A referendum is not an opinion poll!

[fireheart17]

This just made my head hurt.

Occasionally we'll get comments about same-sex marriage popping up in the media. Usually it'll be one step closer to allowing gay people to get married.

Unfortunately, we get the usual arguments that crop up from time to time that seem to gravitate to the words "same sex" like 40 children gravitate towards dry ice. The common arguments being marriage is sacred, think of the children, marriage is a licence to breed etc. and then we get the self-proclaimed "majority experts."

I call them this because their argument usually goes something like this:

-There's a "silent majority" who are "afraid to speak up" for fear of getting attacked by trolls (oh the irony...)
-"Most" Australians will never agree to it.
-They want a referendum to put the issue to rest.


The last point is the head-hurting part.

Specifically, a referendum refers to a change to the constitution. There is NOTHING in the Australian constitution about marriage AT ALL. The marriage act is a federal law.

And people want to review the curriculum so that they're not being taught "left-wing propaganda"...
At least make sure that you know the difference between the constitution and federal law! TWO VERY DIFFERENT THINGS.

(Part of this may be due to the fact that in recent months, one state passed a law allowing same-sex marriage. It was struck down by the High Court (think SCOTUS) because it clashed with the federal law that prevented same-sex marriage.)

[s_stabeler]

to be fair, having it spelled out in the constitution that yes, gay people can get married would shut the bigots up.

[fireheart17]

And I stand corrected.

There is a note on marriage in the constitution...except that all it states is that Federal Parliament has the OK to make laws regarding marriage. It does not state anything about who can marry who.

This is what the more vocal folks for same-sex marriage know, but won't tell the others that

And in case anyone's wondering, the High Court CAN deal with state-based matters if they need to. I've posted about the Rundle Mall preacher bigots before. They wound up escalating their case (basically the city council made several rules around preaching in the mall, they did not like that, their application to preach was rejected and they wound up dealing with the police repeatedly because they tried to make out that they were following the rules but weren't) to the High Court of all places, arguing that under the constitution, they had a right to basically act like Westboro on a smaller scale.

The section they were quoting related to the fact that the country cannot play favourites with one religion over another (states/councils ARE allowed to reject the building of say, a Buddhist temple, for non-religious related reasons but will work with said group to find a solution). They played the "we're a religion and we're being mistreated" card and failed. The ruling was that the city council rules were valid and that people had a right to shop in peace. The city council placed some MORE rules in effect (most of which were a giant "fuck you" to the group in question ) and the preachers moved interstate.

[Teysa]

Since when does not being married stop people from breeding? That argument makes my head hurt.

[fireheart17]

Since when does not being married stop people from breeding? That argument makes my head hurt.

Because they're under the belief that any illegitimate child is going to somehow grow up "lesser" than their married family counterparts.