Dear Mikk,

«Any exceptions for magic fairy believers are surely going to be closely followed by exemptions for jew haters, racists, witches, pagans, nazis, et al.»

No exceptions - it is very wrong to have any laws, including anti-discrimination laws, that restrict private businesses from operating in whatever way they like. No private business should be subject to such laws. Essential services are anyway provided by government and/or companies. In fact, even most bakeries operate as companies.

Tony Lavis

In theory those laws should apply to the Muslims but in reality, the Muslims control
whole suburbs where they practise their religion as they wish and the police enter these
areas on tiptoe, and defer to big Muslim males who stand around in big intimidating
male groups. This is particularly true in the UK and Europe.

Sure they may not get away with murder but blocking off streets to pray would be stopped pretty quickly if the Christians did it.

The left wing and greens are hypercritical when it comes to the Christian religion though.
The Muslims, who run shops and businesses, would in a lot of cases not support a gay wedding, dont see them being told they must not do this.

And I am not against gay marriage, just against the tolerating of one religions discriminatory practises over another religions.
The multiculturalists whilst self righteously proclaiming religious tolerance are shown
to be not tolerant of all religions, equally.

I don't know of any marriage celebrant who's going to
perform a marriage ceremony that he/she doesn't want to,
nor any baker who's going to be forced to provide a
service he doesn't want to. All this is merely a
diversion to try to stall the passing of the legislation.
Well I doubt very much if that is going to work. The
Dean Smith Bill has passed in the Senate and it's now
up to the Lower House. The additional amendments have
been knocked back as being unnecessary. Most MPs feel
that there are already enough religious protections in the
Bill as it is. And with time hopefully most rational
people will see that all this has been a storm in a teacup.
Which is as it should be in a secular society such as ours.

As far as the "keeping children safe" argument. That is the
choice that parents have to make as to what schools they
send their children to. Be it private or secular. And in
choosing they need to look at whether the schools do have
the "safe-schools" programs to which some parents may object.
Because these programs are not compulsory, not all schools
have them - and its up to the Principals of the schools
to decide whether their school is going to participate in having
these programs.

So concerns are unwarranted. Parents need to look after their own
children and their interests and not force their opinions
and concerns onto other people. Most of us do have choices
in life - but as far as same-sex marriage is concerned -
Australians have already voted. It is now up to Parliament to
ensure the wishes of the majority.

runner accuses me of being a leftie, stealing language and twisting it. I have done none of that. It was runner who labelled homosexuality as a 'lifestyle' and that is clearly an ignorant and bigoted lie.

Dear Cherful,

It is not just about Muslims versus Christians: government only cares for those established big religions and so-called-religions that are strong and might cost them in votes and only their concerns will appear in the Ruddock report - it doesn't give a damn for small groups of devotees and people's own private religions.

---

Dear Foxy,

«And with time hopefully most rational people will see that all this has been a storm in a teacup.»

The legal registration of same-sex marriages by itself has indeed been a storm in a teacup and really a non-issue, but it has exposed the wound that was there all along: that religious freedom is not guaranteed in Australia (or anywhere else).

Our very ability to serve God, keep our vows and follow our conscience, which is after all why life exists in the first place, is subjected to the will and kindness of government, even if you like, to the will and kindness of the majority of other people who live in this continent.

While there is currently no particular serious threat (except perhaps for Sikhs who cannot carry their daggers on planes) this is very scary and unacceptable.

The main thrust of the SSM debate was that a strong majority of people supported it by roughly 60% to 40%. What the opponents to the protection in the SSM act forget is that recent polling indicated that nearly 70% of those polled indicated that they favoured protections being legalized.

As for the safe schools re education program, not only is there is no choice of public schools as one is zoned to a school by where you live, and the suggestion that one pay for private schools to avoid the flawed safe schools program is pure bollocks.

My major problem is mainly that the SS program is factually incorrect. The entire concept of gender being fluid is complete crap as only 0.6% of the population does not identify as the sex they were born with and of the population in general roughly 96% are straight. I fail to see why the sex education program whose main purpose is to educate people on sexual health and relationships has to be completely distorted to conform to a new political ideal which may not include a single person in the class.