Gay Rights activist and today’s Lunchbox/Soapboxer, Rodney Croome has taken aim at our new Prime Minister Julia Gillard on her views on same-sex marriage in his post for ABC Unleashed.
At issue is an amendment to the Marriage Act in 2004 which banned the recognition of same-sex marriages including those made in countries where gay marriage is legal. While civil unions exist and there is some recognition of same-sex couples, Croome says they are “an unsatisfactory substitute for marriage”.
For Croome the disappointment with Gillard is greater, because while other PMs have been in marriages themselves, Gillard is not. “As a partner in a de facto relationship, Gillard understands the profound importance of couples having the choice to marry and the equally profound indignity that comes from that choice being circumscribed by prejudice or law.”
The piece points to inter-racial marriages as being viewed with more tolerance than same-sex unions and how the choice to marriage is a decision about controlling your life as well as having important legal value and moral value. Croome concludes with an appeal to Gillard: “I can only hope our new Prime Minister comes to realise what a terrible injury she is inflicting, not least on the principles upon which she has founded her own personal life.”