Same Sex Marriage Debacle.

[Rorschach]

My Comments...
'The time is now': Liberal senator confirms same-sex marriage push
Adam Gartrell

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is seeking to downplay the latest Liberal backbench push to legalise same-sex marriage, saying the move is not a surprise and will not shift the Coalition from its plebiscite policy.
Malcolm is of course being a bit disingenuous here because he said many times now that this policy will only last for this term. The question is what will he run with during the election if the pollies haven't voted on it before hand and will he simply allow a free vote first thing next election without telling anyone. Pyne seems to think the WETS have control and will bring it in even if most Australians are against it.
Liberal Dean Smith is going it alone to legalise same sex marriage, going against the PM and pushing for a free vote in Parliament over a plebiscite.

Liberal senator Dean Smith has publicly confirmed he is drafting a private members' bill he intends to bring before the Liberal party room in the coming months, saying the issue has become an embarrassment for the nation.

"The bill is important because it will allow the Liberal Party to revisit the issue of marriage once and for all before the next election," Senator Smith told The Sunday Times in Perth. "I don't doubt the complexity same-sex-marriage presents for some Liberals, but I am not asking people to change their mind on the issue. Instead, we should allow everyone the right to vote according to their own conscience."
But since he is against the plebiscite he means "everyone in Parliament" and we know how weak the minds are in that group.

As revealed by Fairfax Media last month, Senator Smith is working on the bill in collaboration with lower house NSW MP Trent Zimmerman. They want to bring on a free vote as early as August, when Federal Parliament resumes after the winter break.

"This is not an academic or theoretical issue," Senator Smith said. "This goes to the heart of how some Australians could be free to live their lives according to their own choices."
But then nothing is stopping them now is there everyone has the right to marry someone of the opposite sex.

"This is not about gays and lesbians. Really? Well YES it is and not even the Bis get a say. It is about respecting our humanity and it extends to the friends and families of gay and lesbian Australians. The electorate is the best gauge of authenticity and my sense is that people are embarrassed that Australia has not resolved this issue.
Well being gay perhaps your "sense" is rather weighted and biased.

"Many do support the matter being put before the parliament and finally resolved. The time is now."
As long as all Australians do not have a say in the decision.

But Mr Turnbull disagrees.

"Dean crossed the floor against the plebiscite bill in the Senate so he's got a longstanding view about it. And in our party room, members are entitled to raise what-ever issues they like," he told reporters in Paris on Sunday.

But the government's policy is clear: "We support a plebiscite where all Australians will be given a vote on the matter. It is critical that all Australians be given a say and the only reason they haven't been given that say is because of Bill Shorten."

Mr Shorten said Senator Smith agrees with Labor and "I know deep down the prime minister agrees with Labor".

"It's time for Malcolm Turnbull to listen to Australians and his own MPs and senators and just get this done," he said.
Yes so, the only way for that to happen and to have any credibility, is for there to be a Plebiscite.

Advocacy group The Equality Campaign's executive director Tiernan Brady said Senator Smith's move showed there was growing political will for the reform.
Political will is not the same thing as the will of the people.
"The campaign for marriage equality is not going to go away. It grows stronger and more determined with every passing day," said Mr Brady.

Senator Smith, who is gay, says his bill will include exemptions for religious and other celebrants who did not want to participate in same-sex marriages.
But the issue just isn't that shallow.
He acknowledges that the Coalition's official policy is still to hold a plebiscite, even though it has no chance of getting through a hostile Senate.

Mr Turnbull's stance does not necessarily prevent movement, if enough Coalition MPs are prepared to cross the floor to force a debate. If the bill did come on it would need the support of only a handful of Coalition MPs to pass into law.
Which proves how unrepresentative this mob truly are.

[J o h n S m i t h]

turdball needs to allow a conscience vote and move on ..... how long must this non event remain an issue?

[Rorschach]

turdball needs to allow a conscience vote and move on ..... how long must this non event remain an issue?

Only fools think its a non-event johnboy.

[Rorschach]

Only a plebiscite will give any decision on this radical change to society, its traditions and its mores credibility.

[J o h n S m i t h]

turdball needs to allow a conscience vote and move on ..... how long must this non event remain an issue?

Only fools think its a non-event johnboy.

yes, cause if poofs can get get married you're suddenly gonna have to marry your boyfriend, right?

[Black Orchid]

Everyone deserves to have an opinion on it. Even most gays want to have their say and not necessarily in the affirmative.

I don't trust anyone in Parliament to speak on my behalf on either side of the floor.

[Neferti]

Only a plebiscite will give any decision on this radical change to society, its traditions and its mores credibility.

Not that I care, but I also think that ALL AUSTRALIANS should be able to vote for their opinion on this. I think everyone is sick of it anyway, so it will be passed but ......... leaving it to Pollies to make a decision is NOT on. They are a useless bunch and not one of them deserves the status of MP, including the current PM.

[Rorschach]

To marriage ‘equality’ militants: Take our olive branch and shove it

People seem to forget that the marriage plebiscite was offered as a compromise by social conservatives to deal with an issue which has dogged politics for a decade. There have been 18 failed attempts to push same-sex marriage through parliament since 2004. When does no mean no?

For defenders of traditional marriage, the plebiscite was a significant concession and a risk they didn’t need to take.

But if the other side doesn’t want to come half way, then so be it. Take our olive branch and shove it where the sun don’t shine.

There goes any chance of same-sex marriage being made law with the blessing of the entire nation, of fence-sitters embracing it, and of the losers accepting the verdict with good grace.

Attitudes will harden. Even if marriage “equality” activists win in parliament they won’t win. Everyone will know the outcome was rigged, and that the change merchants didn’t trust the Australian public to legitimise this radical change to our foundational social institution.

We will know that victory was only achieved through lies and intimidation. Defenders of traditional marriage are not bigots or hostile to homosexual relationships. Yet they are being treated as “deplorables”, as Hillary Clinton would say, non-persons, irrelevant, disposable, hateful. Anything can be said or done to them in the name of “equal love”.

“I never thought I would be meeting secretly in this country in my lifetime,” says Lyle Shelton, managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby. “It’s not the Australia I grew up in or the Australia I want for my children.”

Shelton says his receptionist at ACL’s Canberra offices is regularly distressed by abusive phone calls. Uninvited visitors have intimidated staff. ACL now has to lock its doors.

It is true that the marriage debate has unleashed hatred from intolerant authoritarians. But the victims are not loved-up LGBTIQ folk.

They are gentle Christians and other defenders of traditional marriage who have been vilified for daring to hold a contrary view. Those courageous enough to raise a head above the parapet are brutally made examples of.

It’s the social form of warning off perfected by ISIS when they publicly behead people or lower them in cages into swimming pools or stage any number of elaborate tortures as a lesson to others who might dare even think of being disobedient.

Social death awaits those who defy the fashionable position on marriage.

For example, Christians in northwest Sydney who set up a group called “Children’s Future” were named and shamed in a vicious article in the Sydney Morning Herald last week because they letterboxed pamphlets which linked the same-sex marriage campaign to “Safe Schools”. Since Roz Ward, the architect of the radical sex education program, has explicitly made the same link, it’s hardly a giant leap.

But because some members of Children’s Future also are members of the Liberal party, and are Catholic, they were easy prey for factional rivals who sicced willing media onto them with gratuitous mentions of Opus Dei and George Pell.

One shop owner, named just because his brother is involved, was in despair last week, forced into hiding after phone calls and strange visits to his shop. He is terrified his business will suffer as a result of the smear campaign.

Let that be a warning.

Last month, when the ACL and other Christian groups tried to hold a meeting at the Mercure Hotel at Sydney Airport to prepare for the plebiscite, their booking was cancelled after threats of violence to hotel staff.

They regrouped last week but had to meet in secret.

The same illiberal tactics were employed at The Occidental Hotel in May when protesters shut down a talk in defence of traditional marriage by Joe de Bruyn and Cory Bernardi, whose Adelaide office had previously been trashed by gay activists.

When Toowoomba GP David van Gend wrote a book, “Stealing from a Child”, making the case against same-sex marriage, the printing company refused to print it two days before its launch last week.

Then there is the soft coercion, through corporate “diversity” programs. Employees soon get the message that their careers will suffer if they don’t go with the flow. Take Mark Allaby, a senior executive of PricewaterhouseCoopers, who was forced to resign from the board of ACL after a word from PWC’s “diversity” officer.

Let that be a warning.

This Tuesday, Qantas employees will receive diversity training at Mascot when a spokesman from Marriage Equality addresses them. Will Qantas invite Shelton along to balance the discussion? No chance.

In the end, intimidation of opponents, and Labor’s despicable portrayal of the plebiscite as a trigger for gay suicide, has had the desired effect. Public support and the will of politicians to support the public vote is waning.

The militant arm of Marriage Equality and Labor will be rewarded when, as seems likely, the plebiscite is killed off in the Senate this month. Then Malcolm Turnbull has an existential crisis on his hands.

Inevitably he will be faced with another bid for politicians to legislate same-sex marriage, without the plebiscite he promised at the election, and which is central to the Coalition agreement with the Nationals.

If the public will is subverted, the political bloodletting will be immediate and ugly.

Instead of the country uniting around a publicly-sanctioned marriage revolution in February, a politician-led change will never be seen as legitimate. It will be a Pyrrhic victory which sets the stage for ever more nasty culture wars.

[Rorschach]

Everyone deserves to have an opinion on it. Even most gays want to have their say and not necessarily in the affirmative.

I don't trust anyone in Parliament to speak on my behalf on either side of the floor.

Most gays I know don't want to get married and there are stats on it, and it was only a very small minority of the gay minority that are interested in it at all.

The question should be why are we pandering to a few insecure jealous, whatever people who don't even make up 1% of the population on such a monumental change to our society.

[J o h n S m i t h]

Everyone deserves to have an opinion on it. Even most gays want to have their say and not necessarily in the affirmative.

I don't trust anyone in Parliament to speak on my behalf on either side of the floor.

and almost everyone does have an opinion on it, nevertheess, that's no reason to waste millions on a glorified non binding opinion poll that many MP's have said they'll ignore anyway. We already pay politicians to make these decisions, thats enough money wasted on it. Give poli's a conscience vote, and people truly opposed will petition their local MP. If enough oppose it, it won't pass anyway. It'd save us a fortune.