G'day punters and greetings from down under....
I figured I should post something about this recent event, and my take on things.......
Whether you care or not, there was a recent "Survey" here in Her Majesty Lizzy 2.0's (Bless her reptilian heart) former penal colony, Australia, as to whether or not we wanted the laws changed to allow Same Sex marriage.
Naturally, with the social justice movement, and the fact that, on the whole, Australians are an egalitarian bunch, there was backwards and forwards and arguments about rights and liberties and the fact that here, in Australia, we do not have explicit constitutional protection over speech or religion (I prefer the term faith, as I have little faith in established religion) has been brought up as an excuse for selecting No, as the way the question was phrased was ambiguous.....
However, lets take this all in context. To be clear, this was a survey, not a vote !
All votes and referendums are run by the Australian Electoral Commission and are both anonymous and compulsory. You just have to turn up. You don't have to do a legitimate vote, you can cast a blank, or ineligible vote, commonly called a "donkey vote".
If you don't turn up and don't have a reasonable excuse, work, sickness etc, you can be fined.
This Same Sex Marriage thing, was a survey run by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. It was not compulsory, and importantly the Individual survey forms could be tied to existing bureau data linking your 'opinion" to your geographics and demographics
Not entirely anonymous
This has provided the federal political and administrative class with their very own "Australian Map of Hate and Homophobia"
Something that was never discussed.
Everyone knew that most Aussies don't care what you're into, just do it in private, unless it's Mardi Gras week, in which case keep it to the general area around Darlinghurst in Sydney.
However, with the incumbent major parties, the Labour (leftish) and Liberals (rightish) losing out to the Greens and more concerning to them, One Nation and Pauline Hanson, our very own orange demagogue, and sacrificial anode of Australian politics, the NO voters are now in the focus of these parties to make up the shortfall
Remember, our last election was a hung parliament, which is what you get when you've pissed off the population, (but not pissed off enough for a hanged parliament, which would be far more revolutionary !)
One Nation is attracting the vote from people who get dirt under their fingernails for a living, who are somewhat conservative in their opinions, and feel abandoned by both major parties. The more well to do in the middle are backing the Greens. (Having spoken to the candidates for the greens, and their minions, they seem more down to earth, and you can talk to them, where as many of the candidates and minions for the establishment political duopoly don't always ring true...with few exceptions....just my opinion)
Now the NO vote mostly came from predominantly ethnic Christian and Muslim communities, as well as pockets of conservative Aussie Christians
These are the people that the majors will be scrambling to get on board and not lose out to the likes of Fred Nile's "we hate gays (for votes - Jesus told us to love everyone, but this is politics)" Christian Democrats at the state level, and of course One Nation at the state and federal level.
You may also see a tightening of the immigration and refugee handling policies.....but not well publicised.....for obvious reasons
My opinion: Biggest waste of money, except for those whom will now use the information for targeted marketing. For them it's well spent... especially as the money wasn't out of their own pockets !!!!
Thanks Obama !
One final point....my take on it all: Leave marriage as a societal thing, not for government. Marriage isn't about bonking, anyone who is, or has been married knows that ! In as far as the government is concerned, its really only an arrangement between two consenting adults, that afford them a simple administrative arrangement as far as shared property, power of attorney and succession, and really only should be there to provide clarity in the case of either a split up due to things not working, or death, sickness, incarceration, etc....not something that needs excessive regulation.
Marriage is something that should be left to the churches and other tax free social clubs to milk for what its worth...here it's about 2 billion annually, for a population of 22 million, that's head shaking.....
Let me know your thoughts below
Thank you for your time and remember, vote with your wallet, and be kind to others
Peace