Federal Minister Senator Mark Arbib’s view that the Labor party should change its policy opposing the recognition of same sex marriage, and that the 2012 Federal Conference should be brought forward to allow a revision of the policy so as to mesh with upcoming parliamentary moves has been rejected by Julia Gillard.
The Prime Minister has been intoning the mantra: “marriage is between a man a woman” (which anyone who’s been to a wedding or two since John Howard required celebrants to state this in 2004 would be very familiar with by now).
Arbib, a doyen of the NSW Right who has now stepped down from the National Executive and his factional positions, may well be calculating that a switch in the ALP’s marriage policy is one way to reverse the drift of votes to The Greens. He may also, of course, be sincere. But in any case, it’s curious that the response to Arbib’s statement has been so peremptory. It’s not exactly the debate over ideas and values that various ALP figures have been calling for since the election.
It’s also interesting to speculate on whether Arbib has revised his view that the infamous “battlers” in outer suburban electorates would be scared off voting Labor by a policy such as this. If he has, that’s a good thing. Commentators such as Michelle Grattan still ritually make claims like this:
A reason the Greens are doing well is that they are standing on firm, distinctive terrain, and so people can identify what they believe in. But Labor can’t go too far on to this territory, despite what some on its left would say, because that would lose it some support to the Liberals.
Oh really?
The last election suggested that the reversal of a range of progressive positions – on climate change and asylum seekers – hardly benefited Labor’s vote in the burbs. In fact a lot more of the 2007 ALP vote disappeared in the direction of The Greens than towards the Liberals.
There will probably always be a minority of socially conservative and/or religious voters who oppose same sex marriage. Most research suggests that minority tend to vote for the Tories anyway. To the degree that there vote is in play in marginal seats, it is of course possible to appeal to other cohorts of voters on different grounds (including those of the economy and other aspects of national governance of larger importance to most voters than “social issues”).
When people intone ‘Marriage is between a man and a woman’, who sez? What’s their authority? Why is it?
Gillard, and more power to her for this at least, was honest in her reply when asked if she were an atheist, so it can’t be the Word of God she’s appealing to here. She is, however, a lawyer, and might be referring to the law, but is in a better position than most of us to know that laws can be changed.
She does have a point about official policy and due process, in which case it’s up to Arbib and others who agree with him to keep the pressure up.
Marriage is between a man and a woman because it is a sacred institution, without which the very fabric of our society would fall apart at the seems, and other places.
Arbib will not have said anything publically that hasn’t been given the nod by the powerbrokers in all the factions. We already had Doug Cameron coming out pun intended) and now Biigh. The ALP has made the decision that the ssm campaign is not goung away and it needs to neutralise Green leadership on an issue that is alientating porgressive voters.
My understanding is that there are now strong moves afoot to organise cross-party support for a conscience vote. The question is – what are the numbers?
All this piffle. Voters only care about what effects them, not other people, despite what they may say at polls etc.
The Iraq war is a great example of this – the public was wildly opposed to it, on the order of 80% I seem to recall. And yet we went, and Howard stormed in at the election. The same thing with GST.
Once you do these things, and people see that nothing has really changed, they move on.
Gillard has a choice of being part of the future, or part of the past. It’s disappointing to see her on the side of the past for absolutely no good reason, and a plethora of good moral reasons why she shouldn’t.
affect/effect, blargh.
I’ve always thought that the people who would be terribly upset about a change to the marriage laws aren’t for the Libs anyway. I can’t see how Labor thinks there’s any value in this ‘marriage is for men and women only’ palaver. I can believe that Rudd actually thinks this way because of his religious convictions, but Gillard? Is she just sucking up to the Labor Right? It was awful seeing Wong have to toe this line and trot out a humiliating line.
I have difficulty understanding why people want to get married anyway, except for the party and the presents. But, make it a conscience vote and see what happens.
@6 –
If she is/was, Fine, it’s hard to see how far this gets her now that Arbib and Paul Howes have come out publicly.
The only prominent advocates of heterosexual only marriage in the Labor party – by conviction – are the hardline Shoppies endorsed members.
Like everything else Gillard comes up with, it’s driven by a profound cowardice at the possibility of offending any vested interest group that you care to name.
A bit like her continuing support of Howard’s private school funding formula.
Gawd, they’re a weird mob, Kim. Shoppies and Mizzies and whatevers. How anyone can keep it all straight is beyond.
wait a minute! Isn’t ARbib one of the “faceless men” who never allows any form of political ideology or decency to enter his thoughts, and who manipulates the puppet Gillard into doing the bidding of the right and driving otherwise sensible lefties to vote liberal. How can it possibly be that he would be making a radical social engineering suggestion like this, and how can his erstwhile “puppet” be rejecting him?
I’m confused. It’s almost as if the entire logic for hating Gillard from the left was built on sand!
On this subject, if you have not already, see the Margaret Andrews’ view. It’s pretty grizzly. (You need to be a Crikey subscriber, sadly.)
http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/11/05/benjamin-law-up-close-and-personal-with-margaret-andrews/
Adrian said:
Lovely, because the typo works as a pun.
[Ahem.] Thou hast said it, as Jesus told the apostle.
That’s certainly the case in NSW, Kim. The rest of the Right tag along in fear of the gigantic shitstorm of pain and frustration they’d incur by making any argument that doesn’t end in the a priori superiority of A Mainstream Family With A Mother And A Father. (I’ve done it myself and nearly watched a Shoppie cry tears of rage in a committee, but that’s how I amuse myself).
I’d like to think that Arbib’s finally had enough of the toxic influence of the SDA and as a senior Rightist is finally calling their bluff. Nixon and China, Howard and gun control, and so on.
I’m an optimist.
I thought that Gillard must be going along with the NSW Right who were the main force behind her becoming PM – I can’t think of any good reason for a non-religious person to oppose gay marriage other than personal gain – but now I’m really confused.
Well, Fran I’d like to say it was intentional…
The only question of political interest here is what Arbib’s motives are. We can easily exclude equality for gays, this would imply among other things, that Arbib cares about a policy issue.
I suspect it’s an intra-Right power shenanigan.
Maybe Gillard just doesn’t like gays. There’s lots of Westie women (and men) out there who can’t stand a bar of the G&L culture. And they’re not homophobic (ie in fear oif G&Ls) or remotely religious. They just don’t like it.
Maybe Gillard just doesn’t like gays
Could well be.
David Marr should do another of his psycho profiles, this time on Gillard, for the Quarterly Essay. You never know where a bit of research might lead.
well Paul, I think that in general “G&L culture” involves too much hair wax and bad clothes, but I’ve never thought of Gillard as a fashion critic. So I rather suspect she might be erring on the side of homophobia rather than “just don’t like it.”
I’d also like to think that Gillard acts on slightly more deep-seated beliefs than “I just don’t like it.” I think we should err on the side of caution and assume that she, like most of the leadership of the ALP, is vaguely homophobic.
no, I don’t agree sg. ‘homophobic” explains to those of us who aren’t why those who are, are. its makes them look bad and us good. Because we can say, oh, they’re homophobic, ie they are scared of gays, when in fact, they’re not scared at all. Instead they’re just disgusted by the whole idea of G&L relations and don’t want to have anything to do with it.
maybe Paul, but they’re willing to throw the rights of a whole group under a bus for narrow electoral gain. I think that indicates a certain lack of interest in their rights that goes beyond not wanting to have anything to do with it. Even though historically the ALP have responded well to a lot of gay rights issues, they’ve reached the limit and the limit doesn’t allow gay and lesbian people to be equal to straights.
I think we should err on the side of caution and assume that she, like most of the leadership of the ALP, is vaguely homophobic.”
Agreed SG. I liken this kind of attitude to Moe Szyslak’s classic:
“I’m a well-wisher, in that I don’t wish you any specific harm”
It’s just all a little bit icky, and they’d prefer not to talk about it. But they’re not homophobic… oh no, heaven forfend.
sg,
“but they’re willing to throw the rights of a whole group under a bus for narrow electoral gain.”
Sure, gays, Aborigines, refugees, the unemployed, single mothers, etc, etc. The list doesn’t stop.
It ain’t special. There are a whole lot of groups treated badly for narrow electoral gain. To be fair to Gillard, belatedly, the ALP Caucus, last year, I think had a long discussion on various pieces of legislation affecting gays, all of which I think, went through the Parliament. Perhaps out of those Caucus discussions she realised the numbers just weren’t there within the Parliamentary Labor Party for a ‘yes’ conscience vote. And they certainly wouldn’t be there on the Coalition side, I’d reckon. So she sees no point in trying. I think Graham Richardson alluded to such a situation on Q&A earlier this year.
Doubt it Paul. She is from the Labor Left – you don’t get far in those factional games with a chip on your shoulder about GLBT or feminist issues. It’s why the Shoppies are in the right.
I reckon its more a crisis of our poll-driven policy; our politicians censor what they really believe to present a ‘mainstream sensibility’ facade that doesn’t exist anywhere but their own minds.
You know, I was originally looking forward to a Gillard PM’ship because I thought a change of leadership would allow the ALP to negotiate the necessary policy changes on this issue without losing face.
However, Gillard couldn’t announce a policy difference between her and Rudd without making it an election issue and apparently they didn’t want to do that, so she went with the lazy route – ‘marriage is between a man and a woman’. The contortions are painful to watch.
In a conscience vote, what are the odds it would pass? Who are our enemies and who are our friends? And who is left that needs to be lobbied so that we can kill this issue and never be used as political footballs again?
I wouldn’t assume that Gillard is homophobic. I would assume that she thinks it’s more politically astute not to support gay marriage. I think she’s wrong in that reckoning.
But, I actually think it’s more difficult for a politician whose own personal circumstances (female, unmarried, shacked-up with the First Bloke, BARREN) are used against her constantly, to be brave about these things. Someone like Rudd, with a spotlessly conservative private life, would have a better chance of arguing for gay marriage, and for that argument not to be used against him personally.
The ALP used to be the party of social reform. Those of us who remember the reforms of Whitlam and Dunstan, and the breath of fresh air that those reforms put through society, find it hard to recognise the present ALP as being related to the reformist party of forty years ago.
That is despite the fact that when those reforms were occurring, the shoppies and the Liberals were predicting the end of civilisation as we knew it. The sad thing is that history in Australia has proved that the Dunstan and Whitlam social initiatives did not cause civilisation’s demise, and should have encouraged more reform. The fact that reform has not occurred is providing a niche into which the Greens are slipping.
I might be a little paranoid, but I think that Arbib has no intention of following through. This is just a little carrot in front of us donkeys to keep us from straying to the Greenery on the side of the road.
IIRC, the Liberals at the time said that if we elected Whitlam, there would be a flood of filth.
For which I am still waiting.
If Gillard’s not homophobic, it’d be a pretty simple thing for her to prove. Meanwhile we must come to our own conclusions based on the evidence she has given us.
“This is just a little carrot in front of us donkeys to keep us from straying to the Greenery on the side of the road.”
That’s a particularly rich and apt metaphor Marks. Potent image, a pun and possibly even the donkey is not there by coincidence.
Bravo.
Yes, well said Marks!
rumrebellious @ 24,
i can see the sense of not making it an election issue because she didn’t want it (gay marriage) to turn into a Rudd v. Gillard thing. But that was then. Since she’s so relaxed about Clinton calling Kevin Rudd the Prime Minister (where, as Hendo said on Insiders Clinton was just following American customary address for ex-leaders) Gillard should be even more relaxed about supporting gay marriage laws. Maybe she is just trying to avoid a bun-fight with the various Devouts in the Caucus. The ALP has some very bitter old memories about the consequences of those kinds of political brawls, especially if you come from Victoria.
“This is just a little carrot in front of us donkeys to keep us from straying to the Greenery on the side of the road.”
I would like to think Greens voters are not so easily fooled. I am probably wrong.
There are some seriously misinformed people on this thread.
The ALP has amended 100-odd pieces of legislation to remove discrimination against gays – hardly the stuff of a party that is homophobic.
sg: the leadership of the party is so homophobic that it gave an openly gay woman the finance portfolio.
In recent weeks a senator from the Left – Doug Camereron – and one from the Right – Mark Arbib – has come out in favour of gay marriage. What is the response of people at LP? Ridiculous accusations of homophobia.
I think Fine has a good point, there’s a limit to what Gillard herself can drive personally without being an electoral liability due to her supposed raging feminist bully-girl-ism. Just like there was a limit to what Keating could achieve, because of his inner-city cosmopolitan etc. etc. blah blah.
Particularly with the modern media crop, who have to treat every stereotypical slur like an “interesting” aside that bears investigation…
Well, Im out of explanations as to why the ALP won’t vote for SSM except that the movers and shakers know they wouldn’t have the numbers in a vote on the floor of the House. And, what would be much worse than not having a vote for SSM, is having a vote and losing. It would take years to get back up again – at least the ten years its taken for euthanasia to resurface as an issue the Parliament will soon vote on.
A large proportion of the ALP’s vote comes from various ethnic minorities, none of whom have benign views towards homosexuality. While gay marriage is a necessary reform, I think it will lose the ALP some votes in the short term.
I’m generally unimpressed with arguments from etymology that ignore how languages develop over time. There is far more nuance in English to the term “phobia” than can be gained just from looking at the Greek/Latin. For example, “hydrophobia” as the old symptom synonym for rabies described an aversion to drinking water, not a fear of water otherwise.
Just like “misanthrope” is far more accurately understood as “judgemental/distrustful of people” rather than “hater of people”, homophobe is far more accurately understood as “aversion to homosexuality” rather than “afraid of homosexuality”. Disgusted by homosexuality sounds like the exact description of a homophobe to me.
@36 – agree, tigtog.
This discussion of Gillard highlights some of the inexactitude in terminology.
I doubt she has any fear of or feels uneasy around same sex attracted people. Discussion of purported characteristics of “Westie” women seems to me wrongheaded, and in any case, Gillard is a product of an elite education at Adelaide and Melbourne University law schools in the 1980s.
But I don’t think her personal predilections mean diddly squat. Just as it’s wrong to read off her ‘atheism’ some support for same sex marriage, it’s also wrong to read off her current stance some prejudice.
It’s far more likely explained by political calculation.
To me, the debate is much more likely to go forward if it proceeds on the basis of the political merits of adopting such a policy than on speculation about individual beliefs, which is fundamentally just that.
Sabbra Cadabra’s comment at 35 is a work of art. So many forms of bigotry, nastiness and viciousness all wrapped up in one tiny paragraph. It should be locked away in a deep dark vault along with the last drop of smallpox, it’s just too nasty to be allowed into polite society.
I quite agree tigtog but one might add that even if one wanted to stay with phobia as irrational fear one might ask why, apart from irrational fear, one would find homosexual preference in others disgusting.
It simply has to be some sort of manifestation of existential angst, which given that there’s no presenting existential threat, would have to be irrational, surely.
So yes, disgust at homosexuality is ultimately reducible to irrational fear i.e. homophobia.
Recent events in the USA may well have many people in the ALP terrified of doing anything that could conceivably be called progressive.
Gillard is also no doubt conscious of the persistent 50/50 electoral balance, and may assume that support for gay marriage is unlikely to get any more votes but could lose some.
Excuse me but I really find:
to be really over the top and overegging it. While I don’t agree with the specifics of the analysis, I agree that the Alp has done some close calculations on the electoral appeal of this issue and decided, for
better orworse, that their position is electorally popular. Which means they’re evil. But not that sabbra cadabbra is evil.@40 –
Quite possibly, Ken.
But the ALP hasn’t managed to secure a majority of the vote by being reactive and defensive…
“But not that sabbra cadabbra is evil.”
But Sabbra Cadabbra is evil, wilful. Almost by definition.
True Kim @ 42 but it’s not me you have to convince of that. I surmise that at least some of them believe being reactive and defensive is the only thing that kept them in office. Timid people are hard to transform into reformers.
And just plain wrong, as well, if anyone who has visited Altona recently would know. This is not struggletown, anymore, but approaching yuppietown.
well wilfull, blaming failure to achieve progressive goals on migrants: tick. Accusing the ALP of depending on migrants to win election: tick. Accusing the ALP of political calculation over a minority’s rights: Tick. Insinuating that migrants are more homophobic than whitey: Tick. Implying that migrants will switch votes against the rest of their interests over their homophobia: tick.
It’s not a particularly evil set of opinions by world standards. But squeezing all of that into so few sentences was an act of rhetorical alchemy worthy of respect, and renders the resulting comment more toxic than the sum of its highly condensed parts.
Doesn’t ‘westie’ mean something different in every city anyway? Here in Gillard’s home town of Adders the word is not now, nor has it ever been, current, if only because those from the leafy East know they must pass unharmed through the narrow strip of western suburbs in order to get to the beach. Bwahahahaha.
Perhaps as the perception that Labor is all about identifying problems but not solutions, all about grand plans but not good at execution gets traction, Julia is smart not to give this “distraction” oxygen.
@47 – In Brisbane the Western Suburbs are notoriously “leafy” (though the rest of the joint has greened and Greened up since that phrase was coined), and proverbially the home of small l liberals and Greens. Needless to say, no one who lives in St Lucia, Toowong, Indooroopilly, Kenmore, Chapel Hill, wherevs, gets called a “Westie”.
Never mind Perth, PC, where the whole thing’s completely arse-about.
PC, the fact that beaches in Adelaide have historically been controlled by poor and working class people, not the domain of the rich, says a lot about the cultural differences between Adelaide and the Eastern seaboard.
Hey Paul!
Sure that was then, but she still has her integrity to worry about. Gillard probably wants to appear as a strong leader (I’m sure others here have more nuanced views about about how “westie” female leaders have presented themselves) not prone to flip-flopping.
Which is why Arbib arguing for policy change through the conference rather than the parliamentary party. And that is a crucial first step – although personally I would prefer the ALP to be in lock-step – let’s face it, considering the divisions within the ALP party already over this issue, a conscience vote is a start. Especially one supported by key members of the ALP right like Arbib who could bring some numbers with him.
Remember Penny Wong on Qanda during the election? She was proud of her involvement in the 1998 policy debate that resulted in LGBT’s being mentioned by the ALP in the electoral platform for the first time. The way she pointed out that Graham Richardson was also there made me strongly suspect he voted against it. If I remember rightly that was also the conference where Gough coined the nickname of Joe de Bruyn as “the only dutchmen who doesn’t like dykes”.
But in a conscience vote, I haven’t done the numbers but I’d think we could count on about 1/2 of the ALP caucus. I totally agree the worse thing that could happen is to have the vote go down, so that means we need to start concentrating on individuals within the Coalition.
Malcolm Turnbull and Marise Payne come to mind as possible supporters, but not too sure who else, and those two by themselves are not enough. I’ll be contacting my Liberal member later in the week, and I hope to God she is supportive. I recommend everyone else do the same.
Yes, 47.
We plebs are waiting under the Hawker st overpass, with stubbies and half bricks on the ready, for the next Beamer or four wheel drive piloted by pecil-moustached git or peroxided blonde, mobile phone in hand when they should be concentrating on the road, should these choose to run the gauntlet.
This prior to our long-promised reclaiming of Barton Terrace and consequent invasion of genteel North Adelaide, in our clapped out Coronas and rusted bucket Falcon v 8′s.
What are you on about, sg? What nasty and bigoted points have I made?
sg@51 – and that Adelaide beaches are surf less.
Re Kim, 42; also drsusancalvert and others, I’d go along with that.
Labor has inner city Greens after several strategic seats federally and in the states. The hard social conservatism of sections of the ALP right has alienated progressives, whilst the attempt to “do” social conservatism has not consolidated the Labor position in the mortgage belt.
Given the damage this has done to Labor, it must appear fitting that the olive branch comes from someone associated with the right.
Gillard is then freed up to defend her “brand”.
I doubt whether we are going to see any new anti gay pogrom unleashed in the near future and one hopes the civil unions laws provide adequate legal safeguards for gay people contemplating committing to long term relationships.
But no way is Gillard going to risk a backlash; Hansonist or not, on the issue of gay marriage because the term itself is the sticking point, in this battle of identity politics.
I think you’ve been adequately defended already SC.
Some folks seem to take a description of how things are to be an endorsement of how they should be, unless you laboriously spell out that it’s not.
@ 32:
The ALP didn’t have to amend “100-odd pieces of legislation”. They only had to amend one, and it would’ve obviated the need to amend the other “100-odd pieces”. Introduce marriage equality, and we don’t have to spend our days wading through acres of anti-discimination bumpf simply to give people equal treatment before the law.
The fact that the ALP found it preferable to amend “100-odd pieces” of legislation, to avoid amending that one piece, will well serve future historians who are looking for a good working definition of ‘pusillanimous’.
And homophobic.
I don’t like Mark Arbib but I can’t understand why Julia Gillard is beholden to the Australian Christian Lobby which I don’t think is particularly Australian, or Christian expressing as it does the views of American Southern Baptists and is at variance with established Australian churches like the Uniting Church.
That the Labor Party is in the thrall of lobbyists that don’t have my interests at heart encourages me that voting Green at the upcoming state election is the right action.
We don’t have ‘westies’ in Melbourne, anyway; we have ‘bogans’.
Philomena at #55, I don’t know how well you (think you) know Adelaide, but there is some great surfing within a 60-90 minute drive from the CBD. (Parsons Beach, Waitpinga etc.) To get to it, however, you must drive through the southern suburbs, which are Adelaide’s west. As it were.
Some ask if labor is homophobic, or if the community is homophobic. In the sense that the average laborite (or lib) is going to be waiting outside of a parklands loo with lumps of fourbetwo, for frequenters of these, I’d (like to) think those days are long gone.
“Indifference”, is probably a more accurate term, altho perhaps this indifference is contaminated with atavistic remnants of older ideas.
Also this indifference is tempered by a sort of low level rivalry, if you like; even antipathy, between gays and heteros.
Gays often dont like straights and of course for many straights, it’s a mutual thing.
For this curmudgeon, all marriage can be sacred, or just a hollowed out form of bourgeoise sentimentality overlaid by commercialism.
Not for me, any of it..
Kim @49 – Not westie, but we do call ourselves Westside, the middle-class searching for ghetto chic. Comes with hand movements too.
Not for long, Pavlov’s Cat, when the developers get their way, as to the scenic outskirts of Adelaide.
Inasmuch as I suspect printers are behind the changes in Government ministries, I accuse Wedding Planners, Florists, Department Stores and Resorts of being behind the push to inflict marriage on hitherto exempt citizens. Haven’t teh gays suffered enough? Abolish marriage, don’t expand it. Contract law can handle most situations, and quaint religious ceremonies can still be held by those who want them. They’re just another kind of party.
Great! So now marriage is between one man and one solicitor!?
Lack of imagination, possibly.
The problem with your comment, sg, is that it is sabbra cadabra’s observation of others, not necessarily one he/she shares with them. Indeed he/she describes gay marriage as a necessary reform so it appears that it is not his/her opinion.
The right to vote is not restricted to polite society and much of impolite society has, in varying degrees, homophobic views upon which some of them may be expected to base their vote.
I wish that the ALP would take leadership on the issue but I recognise that there would be some considerable risk for them in doing so unless there was some show of bi-partisan support from the Liberals, who under Abbott will give none, especially while thay have that nutcase Heffernan in the Senate.
Some people find the idea of sex with animals or children disgusting. I don’t think such disgust can be explained away as fear, nor can homophobia. Sometimes disgust is simply disgust and we really shouldn’t invent some explanation for it based on nothing more than our ideological predilections and convenience.
Too right, GregM. As a bisexual male, I’ve been in several gay relationships with NESB males, and that informs my opinion. Also, I note numerous surveys confirm the relatively greater levels of homophobia outside western liberal democracies, see here for example:- http://www.actup.org/forum/content/attitudes-africa-towards-homosexuality-338/
It is the mind destroying, soul crushing insistence on political correctness exhibited by lefties like SG that led me to hand in my certified lefty badge some years back
Anyone who cares strongly about gay marriage is going to give their primary vote to either the Greens or the LNP. They are certainly not going to give it the ALP. Who knows what the ALP position will be in a years time.
The gay marriage issue will hang around until we grow up and accept that gay marriage is not an unreasonable right. Senator Ahbib was quoted by the ABC as saying:
People with strong feelings about climate action and refugees are not going to give their primary vote to the ALP either.
GregM, I don’t know why you insist on trotting out these implications of censorship and wanting to deny people the vote just because I say I disapprove of their opinions. I’m well aware that “impolite society” also votes. Am I not allowed to point out where i disagree with people?
I didn’t suggest that Sabbra Caddabra opposes gay marriage; revisit my 46 if you’re confused as to what I meant.
Oh, and SC, spare me the bleating about PC. But full credit for bouncing from a series of stereotypes about immigrants and some stupid right-wing talking points about the ALP manipulating ethnic voters, to a series of stereotypes and right-wing talking points about “PC lefties.”
SG, here is what I said again: “A large proportion of the ALP’s vote comes from various ethnic minorities, none of whom have benign views towards homosexuality. While gay marriage is a necessary reform, I think it will lose the ALP some votes in the short term.”
Now let’s examine the evidence.
Here is a NSW Parliament report that states the following:
“At the federal election of 1993, the Labor Party held the top 18 electorates containing 27.5 per cent or more constituents born in non-English speaking countries” (p.16) http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/publications.nsf/0/f81970f6ba645febca257129007a8a16/$FILE/PoliticalRepFINAL&INDEX.pdf
The report is a litle old but the finding still hold.
I also note numerous surveys have shown most folk from a variety of non-European minority ethnicities, from Vietnamese to Lebanese, mostly vote ALP. Most people with a functioning brain-stem and a modest interest in public affairs are well aware of such surveys.
Now here is the Pew Global Attitudes survey for 2007 : http://pewglobal.org/files/pdf/258.pdf
Again, with the assistance of a functioning brain-stem, it should be rather clear that ethnicity/nationality and attitudes towards homosexuality bear a strong relationship. Here is how the kind folk at Pew sum up their findings:
“Throughout Western Europe and much of the Americas,
there is widespread tolerance towards homosexuality. However, the United States, Japan, South Korea, and Israel stand apart from other wealthy nations on this issue; in each of these countries, fewer than half of those surveyed say homosexuality should be accepted by society. Meanwhile,
in most of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, there is less tolerance toward homosexuality” (p. 4)
Note how many non-white countries that contribute substantial numbers to our immigration intake now or recently, have exceptionally low tolerance rates, for example China at 17%, India at 10% and Lebanon at 18%.
If you need more evidence please, let me know.
Well, Sc makes at least one valid point, to start with. That’s if we consider the anglo-celtic population as an “ethnic minority”, so to speak. But within this largest and most secure of the subgroups, there is angst and there are fracure lines also: Hansonists, neolibs, progressives, atheists, religious; you name it.
It’s informative the way this is being talked out, “no tears” stuff.
Because your comment @38 implied censorship of sc’s opinion:
You are certainly entitled to point out where you disagree with people. You must expect that you might be ctriticised if you suggest censorship of their observations, however ill-founded you think they are.
that’s right gregm, I really think SC and his ideas should be locked in the same vault as smallpox.
If the impressions I formed of Julia Gillard during our youthful sparring in the early 1980s are at all accurate, I think her stated position on same-sex marriage is most unlikely to be based on personal homophobia and very likely to be based on electoral calculation.
That said, I think the electoral calculations may be flawed insofar as they assume that voters unsettled by a possible amendment to the Marriage Act in 2011 to allow same-sex marriage will still be wielding pitchforks and axe handles over that issue, above and beyond all others, by the time the 2013 election comes around.
You’d think so, Paul Norton.
But then who would have predicted the political outcomes of the last six months, six or nine months ago.
On other issues, I don’t think SG wants SC “locked up”, but is wary of another assumed identity with an obscured agenda.
SC, in introducing a personal story has either, quite dramatically, exposed a personal psychic wound for our contemplation, perhaps seeking understanding.
Or acted in a disturbing way, if the claim is not true.
I notice a parallel between this thread and the “what is politics” thread.
Sg’s criticism is explicable in that we find SC attributing right wing pathologies to ” the left”.
I find that a little distasteful, from an individual who claims to understand the meaning and consequences of smear and innuendo, themselves.
If the impressions I formed of Julia Gillard during our youthful sparring in the early 1980s are at all accurate
People can change between the ages of 20 and 50.
Well at least I can offer an explanation about brain stem function.
SC mentions this in relation to being able to absorb and process information, maybe even form an opinion.
.
The brain stem is essential to life and handles all the automatic processes that support us – heart beating, breathing automaticity, homeostasis( keeping everything ticking along as usual) and all our digestive processes.
To read and think about information however we need a funtional cerebral cortex- all the ridgey,wiggly bits outside and surrounding the brain stem.
You can live without a cerebral cortex- it isn’t much of a life and certainly doesn’t involve any thinking or emotion formation.
Sam #80:
True enough, but in terms of attitudes towards queers and their rights the general trend has been for people to change in the direction of greater liberalism and greater respect since the early 1980s, and I’m not aware of any good reason to believe that, at a personal level, Julia Gillard is an exception to this trend.
What I am far more interested in is how the numbers will go if the ALP shifts to a conscience vote. Assuming that we are aiming for a post June 11 senate – what do we know about the definate yes and nos?
Yes – all the Greens, all the ALP Left (definately Cameron, Faulkner, Plibersek, Wong,Saffin, Albanese, Macklin, Combet) except Gillard. Mark Arbib, Kate Ellis,Bill Shorten, Warren Entsch,, Malcolm Turnbull(?)Judy Moylan(?)Christopher Pyne(?)
No: Julia Gillard, Ursula Stephens (mates with Heffernan re protecting marriage from teh gays), Robert McClelland, Steven Conroy, Joe Ludwig,Tony Burke, Peter Garrett(?)Kevin Rudd,Kevin Andrews, Warren Truss, Sophie Mirabella,Andrew Robb,Tony Abbott, Bronwyn Bishop, Joe Hockey,Connie Fierevanti-Wells, Corie Bernardi, Alex Hawke, Bill Heffernan, Alby Schultz,George Brandis, Ron Boswell, Fiona Nash, barny Joyce
I doubt a conscience vote will do the job.
Of course the government does not even have to legislate to allow gay marriage – all they have to do is tell the ACT government that they will no longer override Territory legislation on the issue, as first Howard and then Rudd have both done in the last five years.
My understanding is that Rudd made specific undertakings on this issue to the ACL, and Gillard still feels bound by these.
On the stoush over SC’s comments at 35, SG is being silly. SG, you made a fool of yourself (as we all do at times) – you read things into the comment that were just not there and overreacted. Have the sense to apologise.
I think the ayes would have it, actually.
Garret would be an aye, as would Gillard if it looked like the “ayes” were going to get up.
Can’t have the PM on the losing side of a debate …
Gay marriage may be a symbolic issue, but as a practical matter it is largely meaningless. The reason being that de facto relationships are recognised by the government here and are on a more or less equal footing to marriage – something that is often not the case overseas. And thanks to federal and state Labor governments there are very few areas of discrimination remaining for gay couples – gay people, full stop.
We’re probably only talking about a smallish minority of gay couples who are interested in marriage. That’s no reason to dismiss the symbolism, but we should keep things in perspective.
The Greens are cynically using this to get up on their high horse and pretend that the ALP are a bunch of big bad Neanderthals, but that goes completely against the historical record. From de-criminalisation to allowing gays to serve in the military (Keating) to adoption law (recently passed by the horrible NSW Government) Labor has a damn good record in this area.
…I forgot age of consent laws (also passed by the horrible NSW government).
That may be so, Ginja, but if memory serves, only a minority of straight couples enter into marriage these days.
Karl Bitar was on the Press Club Schmooze today and, asked about his personal stance on Gay marriage, opted for “Undecided”. His speech was pretty interesting.
No, I don’t agree with Ginja entirely.
It’s true that Labor used to be the party of reform, free will and objectivity.
But the end of the Labor left, induced by structural changes in Australian poleconomics and society over the last generation, means that labor has fallen captive to its strengthening right wing, who are socially conservative and more amenable to neo liberal globalisation.
Ginja, as we’ve said so many times to you already, the movement from labor to the Greens hasn’t happened in a vaccuum. It’s happened precisely because of the prevarications and dissembling indicated in some of the comments above, as to the gay issue, scrub up as something now rather and unfortunately, now too familiar over recent times with Labor..
It follows the pattern, as demonstrated with Enviro, IR, indigenous affairs and neoliberal econonomic policy, as pursued by people like Bligh and Costa; a pattern that shows that,
“Labor; she just ain’t labor, no more”
Indeed, paul @ 90. Labor is no longer the party of Whitlam and Dunstan.
That’s just not true 90 and 91 – not when it comes to gay rights.
The NSW Government in recent has eliminated discrimination against gays, as I said, on the age of consent and adoption – is that not reform? The Rudd Government methodically eliminated discrimination from just about every piece of legislation it could find.
Greens can’t airbrush history – even recent history. The facts are the facts.
..in recent years, meant to say.
DI, I don’t suppose you caught 4 Corners this week?
Another depressing foray into the grey and fearful world of indigenous affairs, culminating in an utterly inept effort by the “new” Labor chief minister of the NT, Paul Henderson, to explain away the latest neglect, failures, suffering and deaths.
PN:
“That said, I think the electoral calculations may be flawed insofar as they assume that voters unsettled by a possible amendment to the Marriage Act in 2011 to allow same-sex marriage will still be wielding pitchforks and axe handles over that issue, above and beyond all others, by the time the 2013 election comes around.”
True, it shouldn’t be a game changer but I can see the conservative media pushing the issue onto the front pages and creating enough mayhem to convince a fraction of the ALP’s more conservative supporters to switch sides over the issue. The ALP’s position is so precarious that it only needs to lose one more voter in hundred at the next election to lose office.
I’m not agreeing with the above line of thinking, but I can see how a hard headed pragmatist, even if sympathetic to the cause, could find it alluring.
No, I deliberately avoided it, Paul. From the promos I figured it would be heart-breaking.
Amazing how far this canard from the christian right has spread.
Last year in a survey by the University of Queensland 2232 same-sex attracted individuals were asked what their personal preference for relationship recognition was (page 42):
Until recently marriage has not been part of the narrative of same-sex-attracted people’s lives, so the low majority preferring it is unsurprising.
Among younger respondents the percentage preferring marriage was 66.7% in the 18-19 year age group and 62.8% in the 20-29 age group (page 44).
It was. The ineptitude on just about every level was staggering.
“I’m not agreeing with the above line of thinking, but I can see how a hard headed pragmatist, even if sympathetic to the cause, could find it alluring.”
You’ve let the terrorists win SC!
only a minority of straight couples enter into marriage these days.
I call bullshit
Putting aside my repugnance at the institution of marriage, I’m thinking that if euthanasia was legal, it would be weird if it was only legal for straight people.
#101, I would have thought that euthanasia is between a person and her/himself. But I’m sure the meddlers and controllers can find something else to whinge about.
sam @100 you are right – but they marry, divorce, marry then not marry.
According to the 2006-07 Family Characteristics and Transitions Survey, 84% of adults had had at least one marriage or de facto relationship. For those aged under 35 years, women were more likely to have had a partner than men (66% and 55% respectively). For people aged 35 years or over 95% had had at least one marriage or de facto relationship. This included 18% who had two relationships and 7% who had three or more. Although men aged 35 years or over were slightly less likely than women to have ever been in a relationship (94% of men compared with 96% of women) they were more likely to have had three or more relationships (8.4% compared with 4.8% for women).
This is about privilege – “private law”, pure and simple. (Some, an ever-shrinking minority of) heteros want to keep a “private law” for themselves, and not share it with their gay brothers and sisters.
As the specious and spurious justifications for maintenance of legal privileges in a modern democracy become increasingly hard to sustain, much less extended, eventually the privilege will be wiped from the statute books.
Can’t come soon enough.
Sabbra Cadabra @ 95
Given the numbers of gay folks around, it might be just as pragmatic to allow gay marriage.
Even though it has a joke name, it can be argued that the Australian Sex Party did very well in the last election. It got far more votes than the run-of-the-mill minor party, and IIRC at least one senator got over the line because of that party’s preferences.
The other thing in pragmatic (or cynical if you like) terms is that these sorts of issues (prostitution, the Republic, gay, euthanasia) are very good for bringing up when other issues look like they are getting out of hand. For example, would the BER, resources super profit tax and insulation issues have gotten any legs at all if the Parliament had been debating gay marriage, the Republic and euthanasia bills? Dunstan did this sort of thing all the time – successfully.
Very interesting, fxh 103, but the stats I link to are very clear. Among couples, there are five times as many marriages as de facto relationships. Only in the 18-24 age group are there more couples in a de facto relationship than are married.
SC #95:
Alternatively one can see, as we have seen over the past year, the conservative media pushing the issue onto the front page and making enough noise that the ALP’s more conservative politicians and backroom fixers start panicking and doing and saying silly things that damage the Labor brand amongst a larger cohort of voters who don’t necessarily have a problem with the policy itself.
Paul Norton, I think you have nailed it.
Although I do quibble with it being the more conservative ALP types doing the panicking, from what I’ve seen it’s the more negative members who can only see the voters they’re losing, not the ones they gain. With the obvious consequence that the voters who have “nowehere to go” have gone to the Greens.
As others have pointed out, there probably aren’t enough votes in the present parliament to pass a same-sex marriage law so it’s all a bit academic anyway.
It’s understandable that many progressives are impatient to move on this, but Labor’s record in this area is pretty good. From decriminalisation to response to the AIDS epidemic to removing almost all forms of discrimination at the state and federal level, the ALP deserves much more credit that it has gotten from this thread.
To describe the ALP as “homophobic” belies the record.
If the Greens eventually do become our overlords will social democrats like me be herded into biodynamic concentration camps where we’ll be forced, like Winston Smith, to airbrush history and drop all Labor’s achievemnts down the memory hole?
…than not that…
No, you’ll be put in the stocks in the relevant town square or suburban shopping mall and have organically grown tomatoes thrown at you.
I would love to know, why exactly does everyone keep bringing the bible into this debate, the bible is so full of contradictions it is just a fictional story, yes i do believe in a higher power or being or god whatever word you want to call it, but i do not believe in a book that NO-ONE TRULY knows who wrote it, you were not there so u can believe what u want, but read the bible carefully and u see there are contridictions left right and centre of the fictional story, everyone deserves to love anyone they want, and love is the whole reason for marriage, so all these heterosexual couples that are living together and have kids but r not married they should lose there rights as well then as they are according to that book committing a sin, Julia Gillard WILL NOT get another term as prime minister if she doesnt do something, because GLBT community is no longer a minority group, the christian groups are becoming the minority and we will continue fighting for our rights because as it stands now GAY is the NEW BLACK, as in black people had no rights and had to fight for them, now there is a black president and who would have thought ever that we would have a female prime minister is is prodominately the GLBT community that has truly made this happen among all the other voters.
Thanks