poll indicates just that: a clear majority of straight people said they would feel very uncomfortable having to face a plebiscite over their own marriage.

Let me elucidate this point. Let's say hypothetically that a proposal for a national plebiscite were put to the nation to evaluate whether:

·         couples, where the woman is over the age of 30, are not permitted to have children; or

·         people who have not been born in Australia are to be to be taxed at a 10% higher rate than everyone else; or

·         smokers be denied hospital treatment paid for by the public purse.

There are Australians who would fervently agree with each of these propositions. But if you were in one of those categories, the cry would go up and there would be marching in the streets. "How dare you propose public evaluation of these personal issues. It is an outrage" would be the response. But the plebiscite proponent could say, "What are you worried about? What could be more democratic than letting the people have their say?"
"BECAUSE", you would shout ferociously, "IT'S NOT A MATTER FOR THE PEOPLE. THIS IS NOT A DEMOCRATIC QUESTION. OUR PERSONAL LIVES ARE NOT FODDER FOR A PUBLIC OPINION POLL. THE NATION’S SOCIAL COHESION IS NOT TO BE PUT TO A VOTE. IT'S NOT AN APPROPRIATE ISSUE TO BE PUT TO THE PEOPLE." And you would be right. None of the above hypotheticals are appropriate for plebiscite. Gay people are saying exactly the same thing about our right to marry our partners. It is not an appropriate question to be put to a public opinion poll. It is demeaning and humiliating.

5.      A plebiscite will be harmful to individuals and families. We are very fearful of the harm a plebiscite debate will cause, not only to the LGBTI community, but to the fabric of the nation itself. It will open up a voluble nasty bitter campaign from opponents who will not hesitate to conflate marriage equality issues with other issues. It will force gay people to have to defend ourselves constantly. Posters and advertisements from opponents will be paraded in front of us on daily basis. This happened in Ireland and campaigners have stated to Australian MPs here that it was absolutely brutal. Irish psychologists have reported increased numbers of very distressed people. Gay people know that the Prime Minister is being either disingenuous or deluded when he says the debate here will be respectful. He obviously has not seen or heard some of the stuff that is out there already if he believes that. Children in same-sex parented families do not need to go through such nastiness. And when the campaign begins officially, it will only get more heated and worse in every way. The LGBTI community does not need this. We are already a persecuted group by the Church and other groups. We are tired of the oppression and utterly reject the legitimisation of it in a plebiscite campaign.

6.      A plebiscite will be divisive to the nation. Australia will be riven by such a divisive debate and LGBTI issues could be contaminated as always being problematic, which they are not. Australia is usually seen as a fair and just society, one of the most entirely successful nations on the planet. Setting one group over another will never be a good thing for our social cohesion. It defies belief that it is being contemplated.

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Marriage equality is a step of social progress whose time has come. It is inevitable in Australia at some point in the future that same-sex couples will be able to marry. Religious and political conservatives are determined to stymie it any way they can and in so doing are making the lives of LGBTI people miserable and unhappy. We leave them to the judgment of the people and to their own consciences. Gay people are made to feel not valued and unworthy in this hurtful proposition. There are already enough MPs in the House of Representatives (at last count 84 where 76 is a majority) and 41 in the Senate (where 39 is a majority) to pass the legislation easily. We could have marriage equality by the end of next week and save ourselves all the harm, all the hurt, all the divisiveness and $160 million to boot, if there was just the political will and even just a modicum of values-based leadership.

So you see, the LGBTI community opposes a plebiscite not because we're scared we'd lose it, but because of the philosophical and practical consequences that such a debate would mean for us. The plebiscite itself? On the numbers, most would agree that it would pass. But at what cost? So much hurt. So much destruction. Vulnerable young people subjected to hate and invalidation.

So many gay people now are saying what I'm saying. Let's abandon or block the plebiscite and if the Government won't allow the Parliament to debate it and have a free vote, then I'm happy to wait until the next election to turf the whole lot of them out. And if that means three years, then three years it is. I'd rather have the New Zealand experience of the Parliament of the people voting 'Yes' with the gallery and MPs bursting into the traditional love song Pokarekare ana than the filth and ugliness that a plebiscite would open us up to. The New Zealand experience should be the Australian experience.

  

Orlando and Australia's Marriage Equality Plebiscite

Matt Glover - used with permission

The slaughter of the innocents in Florida has touched us all. With Orlando searing into our minds; the merciless death, the unspeakable horror, the unnecessary loss of beautiful lives and remarkable futures, the unutterable anguish of those left behind, the deep trauma to a community, and an LGBT community world-wide feeling once again set upon, Australia’s LGBT community stands in solidarity and profound grief with our brothers and sisters in Orlando as we know only too well that it could have been one of our loved ones had circumstances been just a little different. Circumstances were different when we lost one of our own from the Lindt café siege. Gay hate knows no national boundaries.

But this heinous action has come for Australia in the middle of a marriage equality debate; the next logical step in the long road to freedom of LGBT people in this country. By far, the most important and hotly argued topic of this issue is the Tony Abbott plebiscite that was designed to forestall a vote in the Parliament. We all know that that Malcolm ‘I haven’t changed one iota’ Turnbull has agreed with the conservatives of his party on this issue and acquiesced to their demands in order to obtain the Prime Ministership. A deal was done. Even one of their own, John Hewson, admitted that. A sordid deal was done. We all know that Malcolm Turnbull spruiks the need for democracy, for giving the people a voice, whenever he is asked about this issue. That is his serpentine excuse for putting the country through this demeaning plebiscite. I note that never once have I heard him advocate for marriage equality or prosecute its merits. He simply declares that he agrees with it but then says or does nothing about it. To use a powerful Australianism – it is a piss-poor response from a Prime Minister who could wield immense influence but chooses not to. His agreement with marriage equality is frankly worthless if that is all there is to it. Legislation could pass the Parliament today without his vote.

While Malcolm Turnbull declares disingenuously that it will be an ordered respectful affair, those of us on the receiving end of such debates know better. America is already reeling with the tweet of the Texas Lt. Governor quoting the “God will not be mocked” scripture implying that gay people dancing and enjoying a night club is a mocking of God. Then you get the religious nutters like Westboro Baptist congratulating the shooter, and the pastor who advocates that, though he would never take the law into his own hands, gay people should be legally executed by the Government. That guy is happy the shooter murdered these people so that the world will have “50 less paedophiles”. But don’t for a minute think that this kind of thing is only done in the mad Bible belt of America. Not so.

Only a few weeks ago, the president of the Australian Christian Lobby, Lyle Shelton, likened the advent of marriage equality here to the rise of Nazi Germany in the 1930s saying, “The cowardice and weakness of Australia's 'gatekeepers' is causing unthinkable things to happen, just as unthinkable things happened in Germany in the 1930s” (my italics). Christian fundamentalists here never tire of telling us all that being gay is unnatural, against the order of nature, an intrinsic disorder, an inclination toward moral evil, an abomination, a rejection of God, a profanity, a sin, and worthy of eternal punishment. Why, only three days ago, I endured a pentecostal pastor on a Facebook post about asylum seeker policy, and read by many LGBT people, declare, “gay marriage – Abomination – black and white opposed to God”.

All the arguments that marriage equality will destroy marriage and harm children and hurt the nation are all just so much hot air and have been thoroughly and convincingly debunked by facts and sound logic for a long time now. 

There are bigoted reasons why Australians should reject marriage equality, 

but there are no good reasons.

We are a non-discriminatory pluralist secular nation that is not a theocracy and that is not governed by popular plebiscite.

But the Abbott plebiscite will allow every antagonist, every opponent, every religious fundamentalist, every bigot, every homophobe, every hate-filled rogue element, a tax-payer funded free kick to say whatever they like and do so with virtual impunity. The plebiscite debate will demean gay relationships by preparing the ground for ‘a frank and firm public evaluation of our relationships’ and creating a context for hate-speech and calumny of every description. It will be argued strongly that our relationships are not of the quality that should be attached to the word ‘marriage’ and every nasty trick in the book will be brought out by some who do not mind getting down into the gutter. How utterly demeaning! While we’re at it, just to be fair, should we not throw Malcolm and Lucy Turnbull’s as well as Tony and Margy Abbott’s relationships into the plebiscite for public evaluation too?

Orlando is the polar end of the spectrum. Hatred, violence and murder. The actions of this lone gunman have been shaped by historical forces that prepared the ground for his murderous rage and found voice and took shape in either his neurosis or his ideological affiliation. At the other end of the spectrum are the little question marks over the morality of gay people that the pentecostal minister might ask, or the speculation about paedophilia made by the conservative politician, ever so politely, linking it with gay people, or the declaration of God’s judgement on our land made by a Fred Nile or a Lyle Shelton quoting 2 Chronicles 7: 14 and equating gay people with the “wicked ways” that God will heal us from if only we would repent. 

Orlando does not happen in a vacuum. Orlando does not happen free from powerful social and psychological forces that should have been challenged. Gay hate, prejudice, bigotry and homophobia do not happen in a vacuum. They happen in a social context, where push-back against change occurs out of fear and ignorance and goes unchallenged.

In this context, it is wrong to push ahead in Australia with a marriage plebiscite.

It should be abandoned - totally, utterly and unequivocally.

Let the opponents of marriage equality jump up and down and scream blue murder all they like, but this invitation to public bigotry should be abandoned. It is unnecessary, harmful, costly, and very unwise, given that it has the potential to fuel the rage of the deranged or the dogma of the religionist. Turnbull’s ‘what could be more democratic than giving people a say’? is disingenuous and dangerous. The numbers are already there in the Parliament to pass proposed marriage equality legislation and with over two thirds of the population backing it in support, this is a no-brainer.

We have seen public racism get a foot-hold in this country with hooded bands of racist thugs marching in our streets equating their perverted ideology with love of country. The modern version of this started by allowing Pauline Hanson’s words to go unchallenged in the 1990s. The genie was let out of the bottle. The same mistake cannot be allowed to be made with homophobia and gay-hate. It must be challenged at every turn and certainly not given a respectable platform in the guise of a national plebiscite. Conservative and religious voices overstep the mark when they start playing with this kind of rhetorical fire. Good people get burned. You only have to look at Orlando.

The plebiscite is immoral and demeaning. It is wrong to pursue it. It must be abandoned.

Into The Long Grass - Conservative Treachery

On a major social issue, Australia is now in the grip of the worst joke since the White Australia policy, and it’s just about as funny. Gay people are not equal before the law and are still not allowed to marry our partners in this country, despite many of us having gone to the expense and inconvenience of leaving these shores, travelling overseas and getting married in other more enlightened jurisdictions where marriage equality is a reality. Australia ostentatiously lags behind the rest of the Western world on this issue. And what is the cause of all this? Two words: the conservatives.

Prior to 2004, the wording of our Marriage Act did not specify gender at all. Stand up John Howard. He changed the wording to specify man and woman solely, after seeing marriage equality slowly but surely becoming a reality around various states in the US world and in Europe, and so, rushed the legislation through the Parliament, thereby blocking any possibility that same-gender marriage could evolve in this country. He didn’t take it to a plebiscite, just to the Parliament. Interestingly, unlike his present-day descendants, he had this remarkable thing to say.

“We've decided to insert this into the Marriage Act to make it very plain that that is our view of a marriage and to also make it very plain that the definition of a marriage is something that should rest in the hands ultimately of the parliament of the nation. (It should) not over time be subject to redefinition or change by courts, it is something that ought to be expressed through the elected representatives of the country.'' Oops, it looks like the present crop didn’t get that memo. Interesting, don’t you think?

Fast forward a decade or so and the infamous love-child of Howard and Bronwyn Bishop, Tony Abbott, an even more conservative backward looking monarchist 50s man than Howard, is in office as Prime Minister. Apart from rusted on arch-conservatives, he is near universally disliked and by many, despised. He was only voted in because he wasn’t Gillard or Rudd; hardly a ringing endorsement. There were no palm fronds cast onto the road in front of Abbott’s entourage as he slipped into Canberra.

This is a man who on 7 March 2010 told a 60 Minutes interviewer in response to a question about homosexual people that, despite having a gay sister himself, he "probably [felt] a bit threatened ... as most people do." He defended the assertion on the ABC’s 7.30 two nights later as a “spontaneous answer” and went on to say, "there is no doubt that it [homosexuality] challenges, if you like, orthodox notions of the right order of things." This is the guy who subsequently becomes Prime Minister of Australia; a man who has not the first idea about LGBT people and our lives and who is implacably, rigidly and unwaveringly opposed to marriage equality. If gay marriage were ever to get up during his term of office, it would be over his dead body.

Just before he lost power due to the relentless abysmal polling he received in over thirty consecutive polls, and with the Government looking more and more like a one-term government because of him, the marriage equality issue came once again to the fore due to the submission of a suggested bill put up by one of his own, Warren Entsch. Abbott had already pronounced only a week or so before, that no party would own marriage equality and that if it were to become reality in this country, it would do so as a result of the whole Parliament. Sounds a lot like John Howard’s stated position, doesn’t it? But don’t be fooled. It’s all smoke and mirrors. There are a lot of them in this debate. Instead, because of the Entsch bill, a hastily called party room meeting was announced and all party members had to stop their work to attend the Tony Abbott Marriage Equality workshop for the day. At the end of it, the Parliament was superseded and forgotten and Australia was to have a plebiscite on the issue instead; a non-binding poll. And not at the next election, but sometime after the next election; say six to twelve months after. Abbott’s conservative mates like Abetz, Andrews, Bernardi and Fierravanti-Wells, to name a few, were enough to carry the day. Abbot got his way and fudged the whole the thing, proudly rejoicing in democracy because now, everyone would have a say.

Conservative religious folk, also implacably opposed to marriage equality, thought all their Christmases had come at once. The issue had been kicked down the road, off into the misty future, and reframed by marriage quality public enemy number 1 as a vox populi democratic issue. The Australian Christian Lobby’s President Lyle Shelton wrote on an American blog: “Instead, a people’s vote known as a plebiscite would be held sometime after the 2016 election, kicking the issue into the long grass (putting the issue off) and blunting the momentum of same-sex marriage lobbyists” (my italics).

No doubt embarrassed that these words have found the light of day, they have belled the cat and tolled the truth of this plebiscite. It is nothing but a ruse, a tactic, a way to delay, to obfuscate, to impede and to push the issue off the front pages. Abbott knew it. The ACL knows it. Turnbull knows it. All of Australia knows it, given that over two-thirds of us are supportive of a change to the Marriage Act already and have been for some time. It is a transparent tactic; worthy of Lao-Tzu.

Now, a human rights issue was going to be voted on. In any domain of Western jurisprudence, that is a no no. It is an absolute. You don't vote on human rights. They are not for the vote. Human rights are never to be given. They are only to be recognised. They belong to us all; as human beings. They do not lay in the purview of any man to give. And they do not lay in the voting intentions of an entire nation. Human rights are of a different order than say, education policy or health policy. They are over and above such quotidian issues, important though they may be. In a Western representative democracy like Australia’s, it is Justice 101 that all are equal under the law. Human rights are to be respected. And where we are found wanting occasionally or could do better, we adjust and change our ways to conform to the higher good, that of human rights.

Professor Gillian Triggs, President of the Australian Human Rights Commission wrote in an opinion piece in The Age. “Under article 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights all people ‘are equal before the law and entitled without any discrimination to the equal protection of the law’. The Australian Human Rights Commission considers that this principle of equality means that civil marriage should be available, without discrimination, to all couples, regardless of sex, sexual orientation or gender identity. - - - Of immediate relevance to Australia's proposed plebiscite, is the [US] Supreme Court's view that fundamental rights may not be submitted to a vote. Rather, ‘they depend on the outcome of no elections’. In principle, why should the right to equality in marriage depend upon a plebiscite”? Indeed, it shouldn’t.

As a result of this farce, my relationship and tens of thousands like it around the country, will be judged and voted on by bigots and homophobes and the ignorant who despise us. Our status in the nation will be evaluated by other Australians; something I dare say, not one of them would be comfortable with. Conservative politicians and religious folk who confirm our relationships as being of second-class worth see this exercise as something good and noble.

I have already written a piece about the plebiscite and you can read my argument against it here.

Since Malcolm Turnbull unseated Tony Abbott and took the prime ministership, he has been lumbered with almost all of Abbott’s far-right policies, including the plebiscite; the $160 million waste of money that even now, conservative politicians are saying they will not abide by regardless and will still vote against marriage equality though their electorates be supportive. It’s the usual suspects. Abbott should be counted among them. Then there will be Abetz, Andrews, Fierravanti-Wells, as well now as Bridget McKenzie who told the media this week that she will vote against marriage equality no matter what the plebiscite turns up. And oh, it was like getting blood out of a stone for her to admit this publicly. Seems she didn’t want to own her own intentions on the record.

These conservatives and others not so public are said to be voting with their consciences. 

Apparently, their consciences are perfectly okay with inequality before the law (one law for straight people and a different law for gay people), consciences just fine with the hurt and pain caused by relationships deemed second-rate, consciences just peachy with young gay people getting the message from Government that ‘we don’t care what you want’, consciences that sleep well at night knowing that over two-thirds of Australians disagree with them but they don’t give a stuff anyway, consciences that are jim dandy with depriving gay couples the affirmation of acceptance and celebration by society even when society has said it is perfectly happy to offer that affirmation. You gotta love the conservative conscience. These people alone stand in the way of Australian marriage equality.

So what of Turnbull? He is increasingly looking weak. Abbott does not hesitate to prosecute his own case. He’s out and about everywhere. This week, he’s in America telling a right-wing homophobic lobby group that marriage equality will “erode” the family and “damage” marriage. Rubbish I say Mr Abbott. Show us how that is to happen. The burden of proof is on you. Show us the evidence of erosion and damage.

But in all this, where’s our great enlightened moderate Liberal hope Malcolm Turnbull? Silent as the grave. Just mouthing the party line. Inanities about plebiscites and democracy. Repeating the words and policies of his political nemesis. It’s pathetic and he is looking more and more pathetic every day. Turnbull looks and sounds weak; a pusillanimous puppet of the Right. If he truly believes in marriage equality, then let him advocate for it and stop vacating the field to the likes of Bernardi and Abetz and Abbott. Let him use his considerable influence as Prime Minister to do some good for the country on this issue. Let him not be like Gillard who squandered her chance to do something when she had the power to do so. Turnbull really needs to grow a spine. He might be moderate, but if he presides over a far-right government and allows that discourse to fill the conversation, then his moderate credentials amount to zero. He is moderate in name only and will ultimately become a laughing stock. When a leader loses the respect of the nation, he or she is in deep trouble.

What a farce this has turned into. We have a weak pathetic Prime Minister who is scared of his own party and who won’t even advocate the issues he believes in. We’ve got an inordinately expensive unnecessary plebiscite which will be ignored by some conservative politicians anyway. We ‘ve got the unedifying spectacle of Australians being asked to vote on human rights. We’ve given bigots and homophobes equal standing in their views about gay peoples’ lives as us ourselves. We will still have to have a vote in the Parliament. And the whole thing is off in the never never somewhere.

What an utter disgrace! This is how we do social policy in Australia. This is how we treat people in Turnbull’s Australia.

If Turnbull fudges this, it will never be forgotten.

  

Respect? Respect For What?

Aretha Franklin sang about it. Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King spoke about it. We hear the word all the time. Respect. You are to show respect. You must respect your elders, respect your teachers, respect your pastor or priest, respect the Parliament, even respect your opponents.

This week has brought into stark relief the notion of respect again for me. Once again, it is over the marriage equality debate in Australia. That snail-paced item of social progress that it seems forever is just out of reach, just beyond our grasp. For the first time in history, Australia has full agreement and full support of the leaders of all our political parties. Even the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition are feuding friends over marriage equality. They are in concert that Australia should allow its gay and lesbian citizens the right to marry our partners. But still, we cannot get there! It is incredibly frustrating!

We are faced now with the idiotic imbecilic situation that despite over two thirds majority of Australians consistently supporting the change, the leaders of the Parties in support of the change, the majority of Parliamentarians in support of the change, and the High Court of Australia saying that it is in the purview of the Parliament, and nowhere else, to make decisions concerning the Marriage Act, we are not able to have a free vote in the Parliament but must take the country to a monumentally expensive and divisive plebiscite on the matter, only to subsequently return to the Parliament to have the vote we're not having now.

It begs the question. Why?

It would appear that the price of the National Party's and conservative Liberal's support for Malcolm Turnbull in the recent Prime Ministerial dumping was that Turnbull inter alia hold the line on marriage equality. In other words, while he himself is totally supportive of the change and is local Member of an electorate that has one of the largest populations of LGBT people in the entire country, he has tied himself to Tony Abbott's backward and obstructionist policy; a policy that Turnbull himself spoke out against when he was still Minister of Communications before his ascension to the big office.

The plebiscite itself was Abbott's idea alone; an idea designed to impede progress of the issue while the opponents lined up and spent millions of dollars in order to attempt to stop this change from happening. For them, on the issue of marriage equality, they would wear it as a badge of honour to be the anomaly of major Western countries who have comfortably lived with their LGBT people marrying without civilisation or the Church falling into a chasm. They would comfortably and happily deprive gay and lesbian people of their right to be treated the same as everyone else and the happiness they would derive, against the clear will of the majority. These people will not hesitate.

In the Parliament yesterday, Malcolm Turnbull vomited out a whole lot sweet and saccharine statements about Australians having the ability to have a sensible conversation, to bring their collective wisdom to this, to have a respectful and open dialogue as we have the discussion over the lead up to the plebiscite. He placed much weight on the wisdom and grounded nature of Australians as the discourse would develop.

Not for me! From my experience, I've never heard so much rubbish and I think Turnbull is smart enough to know it. Have you seen the comments sections in newspaper articles and blog posts around marriage equality? Have you ever been in a Facebook thread where marriage equality is being discussed and some opponent lobs in one of the well-known hand grenades they are so fond of? Have you heard Eric Abetz talk about marriage equality? Have you heard Concetta Fierravanti-Wells tell us all that non-Anglo Australians are all opposed to marriage equality?

Have you heard what the Catholic Church still officially teaches and proffers by Australian Catholic apologists about gay people? That we are intrinsically disordered, we are  inclined to moral evil and are against the natural order. Have you heard what Lyle Shelton of the Australian Christian Lobby or Fred Nile from the Christian Democratic Party say of gay people? Here's a basic off the top of my head list of what Bible-believing [read: fundamentalist] evangelicals think about gay people. Being gay is a choice. Being gay can be changed. Being gay is not part of the identity. Being gay is a sin. It is a behaviour that can be stopped and should be repented of. It is an abomination. It is a rejection of God. It is base. It is disordered. It is anti-scriptural. Gay people will not see God nor enjoy eternity with God. God will punish gay people. Being gay itself is a punishment by God for godlessness. And if you happen to be Pentecostal, you will throw in that being gay is caused by a demon and that we are all possessed.

Now, let's go back to where I started. About respect. I understand and accept the maxim of  "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it". I understand why this is right. It is because the only logical alternative to this is epistemological coercion ie., I force you to think the way I do. Some have tried this: Fidel Castro, Lenin and Stalin, Mao Tse-tung, the Kim dynastic dictatorship of North Korea. All have attempted to coerce thinking and to enforce knowledge. A strong belief in the maxim above protects against the worst excesses of coercive thought. BUT, while I agree with the right to express thoughts freely, with the caveat that you are not expressing hate speech or inciting violence, it does not mean that I respect your views.

You can be racist. I can't stop you. But don't ask me to respect your view.
I don't respect you.
You can be sexist. I can't stop you. But don't ask me to respect your view.
I don't respect you.
You can be homophobic. I can't stop you. But don't ask me to respect your view.
I don't respect you.
You can be a religiously motivated bigot. I can't stop you. But don't ask me to respect your view.
I don't respect you.

The fact of the matter is that a plebiscite on marriage equality gives equal and equivalent weight to those who are implacably opposed to my being married to my partner of fifteen years. Can you imagine the outrage if the situation were reversed; if Australians were being asked to evaluate straight relationships to see whether we would approve socially? A plebiscite gives equal weight and moral equivalence to those who are only too willing and eager to judge me according to unscientific standards that are outdated, unjust and harmful, to those who are conservative Christians who believe that intrinsically I am a sinner, a rejecter of all that is good and encumbered by a willful opposition to the natural order only to be judged by a God who will cast me into the fires of hell for eternity for my wickedness. A plebiscite allows such as them to evaluate the morality and praxis of my relationship.

Malcolm Turnbull could not be more wrong. A Government-funded No campaign in a plebiscite will draw out the opponents of marriage equality who are not only quiet and inoffensive, but will unleash a flood of derogation of gay people by the conservatives, the crazies, the nutters and the Christians who believe we're all filthy sinners and possessed. He is deluded if he thinks otherwise.

But the right thing to do is not a matter for the democratic voice. Sorry, but it's not. Discriminating against gay people because of our sexual orientation is just wrong; no matter whether one disagrees with me or one hundred million disagree with me. Treating gay people as second class citizens will never be right. We shouldn't vote on whether racism is okay or homophobia is okay within limits or sexism is okay. They're not. And they never will be. It' s not a matter for a vote.

We should have the right to marry our partners and Turnbull should use his undoubted oratorical skills, his numbers in the Parliament, his place in the polls and his stated personal position to stand up and do the right thing and to stop being so cowardly by being frightened of the Nationals. He is looking pathetic.

I will respect anyone's right to think however they damn well please within the caveat mention above, but don't ask me to respect clearly wrong discrimination and the bigoted ugly language that goes with it.

Prime Minister Turnbull, stop being such a wus and get this to the Parliament and bring the damn thing to a vote.