A university spokesperson has since come through with a statement:
“It is in this spirit of open discussion of broad community ideas that the University allows a range of groups to use the facilities to explore and discuss important community issues. All views expressed are those of the presenters and the community groups.
In keeping with this principle, the University has made a venue available to the Australian Christian Lobby tonight to hear from Dr Ryan Anderson on the topic of marriage.”
Meanwhile, the LGBT+ Society of ACU Melbourne also got in touch with their own statement.
We, the LGBT+ Society of ACU Melbourne, formally express our disgust and disappointment at our campus’ decisions to…
Posted by LGBT+ Society on Wednesday, 19 August 2015
They later added: “Everyone is entitled to their opinion but “open” bigotry and further putting down marginalised groups is not OK.”
We spoke with the president, Nicholas Versace [SP? C h i c], who said: “I believe that, because we’re a publicly funded university, we have a responsibility to be politically correct and this is not politically correct. This is bigotry, this is putting down a marginalised group and I think it’s disgusting.”
‘The Cost of Equality’ looks set to go ahead as scheduled but university groups have begun holding discussions about talks of this nature, citing a past event by pro-life group ‘Right To Life’, which Crikey covered back in 2011. A number of students have registered their concerns with university Vice Chancellor Dr John Ballard and the LGBT+ Society informed us they are planning a rainbow day for next week sometime.
Title image via Getty by The Washington Post.
