Liberal MP At Root Of Coopers Cock-Up Reckons Backflip Shows “Little Spine”

The Coopers Brewery swift and somewhat enfeebled backdown is a pretty prime example of a number of colliding factors, none of them particularly great.
Aside from being a pretty staggering misreading of their core consumer base, the initial video is a stark failure of its own premise; that Australia both “needs to have a debate” on the issue of same-sex marriage (statistics reading public support routinely prove that notion to be false), and that we should be participating in “civil discussion” about the matter.
The problem there is that debate assumes the issue is open to compromise and give-and-take (it’s an extremely binary, one-or-the-other issue) and those calling for “civil discussion” on the matter largely come from the conservative side, meaning they’re not so much angling for a polite chat about the many pros and almost zero cons, but rather they’re asking “I would like to be able to express how uncomfortable this whole thing makes me, and I’d like to be told that it’s ok for me to oppose it.”
Regardless, the two Liberal MPs who appeared in the very ill-fated Bible Society video, Andrew Hastie and Tim Wilson, have expressed deep disappointment over Coopers backflip – which included severing ties with the Bible Society, cancelling plans to run Bible verses on a limited run of beer cartons, and pledging to join Australian Marriage Equality.
Hastie, who represented the party line of “no marriage equality ever, thank you,” was not shy about venting his frustrations over both the consumer backlash and boycott, as well as the company’s subsequent backflip, labelling the whole shebang as a “craven capitulation” that showed “little spine.”

“The whole point of this video was to demonstrate that two MPs can disagree on a very important issue and still be friends and still respect each other.”


“The public reaction from the left has demonstrated there is something seriously wrong at the heart of our democracy. I had no idea when I did this with Tim that we would trigger so many people on Twitter.”

Interesting that he’d use the word “trigger” to describe a swathe of people speaking their minds when he, himself, appears quite perturbed about the whole thing.

But that aside, herein lies the issue with this idea of having a “civil debate” on the matter: Hastie’s point is that they can agree to disagree, which is – to use the official term – pissweak horseshit. Wilson expressed a desire to marry the man he loves, and Hastie looked him in the eye and told him he’d prefer it if he weren’t allowed to do that.
Wilson, while not as vitriolic as Hastie, also expressed something of a furrowed brow about the fallout:

“I think it’s a sign that there’s a section of society that’s very intolerant of a difference of opinion on an issue like this today.”


“I think the response has been way over the top, and shows just how easily people use the idea of being offended today now to boycott companies when they haven’t done anything wrong, when their product was simply used as a prop as part of showing how you can have a robust discussion.”

Firstly, if it was a prop then why the sodding hell was it positioned like a meta-gag in a ‘Wayne’s World‘ film?

And secondly, people didn’t like something so as collective individuals they chose to not engage with it. It didn’t stop the brewery from selling the beer over the weekend to people who still wanted it. That’s the beauty of having a *choice*.
Hastie, who apparently didn’t fully grasp the irony of the words he was using, closed it all off thusly:
“I’ve had crass and bullying emails from as far away as Tasmania and the reason people are so unsettled by it is that it goes to the heart of our civilisation. Are we truly free, are we truly democratic, do we allow free thought?”
Wonders never cease, sometimes.
Source: The Age.

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