Rights debate should be global

It’s with great pleasure we present two editorials this week from the enormously well regarded author and academic Dennis Altman and talented writer and tweeter extraordinaire Benjamin Law.

The pair have written ahead of their appearance at a Sydney Writers’ Festival forum this month titled ‘Why Get Married When You Could Be Happy?’

The discussion will also feature celebrated writer Jeanette Winterson and American-Russian journalist and LGBT rights advocate Masha Gessen. It looks set to be a lively discussion.

As I’ve no doubt expressed countless times before, I’m with Law and Altman on this one. I’m not terribly enamoured with the institution, but think the ban on queer couples marrying is outwardly unjust.

Altman raises an interesting point about his desire to see the same efforts thrown into the marriage equality campaign directed towards helping queers overseas overcome far more dire discrimination.

Of course, as he points out, for a range of complex reasons, attempts to do so would be mired in difficulties.

But there are small, and significant, steps being made on the global stage.

Late last month the United Nations Commission on Population and Development (CPD) adopted a landmark resolution to support young people’s sexual and reproductive rights.

The resolution, pushed largely by non-government organisations, stated that young people should have the right to decide on all matters relating to their sexuality, have access to sexual
health services, have a right to comprehensive sex education, and importantly, be protected to experience sexuality free from violence and discrimination.

Of course, talk is cheap, and in some parts of the world, UN resolutions even cheaper. But this is an important message to send in support of the freedom of the next generation of young people across the world, the next batch of LGBTI rights activists who can make a difference.

It’s worth recalling the comments of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a speech she gave in Geneva last year, for inspiration.

“It is a violation of human rights when people are beaten or killed because of their sexual orientation, or because they do not conform to cultural norms about how men and women should look or behave,” she said.

“Gay people are born into — and belong to — every society in the world. They are all ages, all races, all faiths. They are doctors and teachers, farmers and bankers, soldiers and athletes.

“Being gay is not a Western invention. It is a human reality.”

Unfortunately for many LGBTI peple around the world, violence, abuse and discrimination is also a reality. Let’s hope, once marriage equality is won, this is a cause where we can somehow make a difference.