Towards the end of all wedlock
- From: The Australian
- November 26, 2011
IF you are fed up with hearing about gay marriage, then join the club.
The results of the most recent poll about this contentious and important issue shows that while a slim majority of Australians support the concept, nobody rates it very highly as an issue. Even Get Up!, the main flag waver for gay marriage, says it is at the bottom of the list of concerns for Australians already burdened with a failing health system, a carbon tax and a rash of industrial action. By taking on this issue at the behest of the Greens, the Labor Party has not only made life difficult for Julia Gillard. It has betrayed its promise to the electorate not to introduce gay marriage, the declaration Nicola Roxon, as opposition legal affairs spokeswoman, made in 2003 at the national marriage forum at Parliament House.
The Prime Minister has decided on a conscience vote, a clever move. It puts Tony Abbott on the spot. There could well be enough wet Liberals voting for gay marriage to get it through in the lower house, although whether it would pass the Senate, which is more conservative, is uncertain.
These questions are the kinds of things that we normally do regard as conscience issues. And eventually, if it is put enough times and enough people change their vote, it would probably get through. It is called legislation by fatigue.
One element of this issue that has been touched on only lightly is the so-called slippery slope. There usually is one on these matters, and fatigue with the issue often leads directly down the slope. So abortion as last resort has turned into abortion on demand and to term, and in-vitro fertilisation as an aid for infertile married couples has become IVF for any geriatric mother or her surrogate.
So it is with same-sex unions. Abolition of the punitive legal barriers that dogged homosexuals' lives in my youth has morphed into a general acceptance of homosexuality as no more than a type of sexual left-handedness. This has allowed homosexuals to manufacture families whose children have birth certificates that lie about their parentage, which in turn has become a push to legalise and give the same status to homosexual unions as marriages - even though legal heterosexual marriage exists and has status because only heterosexual relationships can produce children.
This incremental deconstruction of the natural, social norms of sexual relations is the stated gender policy of the Greens. They have all but succeeded. The public may be apathetic, but in the long run Australians should be aware of the dangerous implications that could limit our basic freedoms.
Where Canada goes we tend to follow. This week in that hotbed of gender deconstruction, where kids can have three parents and gender-neutral means just that, an attempt to overturn that country's laws against polygamy have been challenged. Ironically, for something that is very regressive, punitive for women and children, and generally regarded as heralding the acceptance of sharia to govern family law, an unsuccessful move to introduce polygamy in Canada has come directly because of the legislation on same-sex marriage. In same-sex marriage the argument was based on discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation; with polygamy it's based on breach of freedom of religion, which is an even more protected right.
At the heart of the legal arguments was the slippery-slope argument that Canadians (and Americans) opposed to same-sex marriage have long asserted. The polygamists argued Canadian law condoned "casual group sex, but criminalises committed, group relationships . . . marriage is no longer only between a man and a woman, adultery has never been a criminal offence and group sex and partner-swapping were legalised in 2005 following a Supreme Court of Canada ruling".
If polygamy is ever introduced it could affect pension law, survivor rights to pensions and health benefits. It could also affect immigration policies on family reunification if a person has more than one spouse. This time Canada recognised that just as the 2004 same-sex marriage law resulted in a move away from the traditional definition of marriage, striking down the law also could significantly further affect the way Canadians define the institution of marriage as monogamous, because polygamy could lead to polyamory or no legal marriage.
And the beginning of the end of marriage is a situation that would further harm children. That is one reason this move did not succeed. In his opening statement, the lawyer for the polygamists boldly stated that "polygamy is not inherently harmful to children", but he cited no evidence to support that. Interestingly, homosexual activists routinely declare that same-sex partnerships are not harmful to children, even though there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.
Same-sex marriage is a deconstruction of the natural heterosexual family structure; hence it is dangerous in itself.
But for those opposed to gay marriage the real line in the sand is that gay marriage is being pushed as a way of thought control. By legally normalising homosexuality beyond mere social acceptance, many groups, including Catholic educators, worry that acceptance of homosexual partnerships will be reinforced by punitive legal sanctions, which would shut off all debate on homosexuality as a moral issue and effectively limit our already limited freedom of speech on the issue.
Witness what happened to general practitioner David van Gend, who was dragged before the anti-discrimination police when he argued against homosexual families bringing up children.
If you don't believe me, look at what has happened in Massachusetts in the US since gay marriage became legal there. It has to be reinforced in schools and it has put Catholic schools in a particular bind. In this country, Green pro-gay lobbyists make no secret of the fact they would like to overturn exceptions to the anti-discrimination laws to target the Catholic school system and what is taught about human sexuality. This threat to freedom of speech is the real dangerous end of the slippery slope. One would hope those wrestling with their consciences would give pause to consider this.
There is a veritable Luna Park, or lunatic park, of slippery slopes out there.
