Marriage ban ‘Australia’s shame’

A prominent Indigenous lawyer and 2011 NSW Australian of the Year has compared the ban on same-sex marriage to past policies by state governments that required Aboriginal people to seek government approval before they could marry and called on the Government to act on the issue.

Speaking on behalf of the Metropolitan Aboriginal Land Council at Saturday’s Sydney marriage equality rally, Larissa Behrendt told the crowd of close to 1000 people that Australia’s ban on same-sex marriage was a national and international shame.

“I think it’s beholden to anyone who lives on Aboriginal land now to do so in a spirit of tolerance and acceptance and it seems to me that the failure to achieve marriage equality mocks those principles,” Behrendt said.

“It was … only decades ago that Aboriginal people themselves were told who they could and couldn’t marry and we look back on that now and say that was one of the worst pieces of discrimination that we suffered because it meant manipulation of the most private and intimate parts of our lives.”

Behrendt was referring to policies in the 19th and 20th centuries whereby Indigenous Australians could not marry without the approval of their state’s Protector of Aborigines.

“The fact that there are Australians living on this land today who still suffer from that discrimination is something that the whole country needs to be entirely ashamed of … It’s an embarrassment to those of us who live here and its an embarrassment to us internationally,” she said.

Behrendt called on Australia’s political leadership to follow in the footsteps of US president Barack Obama and evolve their position on same-sex marriage.

“A very prominent black man in the United States this week said that his thinking had evolved and he now agreed that marriage equality was right,” she said.

“Now this black woman asks that the leaders of this country evolve to the same point and say that it’s time now to extend this equality to everybody who wants to marry the person they love.”

The Sydney rally was one of several held around the country over the weekend. Around 4000 people rallied in Melbourne and close to 7000 Australia-wide.