RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under contestant and local trans and nonbinary icon Etcetera Etcetera just gave a powerful speech at the protest against the Religious Discrimination Bill in Sydney today, that perfectly explains why this piece of legislation is so dangerous to queer people and everything generations of LGBTQIA+ people have fought for. For real, stop what you’re doing right now and hear this.
Members of the local LGBTQIA+ communities and their allies gathered at Taylor Square in Darlinghurst this afternoon to protest against the government’s bill that would legally allow people to discriminate against queer, trans, nonbinary, and other non-heterosexual people, and those who identify as a gender they weren’t assigned at birth, purely on the basis of their ReLiGiOuS bElIeFs. Before they marched, however, the Sydney-based drag performer and trans and nonbinary activist took to the mic to inspire people to stand up and speak out.
“I have spent the last 23 years of my life coming to terms with who I was because I spent 13 years in incredibly religious, conservative school systems,” they said.
“In these school systems, I was taught the way that I am is wrong. I was taught it by teachers, I was taught it by peers and I was taught it by parents of my friends.
“If I didn’t have the support that I needed in those schools and if I did not have people standing up for me when I needed people to stand up for a young queer person when I was my most vulnerable, I probably would not be standing here today.”
They added: “It is a shame that this government and other people in the government want to arise the protections for our young queer people in schools. They want to arise protection for queer people in institutions because it suits their so-called religious freedoms. Shame on them!
“The words I hear uttered by these right-wing conservatives are the same words I heard uttered by my bullies at school. And that is all they are: bullies.
“They are afraid of our beautiful, beautiful souls, our beautiful right to express who we are, and you know what they’re ashamed of? They’re ashamed of the fact that they will never love themselves as much as we love ourselves.”
In case you missed it, Prime Minister Scott Morrison personally introduced the third draft of the Religious Discrimination Bill last month. Human rights and equality groups have been spending the last three years protesting the shit out of it and say that it’ll protect people who harm LGBTQIA+ communities, as well as discriminate against women, people with disabilities, and even (ironically) people of faith.
Basically, under this bill, someone who is being sued for discrimination can argue what they said was a statement of belief and be immune to all federal and state anti-discrimination laws. They have to prove that their comments or actions were in line with actual doctrines or teachings of their faith, and the comments cannot be made maliciously or attempt to threaten or vilify. In the end, this is a lose-lose. It will protect people who bully both majority and minority groups.
The bill is an extremely big fkn yikes for any person from a minority community in Australia and their community’s history. And, as Etcetera added in their speech, it also undermines the actually good people of faith in religious communities and the work of LGBTQIA+ peoples in this country, too.
“This bill does not represent all people of faith,” they added.
“My family and my friends of faith have told me that these right-wing conservatives pushing this religious freedom bill do not represent them and do not represent ordinary Australians who wish to practice their faith in peace.
“It represents a fraction of this society which will wish to take away everything that we have fought for – that generations of queer people have fought for. Shame on them.
“The survival of our stories and our histories are under attack by this current government. I will not let another story, another history, people that we have never met because of oppression, because of violence, I will not let that happen again to people around me. We need to protect our queer youth from governments like ours.
“Shame on them that in this country, while we need to be fighting for all of the Indigenous People wrongly incarcerated, the trans people of colour being murdered, women’s rights, refugees rights, this is our government’s priority. This is what our government wants to focus on instead of fighting for protection for those who are most vulnerable in our society? Shame on them.
“And for almost more than two years they have tried to bring this bill up in different forms and they have always been bringing up ideas to quash the voices of people like us who wish to speak up for ourselves and those we love. We will not be silenced. I refused to be silenced.
“Momentum must continue because if we do not keep up the momentum, they will take away everything we have as long as it suits them. They will come for marriage equality, they will come for our trans youth, and then they will come for all of us because we are the only ones keeping them from attacking our community further.
“I will not be silenced. Scott Morrison, are you listening?”
Following Etcetera’s inspiring as fuck speech, the crowd made their way down Oxford St and could be heard chanting: “Fuck you, ScoMo”, “Kick the bigots out the door”, and “No room to discriminate”. Same, besties, same.
Then they turned right on College St and walked along Hyde Park. They ended their protest across the street from St. Mary’s Cathedral at the park itself, where some of the protesters shouted “stand up and fight back” against religious bigotry.
While the bill threatens the lives and lives experiences of LGBTIQIA+ people, past, present, and future, Etcetera told PEDESTRIAN.TV that “anyone who is the target of hate speech and bigotry” should stand up and speak out on this bill.
“Religion should never be used to justify hatred – especially against our vulnerably queer youth in schools,” they said.
“Labor should be ashamed for suggesting they would work with the liberals to support this bill – and there must be bipartisan opposition for this piece of legislation, which has been created to protect the very bigots who seek to erode the freedoms of the LGBTQIA+ community.”
In the wake of Morrison’s attempt to push for this bill once again, teachers and students across the country opened up about their experiences of discrimination by the Christian school system.
