Tasmania votes for gay marriage
Misleading headlines 'r' us.
On 21st September 2011, the lower house of Tasmania's Parliament (House of Assembly) voted to "support gay marriage". Great. I support gay marriage too. What they didn't do was introduce a bill to both houses of Parliament to legalise gay marriage. Why not? Tasmania's upper house (Legislative Assembly) has two Labor Party representatives, one Liberal Party representative, and fifteen independents.
The Labor Party knew that they couldn't guarantee passage of a bill through the upper house, so they took the option of only presenting the motion to the lower house. Essentially then it means nothing. No law has been changed and opponents of gay marriage have ammunition to say that the Tasmanian Government were too scared to introduce a real bill which may have made a real difference and legalise gay marriage.
In closing, I fully support what the Tasmanian government has done. I just wish they had had the courage to make it an actual legislative change rather than just a "vote of support".
The fact that loving couples may or may not be married purely because of their respective genders is an outrage as far as I'm concerned. I married my wife because I loved her, not because I am a man and she is a woman. Why shouldn't a man (or woman) be allowed to marry the love of his (or her) life, just because of the partner's gender?
It makes no sense. But until States and (I wish) the Federal Parliament start passing bills/acts to legalise gay marriage we are stuck with ridiculously discriminatory marriage laws.
On 21st September 2011, the lower house of Tasmania's Parliament (House of Assembly) voted to "support gay marriage". Great. I support gay marriage too. What they didn't do was introduce a bill to both houses of Parliament to legalise gay marriage. Why not? Tasmania's upper house (Legislative Assembly) has two Labor Party representatives, one Liberal Party representative, and fifteen independents.
The Labor Party knew that they couldn't guarantee passage of a bill through the upper house, so they took the option of only presenting the motion to the lower house. Essentially then it means nothing. No law has been changed and opponents of gay marriage have ammunition to say that the Tasmanian Government were too scared to introduce a real bill which may have made a real difference and legalise gay marriage.
In closing, I fully support what the Tasmanian government has done. I just wish they had had the courage to make it an actual legislative change rather than just a "vote of support".
The fact that loving couples may or may not be married purely because of their respective genders is an outrage as far as I'm concerned. I married my wife because I loved her, not because I am a man and she is a woman. Why shouldn't a man (or woman) be allowed to marry the love of his (or her) life, just because of the partner's gender?
It makes no sense. But until States and (I wish) the Federal Parliament start passing bills/acts to legalise gay marriage we are stuck with ridiculously discriminatory marriage laws.
posted by Alan at 4:49 AM
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