I notice on Same Same that Penny Wong and Bob Brown were voted for the fourth year in a row two of the top 25 most influential gay people in Australia. See list for previous years at:
http://www.samesame.com.au/25/2009/
http://www.samesame.com.au/25/2008/
http://www.samesame.com.au/25/2007
What a pity Wong and Brown appear unable to sway Julia Gillard in supporting equality for gay people. Can anyone speculate why she is against gay marriage?
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Google just ate my comment. Wonder how many times that happens?
ReplyDeleteThe Prime Minister is bound by Australian Labour Party policy, which is decided at Labour Party conferences. Supporters of same sex marriage have consistently failed, at ALP conferences, to have their agenda included in ALP policy. The party is much more socially conservative that the National or Liberal parties, who are the ideological descendants of social libertarians. Although the Australian Greens have incorporated same sex marriage into their political platform, on this issue they sold their supporters (and Adam Bandt, their only member of the executive chamber) down the river for the sake of pursuing a broader agenda on the environment.
ReplyDeleteThe best hope of changing Australia's marriage laws in the foreseeable future would be a conscience vote, where parliamentarians vote according to their personal values. The ALP is historically less likely to allow such a vote than the Liberal or National parties. However, since both of those parties have been hijacked over the past two decades by the conservative and religious right, it seems unlikely that they will initiate a conscience vote on what has become a religious, rather than a secular, issue, when they command a majority in the executive chamber.
Not sure what happened to your comment, but there are none in the SPAM box.
ReplyDeleteI was unaware that the Labor was socially conservative, just shows you how little I've been interested in politics throughout my lifetime.
Yes, that conservative religious right has a lot of power, and on that note, did you see the documentary about the one million bibles being produced every other day in China and the millions of converts to Christianity occurring in that country? Is there are link - since 'we' are in the Asia Pacific region?
Christian evangelizing works, so you would expect a bounce in the numbers of people self-identifying as christians where the evangelists are active. Now christians are evangelizing in Australian schools we can expect to see a bounce in church attendances in Australia. And attendant irrational fears, for instance of GLBT's and Muslims.
ReplyDelete