Some of the mainstream media1 still seem to be under the impression that the $122 million postal opinion poll was actually to determine the people’s opinion regarding same-sex marriage. Nothing could be further from the truth. It was solely designed to delay any consideration of the subject by the parliament, and to allow the religious opposition to rally its troops and develop its lies and red herrings2,3.
These people have no interest in what the people want. The religious only ever want to dictate to others their peculiar interpretation of their particular holy book, and no amount of argument and reasoning will convince them otherwise. Anyone who expected the religious to acquiesce if the result of the postal opinion poll gave a ‘yes’ majority, was indulging in a delusion. This was clearly shown by Senator Eric Abetz’s first response to indications that the ‘yes’ vote would dominate. He stated that the private member’s bill developed by Dean Smith and colleagues was unacceptable even as a starting point4.
Now, Institute of Public Affairs alumnus, Senator James Paterson, has drafted legislation that will legalise discrimination and which will neutralise state anti-discrimination laws. This will allow people to discriminate on the basis of sexuality1. While this vicious attempt to roll back anti-discrimination laws by the vacuous Paterson, is just an extension of the bigotry of the religious, and is likely to fail in the senate, there will be numerous attempts to amend Smith’s legislation. This clearly demonstrates that the religious right wing nutters will never acquiesce. They are antidemocratic and will never be happy until Australia is a half-baked theocracy.
Sources
- http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/the-great-betrayal-coalition-hardliners-throw-democracy-overboard-to-resist-samesex-marriage-20171113-gzkb9o.html
- http://www.blotreport.com/australian-politics/abbotts-true-bigotry/
- http://www.blotreport.com/australian-politics/acl-bigotry/
- http://www.blotreport.com/australian-politics/plan-b-religious-nutters/
I fear what you say is true.
I often wonder at the connection between the IPA and the Christian conservatives – the IPA don’t present as a particularly pious lot, I suspect it is more a case of convenience as in “your enemy is my enemy” type relationship.