That headline shouldn’t come as a surprise to any of you unfortunate enough to have heard Pauline Hanson say anything ever, but the reality of this story today is so much more deeper that it defies even the intensely low standards of belief that the One Nation leader already demands.
The marriage equality bill debating continued in the Federal Senate today, and Hanson – at agonisingly long last – got to air her precise reasons why she opposes the whole shebang.
In short? They are bad. Dumb. Mind-bogglingly nonsensical. Completely bereft of any and all factual base. An utter waste of time and breath.
Hanson resumed her address to the senate this morning, replete with what appears to be some sort of symbiotic octopus affixed to her collarbone, and among the rambling, pointless, and borderline incoherent litany of points she attempted to make, chief among them was the idea that the legalisation of marriage equality could also open the door for things like polygamy and underage marriage to be legalised.
Pushing for the issue to be forced into a referendum at the next Federal Election – despite the overwhelming numbers in favour of it that the postal vote literally just returned – Hanson asserted that without constitutional enshrinement, politicians will be free to run buckwild and change the legislation at will if they suddenly find themselves insanely horny for a car or someshit and want to put a ring on the tailpipe.
My concern is that in time to come the parliament and its members could at any time change to include multiple marriages or marriages of people under a certain age and I don’t believe that will be the will of the people. If it was a referendum it would be enshrined in the constitution and cannot be changed by Parliament but only by the people.
She also had a conniption over the concept of what kids with LGBTQI parents will refer to them as at school when asked to draw pictures of them, referring to the 11% of Australian children that come from gay couples. A figure that she, for the life of me, appears to have completely made up.
Gay couples now have about around 11 per cent of children … and there will be an increasing number of children in these relationships. What do we do as a society when we get to a stage when these kids are going to school and … the teacher says ‘I want you to draw a picture of your Mum and Dad or Grandma and Grandad … so the kid is there saying ‘what am I going to do? I don’t have a mum or a dad — it’s Peter and Sam’. ‘It’s Elizabeth and Amanda.’ They’re not known as Mum and Dad.
Doubling down on her constitutional comments, Hanson took a brief moment to suggest that the 1967 referendum – in which 91% of Australians voted to have Indigenous people recognises as actual people – has had the unintended result of causing Aboriginal Australians to have “more rights” than others due to “reverse racism.” Somebody get me a goddamned drink, for the love of…
And finally, in the real, true, standing ovation of a kicker, Hanson bemoaned as to why we were being “dictated to by the minority.” Seriously. She said this:
I have no problems with people being in love and doing what they want to but why do you have to put this push on the majority of the population.
It is.
Almost as if.
Nobody has told her.
About the postal vote.
The speech, in part, is here if you happen to be recovering from surgery and need something to keep the blood pressure up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6Qp9pRH9HY
For Senator Hanson’s future reference, here’s a handy resource guide we’ve compiled that directly addresses conservative concerns about marriage equality being a slippery slope.
A LIST OF NATIONS WHO HAVE LEGALISED MARRIAGE EQUALITY THAT HAVE SUBSEQUENTLY LEGALISED POLYGAMY, ETC.
We’ll update that one as necessary.
