When Malcolm Turnbull limped over the line in last month’s marathon election count, the die was cast for the future of marriage equality in Australia.
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A Coalition victory meant voters would go to the polls in a plebiscite, this time to decide on the private lives of same-sex attracted people.
The policy was an antagonistic one for many gay and bisexual Australians, convinced it would provide a platform for opponents of marriage equality to indulge in homophobic slurs.
There was, however, one small comfort built into the prime minister’s plan. Mr Turnbull promised the process would be quick, resolved before the end of 2016.
But yesterday, as is becoming fashion for freshly elected prime ministers, that policy was abandoned. It now appears same-sex couples will have to wait until at least February before their fate is determined.
‘What’s another few months?’ you can almost hear a portion of the Australian populace ask.
Those people are surely heterosexual.
The truth is, every month – every moment, in fact – that inequality prevails is another month same-sex attracted Australians are held in lesser esteem than their straight peers.
It’s another month of Australia playing court jester to Western democracies that have already seen fit to remove inequality between people of different sexualities.
Even worse, a February plebiscite is effectively sanctioning a seven-month long attack on egalitarianism Australians are meant to hold near and dear.
One would think his eight weeks on the hustings before the July 2 election would be enough for Mr Turnbull to have learnt how damaging a protracted campaign can be.
Still, his government has seen fit to draw out a process that might green light marriage equality, but will almost certainly add to the depression and anxiety that a swift and just decision in Parliament would have started to remedy.
Along with other contemporary human rights disgraces, like the indefinite incarceration of asylum seekers in offshore detention centres and the treatment of youth languishing in juvenile prisons, the government’s marriage equality policy does not paint a pretty portrait of how Australia views its vulnerable and historically marginalised populations.
Mark Kearney, journalist