LGBTQ intolerance towards traditional marriage
The High Court of Australia’s decision on Thursday afternoon to throw out legal challenges to the postal survey on same-sex marriage drew palpable sighs of relief from the Turnbull government.
Immediately after the decision, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann, who is also acting minister of state responsible for the poll, asked both sides to act with courtesy and respect. Well said.
While rules for the poll will be drawn up this weekend, both Yes and No camps could start by being less shouty, less winner-takes-all, less take-no-prisoners.
Gay marriage crusaders in particular, might want to rethink their conduct over the next two months as 16 million Australians are asked to fill out and return their ballots by November 7.
A good way to check their tactics so far is to imagine if the tables were turned. Warning: the following scenarios jar the mind, and for good reason.
Imagine that in March this year Coopers Brewery cancelled the release of a “Keeping it Light” video featuring a respectful conversation about marriage between two federal MPs when defenders of traditional marriage kicked off a #BoycottCoopers campaign. The Guardian reported the backlash from traditional marriage defenders was “swift and brutal”, with hundreds of social media posts accusing the brewery of promoting same-sex marriage, and a dozen hotels deciding not to sell Coopers beer. Coopers promptly capitulated, issuing a grovelling apology to supporters of traditional marriage.
In the same month, suppose that traditional marriage activists targeted the managing partner of IBM because he believes in same-sex marriage, defending their intimidation tactics by claiming that the managing director’s private views are entirely incompatible with IBM’s stated support for traditional marriage. Imagine, too, that defenders of traditional marriage also harassed a senior executive at PricewaterhouseCoopers and an academic at Macquarie University because of their links to same-sex marriage lobby groups.
Now try running the ruler over some of Australia’s biggest businesses who joined the crusade to defend traditional marriage by asking their employees and all Australians to wear a specially designed “acceptance ring” to signal acceptance of the status quo around marriage. An employee of one of the big four banks told The Daily Telegraphthat being “constantly bombarded” with traditional marriage propaganda put him in a position of having to justify his support for same-sex marriage. The employee lamented the “sad state of affairs in a country where freedom of thought was once a prized right”. The boss of a traditional marriage lobby group said “it is wonderful to have so many businesses” defending traditional marriage.
Try to then picture traditional marriage activists calling for a sports arena named many years ago in honour of a former Olympic champion to be renamed because the Olympian expressed support for same-sex marriage. When invited on Channel 10’s The Project, the sporting hero was roundly mocked and spoken over by those on the panel who weren’t interested in listening to someone who supports same-sex marriage. They simply wanted to proselytise in favour of traditional marriage.
Turning the tables, imagine that in September 2015 a Tasmanian defender of traditional marriage lodged a complaint with Equal Opportunity Tasmania over a booklet that set out the reasons why same-sex marriage should be legalised. Suppose, too, that in May this year the outgoing anti-discrimination commissioner revealed why she thought there was a case to answer: the booklet — distributed only to same-sex marriage supporters — offended and humiliated those who support traditional marriage.
If switching the two sides hasn’t sparked outrage yet, imagine that in the busy month of May for defenders of traditional marriage, the Australian Medical Association called on parliament to recommit to marriage as the union between one man and one woman, dressing up its support as a health issue. “There are ongoing, damaging effects of having a prolonged, divisive, public debate,” it said in its position statement, leading AMA president Michael Gannon to write to Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten urging a bipartisan approach on traditional marriage.
Sticking with this, consider that the NSW Law Society also endorsed traditional marriage in a joint press release with the Bar Association and the NSW branch of the AMA.
Lawyers with different views complained that members were not consulted and the press release gave the misleading impression that traditional marriage is favoured by all 29,000 solicitors in NSW. The president of the Law Society scoffed at the complaints, noting that the society regularly makes decisions on a range of important legal issues.
Now try to imagine months, nay years, of campaigning by the taxpayer-funded broadcaster — across radio, television and online — to defend traditional marriage. So much airtime devoted to supporters of traditional marriage that viewers have started to wonder whether ABC employees are paid to be activists rather than impartial journalists. When an ABC host interviewed the head of a same-sex marriage group a few weeks back, the journalist asked what right did a same-sex marriage supporter have to cheer a heterosexual athlete?
And when the national broadcaster interviewed on prime time TV a couple who will vote Yes to gay marriage, it was so out of kilter with its normal programming, it made headlines across Australia’s media outlets.
Substitute the two sides to the same-sex marriage issue one more time when traditional marriage activists last week launched an online campaign against a doctor who appeared in a TV advertisement supporting same-sex marriage. The online platform powered by GetUp! demanding that the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency and the AMA review her registration quickly attracted 6000 signatories from those defending traditional marriage. When news of the bullying was reported in the media, GetUp! pulled the petition and claimed it bore no responsibility for the intimidation directed at “Dr Yes” for appearing in a same-sex marriage advertisement.
Is your head spinning from the intolerance and the intimidation? Ready to condemn the personal attacks and the mob mentality of activists who have undermined the freedom to hold a different view? If switching the sides around is not enough to cause strategic thinkers on the Yes side of same-sex marriage to rethink the present campaign, they’re looking at an own-goal defeat, not just in the coming vote but beyond. A more sensible, tolerant and respectful campaign by same-sex marriage crusaders would understand that same-sex marriage should be founded on the broadest possible base of community acceptance.
It’s no surprise that those with strong views on both sides have settled into their respective trenches, shouting over one another and refusing to budge. But there is a world of difference between those who have been critiquing same-sex marriage, even succumbing to ill-conceived claims, and those who call for people with different views to be sacked, deregistered or hung, drawn and shamed in the public square or at least on national TV. There is no moral equivalence between the bullying and disagreement, even shouty disagreements.
And the silence on the Yes side about the bullying has become a shaky moral alibi for the bullies to continue to browbeat people with a different view.
On Thursday afternoon following the High Court’s decision, Labor’s most prominent Yes campaigner, Penny Wong, condemned “the nasty arguments” by some on the No side. Draped in a rainbow flag, Greens leader Richard Di Natale pointed to the need for stronger laws to stop misleading statements made during the campaign.
In the absence of greater moral clarity from same-sex marriage supporters denouncing intimidation used by their side, many more Australians will vote No as a protest against a campaign premised on tolerance that has practised repeated intolerance.
Try switching the sides around beyond the same-sex marriage debate. How would you respond to five university students being dragged through the courts and the byzantine bureaucracy of the Australian Human Rights Commission because an employee at the university was offended by the suggestion segregated classrooms for indigenous students make sense. What would the response be if the AHRC touted for complaints against a cartoonist who drew a cartoon that suited your chosen politics?
Turning the tables on intolerance unsettles the mind, which is no bad thing. It could encourage a greater level of consciousness, rather than the lazy reflexive responses we fall back on when we’re not being intellectually rigorous.
