The GLORIAs: they said what?

Staff Writers
October 18, 2012

In less than a week, the most offensive and ridiculous comments made about the LGBTI community will be announced at the third annual GLORIAs (Gay and Lesbian Outrageous and Ignorant Comment) Awards night.

Domestically, the gay marriage debate crescendoed this year with both the federal and Tasmanian parliaments voting down marriage equality legislation. With the debate came the slurs, most notably senior Coalition MP Cory Bernardi’s speech to the Senate where he linked gay marriage to beastiality.

Internationally, there were some more bizarre comments like US socialite Paris Hilton who said she would be scared as a gay man because “you’ll like, die of AIDS”. Then there was the US pastor who advised dads to break their son’s wrist if they saw it go “limp”.

The poll, organised by NSW MLC Penny Sharpe, reopened this month with six categories including religion, politics and international. It closes on October 24.

INFO:

theglorias.com.au

Here are just some of the nominees from the six categories for 2012:

Most outrageous political/law comment

South Australian Sports Minister Tom Kenyon (pictured) who said on ABC radio: “I don’t want to be rude to Penny [Wong] but it’s not her baby, do you know what I mean? It’s not, biologically, it’s not, it’s not the biological product of two people.”

Doctors For The Family – a group of 150 medical professionals claimed same-sex marriage would potentially increase HIV rates.

Joe Hockey for saying that training aged care workers in LGBTI sensitivity is “something individual operators should be providing, not hardworking taxpayers”.

ALSO NOMINATED: Coalition MP Cory Bernadi, Loree Rudd, Former Christian Democratic Party candidate Peter Madden, Nationals Senator Ron Boswell, Senator Barnaby Joyce, ACT independent election candidate Philip Pocock and Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells.

Worst international comment of the year

Cecil Chao Sze-tsung, a property magnate, and one of Hong Kong’s richest men for offering a reward of nearly £40 million ($62.2 million) to the man who can woo his lesbian daughter.

Charles L. Worley of Providence Road Baptist Church in Maiden, North Carolina, who told his congregation that they should build a large fence, 150 or 100 miles long, put all the gays and lesbians inside it “And have that fence electrified ‘til they can’t get out. Feed ‘em. And you know what, in a few years, they’ll die out. Do you know why? They can’t reproduce.”

Iranian Islamic scholar Ayatollah Abdollah Javadi-Amoli: “Even animals… dogs and pigs don’t engage in this disgusting act [homosexuality] but yet [Western politicians] pass laws in favour of them in their parliaments.”

ALSO NOMINATED: Paris Hilton (pictured), former Growning Pains star Kirk Cameron, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a Southwest Airlines flight attendant, Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry, North Carolina Pastor Sean Harris, Russian deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and American commentator Rebecca Hagelin.

Media

Jackie O (Jacqueline Ellen Marie Henderson, pictured) for going off her middle name, Ellen, because it “sounds a bit lez”.

The Herald Sun for running a poll asking readers: “Do you think calling someone a “f—ing homo” is an offensive insult?”

ALSO NOMINATED: columnists Andrew Bolt and Miranda Devine.

Religion

George Pell on the ABC’s QandA: “Homosexuals are like a flaw in an oriental rug.”

Major Andrew Craibe, a senior Salvation Army official who suggested he supports Christian doctrine that says non-celibate gay people should be put to death.

Jim Wallace (pictured), Australian Christian Lobby, on Channel Seven’s Sunrise: “This whole campaign [for marriage equality] would do great credit to Joseph Goebbels.”

ALSO NOMINIATED: ACL’s Lyle Sheldon, Sacred Heart Primary School, Endeavour Foundation’s Babette Francis, Rev. Ian Copland, blogger Bill Muehlenberg, Rabbi Dr Shimon Cowen and David and Rosyln Phillips.