As featured in The Spectator, Abortion and the Deep South, 14 September 2018. In one of the many forgotten decisive moments in the history of the USA the question of the expansion of slavery was being debated. The one in favour of expansion asked why if he could take his animals anywhere then why…
100 years of Australian Labor In June of 1991, the Australian Labor Party was celebrating 100 years since its founding in Barcaldine, Queensland. The Centennial Conference of the Queensland ALP met in Brisbane. A motion was passed calling for the Parliamentary wing of the party to implement state policy and remove abortion from the criminal code.…
Ireland’s problem is our problem Ireland has had another voluntary referendum on a social issue. The result is reported as a revolt against what Libby Purves in The Times called “centuries of clerical domination”. The referendum result happened not in spite of long-time opposition from the official Catholic Church, but because of it. The Irish…
Democracy and Euthanasia In democratic terms Euthanasia is about whether our humanity persists despite its distressing disguise. The sick in their mostly cheerful persistence in human activity despite their suffering show the nature of human equality to us; an equality that overcomes suffering; that persists despite such. We are called to live in solidarity with…
The definition of marriage has now been changed in Australia. The High Court determined in 2013 that marriage was able to be defined as anything, provided there was a political majority to do so. That majority has now been achieved and the law has changed. One side argued “equality”. The other side argued “tradition”. But…
Same sex marriage and free speech in your own home In the same sex marriage debate, religious leaders have been busy ‘looking after their own patch’, pleading for the freedom — if the law changes — to practice their faith, share it and maintain its integrity in their various institutions. But what about the…
As featured in The Spectator, Why Labor should stop pretending and ditch same-sex marriage, 14 September 2018. Labor voters are the most considerate, salt-of-the-earth people you’re ever likely to meet at a polling booth sausage sizzle. How so? Well, recent polling shows Labor voters, more than supporters of any other party, think freedom of…
There is no mystery as to why the majority of Australians want their own say on marriage. The political establishment just says it’s a “no-brainer” on the basis of equality and equal rights, and that it’s “inevitable”, but avoids principled in-depth discussion. Yet the opposite view was held just two election cycles ago by the…
Real Equality’s downloadable essay contains the following: This voluntary, exclusive, lifelong relationship that involves the equality and union of both halves of humanity therefore represents the democratic principle itself… it is only the equality of men and women that can result in the actual human unity we describe as marriage. The most dramatic division in…
Should a free society based upon human equality view the sexual union of a man and woman in a marriage relationship as a pre-eminent expression of human sexuality worthy of special recognition in its laws, or not? To address this key question we must firstly look at the definition of marriage. It came to us as part of the great democratic…