Pearls and Irritations

Labor played party games when it should have been making a clear stand against bigotry.

Labor played possum, to deep concern among some of its supporters, and doubt among others, about where Labor would be left if its hope that the defeat of the more odious parts of the religious bigotry bill should be made to depend on Liberal-moderate revolt and cohesion among the Independents and minor parties.

Labor had serious objections of principle to the form the legislation had taken, which had violated explicit promises of an agreed approach. But while it would put up its objections as amendments, it would wave the legislation through the House of Representatives if its amendment failed to get support. It would put up the same amendments in the Senate.

It was a tactic without much in the way of a strategy  — at least a strategy that was worth the effort, and it yet again invited questions about whether Labor and Albanese had any bottom — some line they would never cross. The same-sex marriage plebiscite had shown that there were significant groups of morally conservative folk, particularly in Sydney’s western suburbs, deeply offended by the idea of same sex marriage. Most of these were of migrant background; many were Muslim.

These have become a bogey in NSW Labor circles, particularly among a Right faction always inclined to grasp at any excuse to do nothing much. There are even some inclined to believe that this pocket of people (not many of whom, incidentally, seem to be adherents of  the American cults claiming to encompass all Christians), had kept Labor from power at the last election.

Morrison, and before him Malcolm Turnbull, had used the promise of a legislated right to freedom of religion to neutralise some of the religiously based opposition to same-sex marriage. But it was never very clear what form this right would take, or what evil it was needed to combat. The urgent need for such legislation had not much galvanised the leaders of most mainstream Christian groups, which is to say about 95 per cent of those professing to be Christians, but not including the cults such as Hillsong which are so dominant in the Morrison ministry, and, increasingly, in the membership lists of the Liberal Party.

After all the Sex Discrimination Act already permitted a good deal of bigotry to “protect” schools from gay students or teachers, or from others whose lifestyles, like those of the publicans, ne’er-do-wells and prostitutes Jesus hung around with, were a “challenge” to Christian values.

Even some of those who recognised that religious values were under some assault in an increasingly secular society, or that religious groups had to do rather more to compete for attention these days, were hesitant about asking for too much help from the state.

First, religious bodies already received an enormous amount of direct help from the state, including subsidisation of schools, hospitals, aged care homes and community facilities, and even more once their tax-free status was taken into account.  Too much moaning about the difficulties of managing in this vale of tears was apt to draw attention to this assistance, and, perhaps to jeopardise it.

All the more so given that many of the leaders of such churches are not so popular these days, particularly because of institutional scandals of the physical and sexual abuse of children, and evidence that organisational wings of the churches — as well as organs of the state itself — had covered up such scandals. Indeed some of the more worldly and experienced church leaders recognised the risk that demands for a higher level of protection, particularly for discriminatory practices, would backfire. This is what has happened.

Dominic Perrottet, regularly called an ultra-conservative Catholic and a leader of a NSW Liberal right-wing faction once nicknamed the Taliban, made it clear that he could not see the point of having a religious freedom “right” created. It was not clear what problem it would solve. It was all too clear what problems it would create.

It has, moreover, become increasingly clear that the perceived need for such a right was not very much about protecting the rights of individual members of particular churches or cults. These rights are rarely under assault — or, where they are, as is sometimes the case with non-Christian religious adherents, such as Jews or Muslims, their rights can be protected and vindicated under other anti-discrimination legislation.

The strong demand for freedom, where it existed, came from particular religious groups — mostly of American origin — who wanted to loudly proclaim, as matters of religious principle, their bigoted opinions about gays and transsexuals and want their right to discriminate against them to be a matter of law. Indeed they should be allowed to use these rights as weapons — to persecute others — as well as shields, protecting their beliefs and their freedom of expression.

A nation with a constitutional separation of church and state was being invited to lend the coercive power of the state to do things that would otherwise be illegal, to minority groups, in the name of religion.

Such bigotry, seen from this point of view, should have been resisted by all political and social groups espousing tolerance, common decency and respect for others. A high proportion of the population, including most supporters of the Liberal and National Parties, reject the idea of a  “right” to exclude, to punish, and to dismiss students whose sexuality or gender identity does not “fit in” with the particular orthodoxies of religious schools.

Likewise with the right to sack teachers and others working in schools and other semi-public (and publicly funded) institutions because of their sexuality, or because they are not in lockstep with the beliefs about sexual morality of the school authorities. In recent times, school principals and others who have promoted their right to enforce such views have retreated in the face of vocal opposition — and not from the general public, but school parents, cult adherents and sometimes tithing prime ministers.

No doubt, Labor, put to the crunch would have made clear that its opposition to any extension of the right of religious bodies to discriminate was fundamental. The funny-buggers it was playing was a tactic, a part of a game of chicken in which Labor wanted to outstare moderates inside the Liberal Party, shaming them into doing the right and decent thing.

Certainly, Labor speakers during the debate were clear enough about their personal opinions on such matters, even if they were directing their anger not at their leader or their whips but at the other side. And certainly the tactic worked, indeed beyond initial imagining, given that Morrison withdrew the bill.

It may have been good and keen judgment that saw Albanese outsmart Morrison. But some of the reservations about the tactic must remain, if only because civilised people, even civilised Labor people, should not be playing tactical games with the rights and the dignity of other Australians.

Imagine, for example, if parliament had been dickering about the rights of bigoted Christian schools to exclude Jewish teachers or pupils. Could Labor have pretended to go along with it in the strong belief that the other side would blink before they did? What if it were about the right, in practice, of mining companies to override the views and interests of Aborigines in relation to mining or the protection of sacred sites? Oh heck, sometimes we do that.

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