Prime Minister Julia Gillard, your stance against same-sex marriage is absurd. Like me, you are in a long-term heterosexual de-facto relationship. So, like me, you know firsthand the discrimination a relationship like ours can face without the legitimising stamp of marriage – after all, you were asked during this election campaign whether your partner, Tim Mathieson would be living with you in the official Prime Ministerial residence if you won office – I mean, honestly, would they have asked this if you had been married? It was an insulting question. What were they expecting you to say, that to have your partner with you would be living in sin and you wouldn’t dream of sullying The Lodge in such a way?
And like my partner and I, as heterosexual de-factos you also know that if things ever got too difficult you could always just get married. We could end any disdain in an instant, and we’d get a lovely big party too. We might not ever take it up but there is security in knowing that the option is there if we choose it. If you and Tim ever got desperate enough to stop the stupid questions, or if you ever felt the need to make a public statement, or if you got carried away in a dizzying moment of romance, or wanted to prove a commitment to one another after a rough patch.. you could get married. And in fact, having the option of marriage available to our relationships lends them credibility regardless of whether we walk down the aisle or not. Like us, I am sure that Tim has been frequently mistaken for a husband, and consequently accorded the respect due to someone of that significance in your life even where otherwise you would have faced stigma.
So, the very worst thing about your stance against same-sex marriage? The worst thing is that like us, you and your partner have deliberately chosen not to get married – you must have questioned something about the institution – is it the religious traditions, is it the patriarchal legacy, or is it the state interference in personal lives – any one of these, and maybe like us it is all of these, and I wonder how you can possibly justify quarantining the institution of marriage from change.
Frankly, I don’t believe you, Julia when you say that you think a marriage should only be between a man and a woman, and that means I also think you know how discriminatory and cruel the line you are maintaining for the Labor Party is for same-sex couples. I know you can’t make change alone, but for goodness sake, help it along.
P.S. I still hope you win the election.
Hi blue milk,
Touche – on your views about marriage – my partner and I, like you and Julia are not married – on principle – and I, like you, can’t understand how Julia and Penny Wong, can sprout what they do about marriage. It could be the power of the church – a mighty institution to take on – and who wants them so close to power – as they would be with Tony Abbott! You know – blue – I’ve been doing some writing myself today and needed to refer back to a book I bought – and attempted to read in the 1970s – and have dutifully kept on my shelves all these years. But only once or twice during the interim gone back to read – well I did today – and was almost blown away.
The book is The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer – if you haven’t read it – give it a go. It is beautifully written – challenging and radical – all in one. In the spirit of the 1970s she talks about revolution – something that wasn’t uncommon at the time – but today – gives you pause for thought!
Let me know what you think.
Women are powerful – lets hear them roar.
Joannie
I can only think this is a cynical play for votes, but I can’t think whose votes. Preferences from Family First, maybe? But I would expect those voters to stay conservative and preference Abbott (who, of course, is not getting any of these tough questions).
I’ve been in a (same-sex) partnership for 14 years. Only this year could we do our taxes together (thanks, Kevin and the Greens!) and know that she is automatically my next-of-kin when I have major surgery three days after the election and ongoing medical procedures for the rest of the year. Unlike in 2008, I don’t have to rely on the goodwill of hospital staff and my parents if decisions about my medical treatment need to be made while I can’t make them.
I don’t think Julia Gillard is going to take those basic rights away, but it’s an added stress I really don’t need to think that Tony Abbott very well might and Gillard won’t bother to oppose it.
@ lilacsigil – If the Greens have BOP, which I hope they do, then I’m also hoping that same sex marriage, or civil partnerships will be one of their bargaining chips. Julia may have left the door open on civil partnerships by focussing on marriage, but I really don’t know enough to say. I was surprised by her thoughts on the matter and am hoping for an aboutface after the election.
@ Joannie – I suspect Penny Wong is toeing the party line, although she may be one of the gay community members who don’t believe in marriage -for anyone- and she is perfectly entitled to her opinion.
Yes, if the Greens have BOP, I’ll be very cheerful indeed!
Penny Wong is an interesting case – she said her opposition is due to “tradition” which might well leave the door wide open for civil partnerships (though I’m cranky that Labor shoved their Gay Senator out the front to take one for the team!). With the current gender discrimination laws that Rudd referred to in order to pass the current de facto rules, civil partnerships would likely apply to same-sex AND opposite-sex partners, which would be awesome for transpeople and genderqueer people as well.
Brilliantly and articulately put, bluemilk. it is so absolutely unnecessary and reeking of privilege. i feel sad every time i think of it. australia could be such an awesome progressive place.
and yet I still want her to get in too…
and YES to The Female Eunuch. I first read it in high school and it was amazing. maybe that should be the book I take on the plane when I go visit my boyfriend this week… hehehe.
If only either party would step forward and express a few opinions and try to actually WIN votes, instead of pussyfooting around trying their hardest to avoid saying anything interesting that might actually LOSE them a vote or two.
Have they ever considered that supporting refugees, or gay marriage, or dental care or whatever might actually win more people over than it would alienate.
Forget politics of fear – this is like politics of nothing.
I totally agree with you that she should state that she believes in same-sex marriage. Maybe she’s just saying it as not to scare the rednecks. But also agree that despite my disagreement with her stance on this, I want her to win the election!
Notice how no-one has asked Abbott about his stance on same sex marriage? Than we’d have a LOT more to complain about!
I have tried BM, really I have tried, but I feel like I am watching friends walking towards a cliff and I am unable to stop them. I don’t favour any discrimination re marriage, but marriage was one of the key social weapons used by the early church as it destroyed cultures that accepted and celebrated homosexuality. It was key in the regulation of the population as anyone not married was under suspicion, I am sure I don’t have to elaborate on the precarious position of widows.
For a while I tried to accept an argument along the lines of; ok it is a crappy institution with links to genocide but the human rights lobby and a range of qglbt groups think that this is important so I ought to get on board or at least keep my trap shut. I also thought that my Vegas wedding to Dr Honey conducted in as cynical manner as possible was another reason to keep it shut. After all we could do it and we enjoyed subverting the dominant paradigm, so why should I deny someone else the chance to assault marriage the way I did.
What I fear is that gay marriage will rehabilitate marriage, that an institution that is on its last legs will be revitalised and trap another generation, and another and so it goes. Pair bonding is important, we let someone name it we give them power over it. I will drink a toast to every victory in this regard, but I cannot be happy about them.
dylwah – I think that there has already been a resurgence in the institution of marriage.
When I was in my 20s it seems very few of my contemporaries (work, social, family) were getting married at that age. Now it seems that in my 30s there are my peers of my own age, and those a decade younger “taking that step”.
I would be interested to hear how you subverted the institution and/or wedding. While it may be easy to do internally I am curious to how this manifests to outsiders.
Katte, you are probably right about the resurgence of marriage, though it has become so expensive of late that it looks a bit like a bubble of the tulip or real estate variety. there are more married couples than otherwise in our parents group, but the biggest group is the “married for visa reasons” category.
“I would be interested to hear how you subverted the institution and/or wedding.”
Vegas was a good start, but my heart did skip a bit when i saw Elizabeth Taylor’s photo in the reception area of the chapel, it was the chapel closest to the courthouse, the southern preacher with the busted capilleries was not happy about our atheism. there are no photos of us together on the day.
as to its manifestation to others, i am not sure how we do it, but most people seem to assume we are de-facto, i guess the lack of rings on our fingers helps. we are a fairly stock standard het couple with two kids, tho we have swapped roles. we havn’t gone down the path my parents followed in the seventies when our last blended family maxed out at 8 adults and 7 kids.
[...] the Merch Girl has some questions on the rights allocated to marriage, Blue Milk posts an open letter to Julia Gillard and News with nipples points out that, uh, sometimes hetero men cheat on their female [...]
Dylwah, while I sympathise with your position re marriage in general, as a religious historian I feel the need to correct a slight inaccuracy – it was not the early Church that used marriage like this. The early church was apocalyptic, and pro-celibacy, and marriage was left a state concern, rather than a church concern until the 12th century, when it started to be used as you’ve described.
Yes Rebekka, i think you are right, i got told a little while back that if i had another look at the early celtic christians, i’d get another story. But i guess that the genius of christianity for so long was/is its capacity to reinvent itself while denying that anything fundamental has changed. (reification alert).
ciao
“the genius of christianity…” yes, spot on!