Catching Up

The Aussies might be slow but they generally get there in the end. This week they finally went for marriage equality, catching up with their more socially advanced cousins across the Tasman. Well done, Ockers! We sort of knew you could do it.

To be fair as well as condescending, the real problem wasn’t with the average Aussie voter. Polls had show for years that most were in favour of marriage equality. The real problem was with the crusading reactionaries of the Liberal and Country parties. Former Prime Minister John Howard was determined to fight the tide of enlightenment and put through a law defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

The baton was taken up by another Liberal leader, ‘‘Mad Monk’’ Tony Abbott, who somehow managed to turn the debate into one about the ‘‘rights’’ of religious persons to refuse to have anything to do with a gay marriage. This included not only the right of pastors to refuse to preside at a gay wedding, but the right of religious cake-decorators to refuse to adorn a cake with messages that collided with their consciences.

This week Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull promised a gay marriage law before Christmas and scotched the idea that a prejudiced cake decorator would have the right to harass a happy gay couple. And common sense, enlightenment and married love triumphed in the Lucky Country.