Rodney Croome: The Case for Gay Marriage

Is it possible to get a transcript of this?

I didn't do a verbatim transcription, but this is close. I omitted the extended quotations he makes from other sources for brevity and reworded in a few places for clarity.

"Why Australia needs to institute Marriage Equality...

Because a majority of Australian's support it.
60% believe the Marriage Act should be reformed to allow same-sex couples to marry. That's a majority of voters who are male and female, white and blue collar workers, Labor and Liberal voters and in virtually every age group.
The [Australian] Senate Inquiry received over 11,000 submissions supporting Marriage Equality - more submissions than any other Senate inquiry ever. Given the sample size, the overwhelming majority of submissions were from heterosexuals. Despite this, neither major political party is listening to the Australian people. The majority view of Australians needs to be recognized.

Because of the wider impact of inequality.
This reform has popular support because more people than ever know someone, a family member, a friend, or a colleague who is gay or lesbian, and have some experience of what marriage discrimination means through those relationships.
Two groups feel this most keenly:
Those families whose loved ones marry overseas because they cannot marry in Australia, and there are conservatively about four thousand families who have been deprived of having their loved ones marry at home.
The children of same-sex couples who are deprived the security and legitimacy offered to families by Marriage Equality. Again by conservative estimates, there are ten or twenty thousand children denied this security and legitimacy by a single discriminatory law.

Because Marriage Equality challenges the disproportionate religious influence in Australian Politics.
Regardless of any public positions using dodgy science and biological determinism to justify opposing Marriage Equality, opponents are motivated by a belief that God ordained marriage and that homosexuality is a sin.
Most Australian's do not agree that the bible is the basis for Marriage Law. Australia allows divorce although Jesus prohibited it, and prohibits polygamy although the bible's old testament is full of it. Australians don't bat an eyelid at atheists marring, or Christian's not marrying, or even Prime Ministers who are unmarried Atheists. Most Australians no longer marry in churches, so as a nation why should we use Bronze Age prejudices to determine whether same-sex partners can marry?
One of the reasons that Marriage Equality should matter to all Australian's that achieving this reform will help redraw the line that properly defines civil law and religious values in a secular multi-faith democracy, firmly setting the law on a foundation of human reason and need, not divine revelation and wrath.

Because Marriage Equality should be supported by conservatives and christians as well as progressives and non-believers.
Some conservatives, those who have left behind the rigid extremism that is sometimes exhibited on the right in the Western world and have gone back to conservatism's more pragmatic roots, have pointed out that allowing same-sex couples to marry is important because it strengthens family values like love, fidelity, responsibility, and mutuality.
Similarly, those christian's who have moved beyond reflexive fundamentalism have argued that Marriage Equality is critical to freedom of religion. In a nutshell, those faiths that solemnize same-sex marriages in Australia, like the Quakers and some progressive synagogues, are not allowed the same legal recognition for this religious practice as those faiths which only solemnize opposite sex-marriages such as the large mainline churches.

Because the pace of reform overseas threatens to embarrass Australia.
Recently Portugal, Mexico City and Iceland have joined Holland, Belgium, Spain, Canada, South Africa, Sweden, Norway and six US states from Massachusetts to Iowa in allowing same-sex couples to marry. The number of places where same-sex marriages are either soon to be allowed, or already recognized is even larger. Ranging from Argentina through Slovenia, and Israel to Nepal. In the World Cup of Marriage Equality, Australia hasn't even made the first round.
Increasingly Australians are asking "If it can happen in Portugal and it can happen in Iowa, why can't it happen here?" Many feel discomfort that the Australian image of tolerance doesn't match reality. Overseas more and more people are asking why Australia is falling behind. At some point these questions will turn to jokes, in exactly the same way that Australia is taunted now for it's supposed racism. If the Marriage act is not reformed, Australia's national reputation will inevitably suffer.

Because Same-sex marriage benefits marriage as a whole.
For the last 200 years those who declared marriage an archaic institution about to whither away have been wrong, and been proven wrong again and again. Similarly, those who have repeatedly declared that marriage will be destroyed if it is reformed in any respect at all have also been proven completely wrong. The truth is that marriage is both a critical and a durable part of Australian society and like all social institutions it must reform to stay relevant.
Imagine if marriage was the same institution today that it was one hundred years ago - when wives had no rights, divorce was almost impossible, and interracial marriages were banned. No one would want to get married. In the same way, as society becomes more accepting of same-sex relationships, the current prohibition on same-sex marriages will come to be seen as anachronistic and the institution of marriage as a whole will increasingly been seen as an instrument of prejudice rather than a symbol of love. All celebrants are required to say "Marriage in Australia is the union of one man and one woman for life to the exclusion of all others". To the exclusion of all others is meant to be a statement about commitment and fidelity, but in the ears of more and more people going to marriage ceremonies in Australia, it's not a statement of fidelity, it's a statement about prejudice. It reminds us that people like [gays and lesbians] cannot get married. No Australian who is married and no Australian who has ever dreamt of marrying want's marriage to become a fossil, petrified by the prejudices of the past.

In some way or another, virtually every Australian has a stake in allowing same-sex couples to marry. Whether they are touched by discrimination against their gay family members, uphold democratic and secular principles, value Australia's reputation, or just value marriage, each Australian should be profoundly concerned about the way successive federal governments have entrenched and defended discrimination. The key to achieving marriage equality in this nation is to alert our fellow Australians to how the issues affect them. Supporters of reform have no bill of rights to ensure legal equality and no citizens referenda so the people's will can prevail. All we have it the power of persuasion and the sense of decency and fairness in the hearts of those to whom we appeal. Such appeals have worked before. In the 1960s millions of people in both the United States and Australia were moved by stories of interracial couples denied the freedom to marry who they loved. Moved not only to oppose laws banning interracial marriages, but racial segregation generally. It is my conviction that the stories we tell today about the pain and hardship caused by not allowing same-sex couples to marry will also have the potential to motivate millions and to become metaphors for a better future for everyone. While marriage equality is about many things, it is fundamentally about love, and there is nothing and no one love cannot move."

Thanks Brian. Nice to be able to read Rodney's ideas laid out in text, too! I thought this was a wonderful and emphatic speech that looked at the argument from angles I hadn't encountered earlier.

There's another part of this video online - at the WC's Facebook page. In it, Rodney talks about what he sees as the best course of political action to enact some change on the issue, and shares an anecdote about the passing of a same sex marriage bill in Canadian parliament. I'll admit I got a little foggy in the eye.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=464965205184

thank you so much firstly for having Rodney as part of Soapbox, secondly for posting the video.
i hope it was ok, that I have used it to send in a letter addressed to over 140 Members of Parliament...looking forward to my next Soapbox.