Anti marriage group wants to legalise discrimination.

 Anti-Marriage Alliance submission 

to marriage inquiry.

 Australia recently had an inquiry into marriage equality. This inquiry specifically deals with exemptions for homophobic people and organizations.  Presumably this all came about because it was revealed that the coalitions idea of marriage equality would create a new, different and lesser version of marriage for LGBTI people, and would not be equality at all. 
 Personalty the whole idea is a bit sickening it seems to me to be like allowing rapists to be exempt from rape charges or giving racists exemptions from racial discrimination laws. And some of the groups that gave submissions to this inquiry are known LGBT hate groups, so its like inviting the hate groups to discuss how much they should be immune from prosecution or consequence for their hate crimes.
 So much for Malcolm Turnbulls promise that Australia had no place for Hate speech and no tolerance for homophobia.

 I am not going to go through all the nonsense "alt-facts", and lies of these submissions. They usually read from the same hate-book so addressing one should be enough...but which one. Thee is one that was in the news recently for distributing hate-speech pro-LGBT bullying to innocent children not long after a child died from homophobic bullying at school. You will remember that the (anti)Marriage Alliance distributed this filth on a school bus!

 Now I'm not going to go over every little detail in their submission as its unnecessary, many of the points can be refuted at once and unlike the far-radical-right i don't want to repeat myself.

 The submission makes a big deal about freedom of religion and freedom to practice that religion. Their own submission states that such freedoms are limited by their effect on the fundamental rights and freedoms of others. 

 I agree with all this completely. Indeed our own constitution has very similar amendments.  The problem with anti-marriage groups using this argument is of course that the argument is pro-marriage equality.  
 These rights don't just apply to radical fundamentalist Christians, no they apply to all religions. There are many religions and many more deity's that actualy recognize the natural diversity in sexuality. Indeed many christian churches want to marry their LGBT members.
 The current marriage laws which were changed only a while ago in Australia to exclude LGBT couples are actually in violation of the rights to religious freedoms. Because these people are being prevented from practicing their religion, they are unable to marry. It should also be noted that the current laws are unconstitutional as they force others to adhere to a (far-right) religious belief as if it is law. 
 And no, changing the law to allow marriage equality wont impede another persons religion as it will not be mandatory to marry a person of the same sex.

 The submission goes on to say that exemptions for religious ministers are not enough. They seem to want the legal ability to discriminate against LGBT married couples in all areas of life. 

 While i actually don't mind a minister not wanting to perform a marriage on basically any grounds. I do feel that the building itself should be accessible to anyone for free as these religious organizations don't pay tax or rates, because they are expected to provide a service to the community. Now if the church does not want to allow its grounds to be used by the community i also have no problems with it surrendering its tax-free status. (the submission directly addresses this but falsely claims this choice would amount to coercion).
 But as for the hairdresser, doctor, judge, or policeman being able to refuse service based on sexuality or marital status, no way. This is exactly akin to making racists immune from racial discrimination laws. I am sure if "Christians" were refused service because they were in a opposite sex marriage they would be in uproar, just look at the fake "war on Christmas" nonsense just because some stores chose to be inclusive with "happy holidays".

 They use the quote; Governments should respect the moral or religious teachings of parents / guardians. 

 They use this to attack the safe schools program. They claim that parents cant have their children opt out of the program, but i believe this to be untrue. However i think the program is even more important for children of bigots and homophobes, as they are probably more likely to bully other children. So while i think they are wrong saying they cant opt out, i do believe they shouldn't have that option, if your confident in your bigotry you should be able to have your beliefs questioned by your children when they are provided with the real facts.
 They complain that safe schools teaches that normal variance in sexuality is normal, because it differs with the beliefs of their particular interpretation of their chosen religion. Wow, how would they feel if a religion not their own was taught as fact in schools? I am sure they would not be happy at all. No (anti) marriage alliance school should be a neutral ground where real facts are taught, if you want to indoctrinate your children do it at home and on the weekends.
 They go on to bemoan that the time may come when religious schools are not permitted to be homophobic to their students, given the rates of youth bullying and suicide i personally think that day cant come soon enough. 
 And what about the rights of the child? A child should have the right to grow up knowing the reality of gender diversity (puberty is difficult enough without being surprised that your sexuality doesn't fit what you have been taught). A child should have the right to not be bullied at school? A child should have the right to not be shamed or beaten based on their sexuality, And a child should be able to grow up knowing they can marry the person they love. But the (anti) marriage alliance doesn't seem to care about the rights of the child.

 They go on and on about how horrible it is for them to see that normal sexuality is being accepted as normal,
 I fail to see how that's a bad thing. 

  
  They seem to admit that their bigotry is increasingly recognized as extremism.

  I tend to agree, but it is happening too slowly and there is still a reluctance to call a spade a spade. They seem alarmed at this but i can only say if you don't want to be labeled extremist, radical, alt-right, racist, sexist, homophobic just stop fitting that label, its really quite simple. 
 Now if you really feel it is your chosen deity or religion that forces you to discriminate, i have awesome news for you! You are actually free to choose your religion and which deity's you worship in this country. It may surprise you to know that many religions and most deity's actually recognize the diversity of human sexuality. Damn, you could even not follow any religion or powers, many people don't and they live moral, happy lives without feeling the need to discriminate. You don't even need to go that far, many Christians support the fair and equal treatment of other humans. It really is your choice. 

 In conclusion:

 It amazes me that they try to use freedom of religion to argue against freedom of religion for others. That they try to claim anti-discrimination laws should protect them but not their victims. They do this seemingly without irony or self awareness.  Could they really lack such empathy for others that they don't see the hypocrisy of their behavior?
 I think this kind of disingenuous argument comes from the fact that the legislation was changed recently to exclude same sex couples, and that the legislation does not in any way effect the various religious definitions of what marriage is. And their simply came a point where the majority of the public saw through "arguments' relating to this things too easily. You just cant say marriage cant be redefined anymore, because it has, it can and its not.

 If this is the standard of the anti-marriage submissions, it really does seem like the time of homophobic, unconstitutional marriage discrimination in Australia is drawing to a close, as the submission basically boiled down to;

 'We want to continue to discriminate against gay people without consequence and we think our interpretation of our chosen religion should give us cover to continue to do so.'

If you want me to examine more of these submissions, let me know.

The Internet Tax

To fight price gouging or to join in?

 

 

If you are a gamer you already know that Australia pays far more than the US for games. Now this is taking into account exchange rates, and this is even for digital downloads, where no shipping is incurred. It should also be pointed out that the never ever GST (the one that was promised to eradicate all other taxes, but didn't) is not charged on international purchases less than $1000.

Lets look at a popular game the Sims 4. At launch the Sims 4 was $60 for American (US) buyers and $90 for Australian (AU) buyers. Later the mini expansion released for $19.99 for US customers, and $39.99 for Australians. If we take into account the exchange rate at the time the price for Australians may have been justified at $25.00 but in no way should it ever have been double.

There was uproar from Australians, New Zealand and our American allies, and the game released missing key features, i think these two items combined caused the company to quietly rethink its price gouging and take some action. The Sims has released a new full expansion at $40 US and $50 AU. They have also bowed to customer pressure and reduced the cost of the other mini-expansion to $29.99. We can not expect the industry to police itself, while in this case specific factors worked in customers favour, and Maxis should be applauded,  we cant rely on chance or the foresight of company's.

In 2013 the Australian Labour government held a year long federal inquiry into why Australia pays so much for IT related merchandise. This mainly focused on physical products, like TVs and computers, but did also look at digital downloads and games.

The report found that Australians pay up to 50% more on average than other countries. We pay 84% more on games, 52% more on music, 46% more on computers and 16% more on laptops.
The inquiry concluded that the usual excuse of "the cost of doing business" for the price difference for IT products cannot be justified, particularly as it relates to digital downloads.

The inquiry recommended that the Australian government;
Task the Australian Bureau of Statistics with monitoring and recording the price differences.
It wants the import restrictions removed from the  Copyright Act, 1968 and to add a clause allowing consumers to circumvent geoblocking to ensure they're getting the best price. It also wants to educate consumers how to get around geoblocking and provide more access to technologies that allow them to do so.

The inquiry recommended banning geoblocking and voiding any laws enforcing it, if  companies do not agree to lift geoblocking, or to give consumers the tools they need to circumvent it.

                                            Tony Abbot

Now we fast forward to today's Liberal government, that has hobbles the national broadband network (NBN), calls internet commentary "electronic graffiti", retains every Australians metadata in order to give to media company's to aid those company's in prosecuting those who share files, Wants to put an internet filter on Australia' internet in order to block sites that the far right wing Liberal party find objectionable, Thinks Australians only use the internet to send the occasional email, and in there latest budget are trying to cause digital online electronic purchases to be subject to the GST.That is an additional 10% on top of the unwarranted price gouging!

I don't want to sound alarmist, but i will, this could be the death of Australia as a digital marketplace.