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This morning, David Milner — Game Informer Australia’s editor — announced via Twitter that the magazine’s next issue would carry a rainbow logo as a show of solidarity towards LGBTQI gamers.
Game Informer Australia Goes Rainbow
The deadline for the same-sex postal survey is November 7. Results will be announced on November 15.
Anyone yet to vote should check out Lifehacker’s handy dandy how-to-vote guide.
[Twitter]
Good on them. It might seem like a token gesture, but it does make a difference both to the people whose rights are being unnecessarily subjected to public trial and to people that are on the fence or knee-jerk on the no side.
Seeing a diverse mix of organisations from magazines to sports competitions and everything in between publicly showing their support does make some people second-guess their no vote. Someone I know changed their opinion from no to yes after the AFL logo story, because before then he thought it was “leftie bullcrap”, but after that he bothered to do some research and realised it’s just common decency.
Every bit helps.
Let’s hope that it finally gets decided.
Like I said before, I don’t see this is a extremely significant issue but at the same time I want it finally decided as it has become yet another gravy train that all sides are riding and fear arriving at the final stop.
Ignoring Shorten’s stupid remark that a ‘No’ vote will lead to suicide (he can only say that because he’s protected by parliamentary privilege), it’s funny how Labor is giving the topic so much attention now but when they were in office they wouldn’t even give the issue the time of day.
Gillard and even Rudd back in the early days wouldn’t go near it. But when Rudd came back it became his first tool to try and swing the 2013 election to his favour.
I know I’m in the minority, but I personally want this issue settled (yes or no, it doesn’t matter to me) as I’m tired of marriage equality being used as a smoke screen to hide other issues like our current infrastructure projects going awry and our budget being a mess.
Any significance the issue had has long been tripped out by our politicians to hide their arses and some in the public have even done as to use it as a means to redefine what is hate speech.
Wouldn’t surprise me if this post gets lampooned but I’m not going to be silenced by fear from both the Yes and No sides because I don’t align with either of them. If either side has a problem with people like me seeing a difference in significance, they have bigger problems that need attention.
Well said.
There’s a bit too much money and special interest rolling around behind this and other issues at the moment.
I’m not just being passively resistant either, pretending something isn’t important to ignore and stifle it.
I think it’s very important that people reflect on exactly what has transpired, really reflect on what this is.
Yes or No, who the hell do you think you are?!
Come on people, seriously….
I just want to clarify something. A no vote won’t necessarily increase suicide but a yes vote will definitely decrease the suicide and attempted suicide rate of LGBTIQ youth and has been seen in other places after marriage equality passed. Just want to add that as your comment about it makes it sound like there isn’t an issue there (youth suicide) and that lives won’t be saved which is not correct ie its a massive issue and we have seen a reduction in suicide rates after ssm laws in other countries pass so you could argue that lives will be saved quite strongly.
Just want to add that as your comment about it makes it sound like there isn’t an issue there
If that is the case it was not my intention. What I wanted to highlight was Shorten using a textbook demonisation tactic to make it look as though any death due to a “no” vote could be blamed on Turnbull.
The main point I’m making is despite people being very vocal about marriage equality, very little is being actually discussed about marriage equality. It is mostly about how one side is better than the other and anyone who disagrees needs to be shouted down.
Even if the vote is “no” (and people have the right to do so despite those claiming to be of the Yes camp), I feel that some changes are needed.
I personally do not agree that some rights are exclusive to couples who are married. Those rights should at the very least be accessible to civil unions. There are many heterosexual couple who are also denied the same rights as the LBGT community because they choose to not marry. And I don’t blame them; marriage is no longer an occasion, it is now a business.
Either way, I’ve gone off topic long enough. The real issue is despite the public attention very few are actually discussing the details of marriage equality and I cannot help but feel it has become a game to all fronts from the political to the social.
For anyone who reads through this, this is appears to be Shorten’s stupid remark: Let me be as blunt as possible. A “no” campaign would be an emotional torment for gay teenagers, and, if one child commits suicide over the plebiscite, then that is one too many.
It is. For one I didn’t want to dignify that remark with a full citation but mostly because I wanted to keep the conversation on the topic.
That comment of his should never have been though up let alone uttered. Yet he did and it is a bigger insult to the discussion and the people subject to said discussion than even Cory Bernardi’s remark.
Numerous support and counselling organisations have reported increased contact from LGBTI people since the start of the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey. A government-sanctioned nationwide discussion on the validity of LGBTI individuals and their relationships has fostered the growth and creation of groups vehemently opposed to the former.
As a result of both the action and consequence, we are currently seeing the emotional and psychological torment of LGBTI people of all ages.
Pro-marriage equality groups and advocates have been warning for a long time about the negative repercussions we would witness in the event of a plebiscite or survey; their concerns were discarded and appropriate protections were not implemented.
LGBTI youth are already at a greater risk of depression and suicide, why should we think that creating an environment that would increase the incidence of those outcomes would be an acceptable thing to do? The obvious answer is that we shouldn’t.
Shorten was correct to reflect the concerns of the LGBTI community in denouncing the plebiscite, the survey, a No campaign, and placing the blame and guilt of any and all negative results of this process on the political parties and individuals that created an arduous political football out of what should have been a simple legislative measure.
He was also entirely right that any youth suicide as a result of this process is one too many.
All of this is very much on topic.
Discussions around mental health and suicide can be difficult. If you or someone you know needs help, please contact:
Lifeline (www.lifeline.org.au) 13 11 14
Kids Helpline (www.kidshelp.com.au) 1800 551 800
Suicide Call Back Service (www.suicidecallbackservice.org.au) 1300 659 467
MensLine Australia (www.mensline.org.au) 1300 789 978
The thing I ask the people that vote no is simply this, how does same sex marriage affect you? Too many times have the person I asked come up with an answer or a legitimate excuse, it is super infuriating to see that it even needs to go through this garbage when realistically it should have just been passed 2 years ago. What ticks me off is people complaining about same sex marriage affecting the kids of said family and yet drug addicts and known abusive families aren’t an issue for these muppets. How about spending some government resources in the right areas like education and health, stupid fucking politicians. Sorry for the rant guys and gurls.
And worse, the people who say “why didn’t Labor do anything?” as if that’s a reason to not do something now – and ignoring that they did put a bill up, and the numbers weren’t there with a minority government especially as more MPs were against it then than now.
Community views shift, and on this issue they’ve shifted a lot as people have realised that a reversal of Howard’s 2004 spoiling move won’t actually affect most people in this country, but will give a freedom to a minority that is still discriminated against.
As hopefully we’ll see on 15th November.
In the meantime, I’m checking in on friends who’ve got another 4 weeks of this bollocks public discussion of their lives to cope with…
Not only that, the global and social landscapes regarding same-sex marriage were very different pre- and post-2013.
In Australia there had been majority support for same-sex marriage since ~2010 according to opinion polls, but it wasn’t until the Marriage Equality (Same Sex) Act 2013 was challenged in Commonwealth vs. ACT (2013)
that the onus and mechanism for changes to the definition of marriage were clearly presented to federal parliament. Really, at that point, with public sentiment the way it was – and still is – legislation should have been put straight through.
By the time the 2013 federal election was held there were a number of large or closely-allied countries that had only just brought same-sex marriage legislation through, were preparing determinative mechanisms, or hadn’t yet considered the question. For example, NZ, France, and England legislated same-sex marriage in 2013; Scotland and Ireland legislated in 2014 and ’15, respectively; same-sex marriage wasn’t legislated in the USA on a federal level until a 2015 ruling on state bans.
I really do wish the kinds of people who say things along the lines of “…well why didn’t Labor do something?”, mainly with regard to the 43rd parliament, would check the history of the subject before speaking.
Most importantly, it would be just the best if people had the decency and respect for the people whose lives are being directly and negatively impacted by these events.
Exactly this. Thanks for the superb write up.
I would only add one more thing – that we’re in this pickle now only because of John Howard’s 2004 amendment to the Marriage Act designed specifically and cruelly to prevent the recognition in Australia of a marriage (well, two marriages) overseas – he mooted a High Court case literally the day before it was to be heard. 🙁
You obviously have not been rather selective about the responses there..
… most “No” folks I know have a myriad of concerns outside of just “think of the children” but then again any reasons they have are usually labelled as “straw manning” at best and “homophobic” at worst. I’m not going to get into that here because that’s just a huge can of worms but suffice to say that’s the biggest reason why we are at this point. No one sits down to listen to each other side’s reasons because of the evident “my morals and ethics are correct therefore you are wrong” line of thinking such charged topics bring on.
And I do agree this really should have been legislated and done *years* ago.. but again we have to go through with more tax funding wasting shenanigans on a plebiscite.
Would you expect 1960’s activists to listen to reasons why black people deserved fewer rights than whites? This point in history will be viewed the same as the 1960s protests are today ie our grandkids will be appalled that we even thought equal rights could have two reasonable sides when it comes to ssm. The yes people already feel that way.
You are making a hugely radical assumption that just because someone has voted “No” means they are 100% completely and utterly against SSM and are not listening to the “Yes” reasons at all…
Which completely misses my point. There is more nuance to this debate than just the SSM marriage. Yes SSM *is* the biggest and main point to this plebiscite but again just because someone says “No” on this utterly vague plebiscite does not automatically mean they are against SSM. To completely reduce it to “us” vs “them” completely devalues everyone as a person and does not push anyone’s interests forwards and just creates very exploitable political divides. Everyone has an opinion and a different nuance to how they see the topic.
Jumping to “history will be appalled” is not very helpful in getting people to change their minds as you are effectively shutting down view points/concerns they may have had that prevents them from voting “Yes”.
You want someone to vote “Yes”? Then convince them instead of shaming them for a start. Listen to their concerns and then give a valid argument that addresses the concern. All you are doing is entrenching people further away from your position and that doesn’t help anyone in the long run as you’ve just lost a prospective ally into a hard trenched opponent.
I don’t care if people vote no, enough are voting yes that it really doesn’t matter. They need to care because it is something they will keep forever and something their grand-kids will ask about. That old racist dude you see in a home, for our generation will be an old homophobic dude and he will have family who are ashamed of his comments no matter how much light they try and make of it.
It is not a leap to say what I am saying. The debate is one question. To make it about schools, churches, etc is just distracting from the only question being asked. That one question is a yes or no to supporting ssm so a no vote is saying that your human rights mean nothing to me. It is that simple.
So you choose to dismiss people who could have otherwise been persuaded to say “yes” because “you are right and they are wrong” and you are siding on the right side of history?
Thats the thing they DO care hence they are excercising their choice because of reasons they see as holding back from completely voting for the positive.
And you know what sure you are correct theres definitely going to be a huge majority of yes votes here (whether the government does anything is another topic though..) but would you rather have just a majority lead or an actual near unanimous decision?
Again its very easy to do your us vs them mentality but generalisation never helps anyone. Every person is different and has their own opinions and choices. To dismiss everyone who is against you as wrong or at worst don’t matter just breeds more problems down the line. Instead of an open person willing to eventually join you you have shut the door on their face and succeeded in adding another opponent… and guess what close enough doors and people will eventually stop listening and “obvious” votes like Yes becomes harder and harder to acheive.
I never said that, I said I don’t care. I also said it is their issue so again, I don’t care.
The question is whether same-sex couples should have the right to marry. It is not about education, religious freedom or any other topic so anyone discussing those things is distracting people from the very simple question being asked. It’s a yes no question. People want to say no, they are in the minority, they will have to live with it. I don’t care. It’s my mum they are calling names on the streets, comparing to pedos, etc and it was me who was used as a weapon by a conservative teacher when I was ten to hurt my parents for being gay so I feel zero compassion for homophobes and won’t apologise for it. We will win, they can live with their unethical decision in 2017 for the rest of their lives. Not my problem.
Also, I’m a scientist and statistics are my thing so given the decades of of blind studies we already have, we already know the outcome. I have confidence in maths.
Yeah sorry I was pretty selective with responses, as if I listed all the responses I got would be a stupidly long list. I am not the kind of person that goes out of my way to advocate same sex marriage only if someone brings it up I probe. But you are 100% correct in saying that while ever anyone has an opinion they will always feel as though theirs is the correct one. Just a shame that governments cannot sit down in a civilized manner to discuss things.
Their reasons are labelled as such because that’s what they are. Their arguments have nothing at all to do with two consenting people getting married. That’s why they are called strawman. Let me disprove one of them. Children, the no argument about children is strawman and homophobic because gay couples can already adopt children. Stopping SSM would not prevent them from having children. Hence why we call that a strawman argument.
The argument about fears for children from the ACL and the various churches can be dismissed with two words:
Royal Commission.
It’s not a same-sex couple raising a kid or two that are the risk to children’s welfare.
I’ll be voting no. In response to Djbear, I don’t think I’m hypocritical for voting no. Its a yes/no vote and i’m making my choice. Why should that make me hypocritical? benredbeard, how does a redefinition of marriage affect me? I dont believe the Yes group has outlined the impact of voting yes. I’m happy for same sex unions with equal rights as marriage but by an overwhelming number of people voting yes what will the politicians also do? Safe School program is a disaster. I’ld love for someone to fully outline the impact of voting yes and what changes will be pursued if there is a majority yes vote. But the Yes campaign has been very unhelpful in presenting this information to voters because I believe they dont know. no-one does. How can we vote on something without knowing what impact it will have?
The point is, the no campaign argues for freedom of speech then tries to shut down businesses that make commentary or ban musicians from the grand final. They talk about how bad it is being discriminated against for voting no in a debate about stopping discrimination. They talk about protecting children while emotionally damaging the children of gay couples and the well known at-risk group of young gay kids by running this campaign without protection. They are hypocritical completely.
They talk about protecting children while emotionally damaging the children of gay couples and the well known at-risk group of young gay kids by running this campaign without protection.
3 words
CHURCH ROYAL COMMISSION.
The no voters love to claim “Oh but the children”
I guess my point was if a same sex couple was to get married under new legislation, would that have an affect on your life or general well being? I coudln’t imagine how impactful that could be, it is either same sex couples can get married or not.
I am saddened to hear that you will be responding No to the question of whether we as a nation support a change in the definition of marriage within the Marriage Act 1961.
The best example we currently have of what the legislation might look like if there is a majority yes vote comes in the form of a private member’s bill put forward by Senator Dean Smith, an Liberal member within the Coalition government, and supported by fellow Liberal members, Labor members, Senate crossbenchers, and myriad community groups.
Smiths’ bill proposes that the definition of marriage, under section 5 of the act which covers interpretations of terms, would be changed from the current definition as per Howard’s 2004 amendment “marriage ” means the union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others, voluntarily entered into for life.
to a union of two people, to the exclusion of all others, voluntarily entered into for life.
The substance of this change is that nationwide all LGBTI people and relationships will be afforded the same dignity and rights under the act as heterosexual people and relationships. Additionally, overseas marriages will be legally recognised in Australia.
The bill proposes to preserve religious protections that allow ministers to refuse to carry out a marriage that does not align with their religious beliefs. A new category of existing registered celebrants would also be created to allow them to identify as religious marriage celebrants, thus conferring the same refusal rights and religious ministers.
That is in essence the impact of changes to the Marriage Act 1961 if a Yes response if followed. There is nothing else.
Did you respond to the wrong thing?
It is telling that of the 20+ countries that have legislated same-sex marriage the best examples presented by the No campaign are a non-existent link to the mostly defunct Safe Schools Program and a Canadian father put forth by the Coalition for Marriage. The latter is especially of note because the lawsuit he pursued against his kids’ school had nothing to do with Canada’s same-sex marriage legislation.
-derp-
You downvoted me without comment. I’m not sure I said anything particularly offensive here.
I downvoted your comment because it was homophobic. And i did reply. Buy some reading glasses bud.
My comment was about why the no voters are viewed as hypocritical citing numerous cases of their own hypocritic attacks of homosexuals. I was raised by lesbians, my wife was raised by lesbians, my kid’s grandparents are lesbians, my best friend is gay and I will be best man at his wedding which I voted yes to secure human rights for him. So I ask again, why did you downvote me because I never made a single homophobic statement and the fact you have linked me to the people who have abused me and my family, is a huge insult, dude. You might want to reread my comment and I wouldn’t mind an apology for the insult.
@juststu82
Apologies, Misread your comment. :). I was confusing you and mr84.
It won’t have an effect on you what so ever. Safe schools has nothing to do with the legislation and is just a strawman argument akin to that woman claiming her son would be forced to wear a dress.
SSM was legalized in the USA, want to know what happened afterwards? Life went on. Sure some religious nuts had a sook but life still goes on now to this day. The only thing that happened was gay couples got married. That’s all. So your argument against SSM is false.
BTW, The safe schools program is not a “Disaster”. It has operated for quite a long time. It was running under Tony Abbott for quite some time without a single issue raised. The program was functioning as intended and was successfull. The people claiming it was a disaster were far right sooks and religous nuts. Have you actually looked at the program or spoken to anyone who has participated in it? Perhaps you should instead of getting your info from people like Andrew Bolt or mummy bloggers who actually work for conservative think tanks.
For those who want to understand what safe schools actually is, the rather excellent Cate explains all:
One a social level, this is fantastic. Whatever the conclusion of the postal survey and the government’s actions I hope that support for LGBTI people in Australia is a permanent fixture.
No, it’s really not…..
This country allowed the rights and recognition of other human beings to be debated, singled out and displayed as a popularity contest with no political weight behind it.
When it was time to make a decision, Australia went with a glorified Facebook survey and now people want to pat themselves on the back?!
We’re on the same page: that we ever got to the point where the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey was seen an acceptable move is abominable.
However, while we’re in this abhorrent shithole of a situation, I will hold up and point to every example of support for the LGBTQIA+ community and say “This is fucking great, can we have more of this please?”
We’re all furious over the handling of same-sex marriage legislation.
Forget making it one issue, they should keep it the whole time. Show their support for the rest of the magazine’s run. Why not?
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