Anti-LGBTI campaigners say religious freedom proposals don’t go far enough

Anti-LGBTI campaigners say religious freedom proposals don’t go far enough

Anti-LGBTI campaigners have spoken out on Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s religious freedom proposals, saying they don’t go far enough.

The Australian Christian Lobby and Australian Conservatives Senate candidate Lyle Shelton have taken issue with the changes, with Shelton describes them as “flawed”.

Morrison announced yesterday that the government would abandon its pledge to protect LGBTI students from discrimination at religious schools, and seek to enact a Religious Discrimination Act, among other changes.

“It’s ironic that 12 months down the track politicians continue to deal with the consequences of redefining marriage when campaigners said there would be no consequences,” Shelton said in a statement.

“Our nation needs to put freedom first, not the demands of identity politics. The next election will be all about protecting basic freedoms which are under attack from toxic identity politics,” said the former head of the ACL.

“The Government’s proposed religious freedoms act with a religious freedom commissioner at the bureaucratic and flawed Australian Human Rights Commission would only set up further conflict between identity groups.

“It will be lawyers at five paces. That’s not the Australian way – we want to live and let live respecting difference and diversity,” Shelton claimed.

“All provisions in anti-discrimination law that make it an offence to insult or offend should be repealed or overridden.

“Same-sex marriage has weaponised anti-discrimination laws and today’s attempts to restore freedom are just creating a camel.

“Freedom needs to be protected – including and especially the right to dissent from the rainbow gender-fluid world view.”

The Australian Christian Lobby’s current Managing Director, Martyn Iles, concurred with Shelton, saying that the proposed changes “have a long way to go”.

“The efficacy of the proposed Religious Discrimination Act will depend on whether the expression of traditional beliefs about marriage, gender, sexuality and family are explicitly protected,” Iles said.

“Because of the nature of religious belief, the Act should also ensure compulsion against conscience is considered a detriment and therefore religious discrimination.

“Certain entities should also be protected under the Act, like not-for-profits with a religious ethos, including discrimination by governments in the discretionary allocation of funding and other benefits.

“It’s disappointing to see there are no protections for freedom of speech, conscience, or a positive right to religious freedom,” Iles said.

“Ruddock is a start, but there is no doubt we have a long way to go to ensure that religious freedom continues to mean something in Australia.

The ACL’s statement ends by saying that they will seek further protections for “the millions of Australians for whom religious conviction is fundamental to their identity.”

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6 responses to “Anti-LGBTI campaigners say religious freedom proposals don’t go far enough”

  1. Lyle says he wants freedom – but never makes it clear that is only for heterosexual people. He bags out human rights and the commission all the time which has never made much sense. Because, you cannot have freedom, if humans don’t have rights to live how they choose.

  2. “That’s not the Australian way – we want to live and let live respecting difference and diversity,” Shelton claimed.

    HA! HA! That will be the day, Liarl. BTW you are Unaustralian then.

  3. .Australia has still a majority of people claiming the be Christians – even if many of them don’t know a thing about Jesus’ teachings and that includes the vast majority of those who put themselves forward as being “The Voice of Christianity in Australia”. Most of them, from those wearing the Triple Crown in the Vatican, the one wearing the Bishop’s mitre in Canterbury, England, all the way down to the lowest curate etc. who can all justifiably be called Anti-Christ as they have long since stopped doing Christ’s bidding: To Love all unconditionally, To show Compassion to all. They have also totally forgotten, or rather they have chosen to ignore the Ten Commandments” Which clearly sate”
    Thou shalt have no other God but me. Thou shalt Not commit Adultery. Thou shalt Not Kill These men and women have broken those three and the other 7. The leaders of the then small Jewish Cult known ass “The Christians” committed the biggest possible blasphemy of all when in 432AD at Nicaea, Italy the leaders got together and held a little vote, much as the Ancient Roman Senate and Roman Emperors did, when they voted on whether or not Jesus was Divine – a God – it passed & then they must have discovered their blasphemy for they fiddled around – without any more votes – and combined Jesus with God and the Holy Spirit and came up with the Holy Trinity. Their blasphemy still stands. I wonder how their God will like that!
    Those who want religious organisations to discriminate against members of our Community are anything but Christians. They are Hypocrites of the worst variety for they claim to follow the Teachings of Christ but simply ignore them all and God’s 10Commandments as well.

  4. Well said Dave, but let’s also look at what these people are trying to enshrine in law; basicallythe right to follow one’s religion as one believes regardless of the consequences to others. This may well be fine from a “Christian” point of view, but let’s look at some other “Religious practices” that may not be so fun.

    If we make it okay to practice one’s religion as one sees fit, then it will become legal for some people to stone a woman to death for “adultery”, or stone a man to death for “homosexuality”. It will become legal for a parent to have his daughter “circumcised”, and it may well become a defence to a terrorist act because they were just following their religion.

    Australia is a secular country, with secular laws, for a reason; once you start to enshrine “religious freedom” into law you start on a very slippery slope down into the possibilities of a new Inquisition and extra-judicial reviews of how people live their lives. We should be able to live our lives free from the burdens of religious zealots and if we don’t stand up for our rights here and now, we will have lost all our rights in the future.

  5. @ Dave: Your comments are spot on !
    I’d go so far as to say, wingers like Sheldon and the MD of the ACL should go take a cold shower and reconsider the feelings of the millions of us who don’t believe any of the bull shiiit you numb skuls spout daily trying to convince us to believe in your whimsical and totally nonsensical god !
    He never existed in the past and no god, that you profess has done so much for mankind, has certainly never lifted a finger, ever, in the past 2000 years. There’s NO likelihood that any mythical god will ever do anything in the future.
    Throughout human history, none of the 1000+ gods that people like you invent, have ever done anything to help the human race including the millions of children who have died during childbirth and those who have died at a very young age. Your god is a disgusting invention of your sick emotions.
    Stop discriminating against the teachers and students who don’t believe any of your nonsense.

  6. Lyle Shelton has swallowed such an American brand of conservative Christianity that he’s managed to completely lose all comprehension of the word “Ironic”.

    He claims it’s “ironic that 12 months down the track politicians continue to deal with the consequences of redefining marriage when campaigners said there would be no consequences”. No Lyle, it’s ironic that you’re calling it ironic.

    It’s ironic that we got here ENFUCKINGTIRELY because YOU Lyle and your homophobic reactionary mates chose to play the victim card when you got your arse handed to you a year ago in the survey. You could have been an adult, we’d have had no Ruddock review, no political calamity directly resulting from that, we’d have completely forgotten that your beloved Christian schools retained rights to kick out gay folks (seriously, even the Greens had forgotten about it until the Ruddock report leaked), and you’d have so much less to whinge about.

    But that’s the game for you, isn’t it Lyle. Playing the victim card and whinging is your only strategy. Nothing else. What a pathetic little man with zero chance of getting elected in a pathetic whingey little political party.