It’s a bright but cold autumn afternoon in Goulburn and Australian Marriage Equality volunteers are out campaigning in the New South Wales city, which is the heart of the federal seat of Hume.
Warren (“Waz”) Smith, a gay man who grew up in Goulburn and has recently moved back after a number of years, is approaching locals in Belmore park, in the centre of the town.
Waz isn’t planning on getting married but, for him, it’s a matter of winning equality for LGBTI people.
The first couple of approaches produce the sort of reactions the campaigners want to hear. When asked about the supposedly controversial issue, Goulburn mothers supervising their children and shoppers on the way into the supermarket volunteer variations of “love is love”, “live and let live” and “whatever makes people happy”.
AME is focusing its efforts on 30 seats around the country, including Hume, where MPs are undeclared or undecided on the issue of same-sex marriage.
The focus is less about tossing out the sitting members as it is raising awareness of the issue and trying to apply pressure to make the change through a parliamentary vote rather than a plebiscite.
After several very polite exchanges, it takes a van load of out-of-towners to really spark polite debate with the marriage equality campaigners.
About a dozen Middle-Eastern Australians decked-out in Canterbury Bulldogs gear had stopped for a cigarette and some supplies on a road trip down to Canberra for the match against the Raiders.
“Same-sex marriage? Give it to ‘em,” says one emphatically. He explains he and some of the others have gay cousins.
Another, who says one of his brothers is gay, is worried about the effect on children, who he says need a mother and a father.
It’s just these sorts of concerns the campaigners are here to address. The political director for the successful Irish marriage equality referendum “yes” case, Tiernan Brady, had told the campaigners three weeks earlier at a training session that conversations like these are what convince undecided voters.
“People are afraid to ask LGBT people questions because they’re afraid they’ll ask the wrong question.” Campaigners need to give them space to have their questions answered, because an unanswered question becomes a doubt and a doubt becomes a no vote, he said.
Brady also warned this is why opponents wanted a plebiscite: in order to raise doubts through misdirection like whether bakers would need to bake cakes for gay weddings and whether marriage affects adoption laws.
AME co-chairman Alex Greenwich, an independent MP in the New South Wales parliament, had told the campaigners that this particular concern was best addressed by pointing out that many gay people were already parents and “their kids need married parents”.
But the Bulldogs fan is in a chatty mood and moves the conversation on to generalisations about daughters getting on better with their fathers, his experiences gay clubbing in Sydney (to hit on women, he said) and a PayPal ad on social media depicting two dads taking their young daughter around the park on a tricycle.
A third pipes up: “I’m against it. Marriage is between a man and a woman, [same-sex marriage is] against the sacrament of our religion.”
The campaigners received advice for this situation, too. In training they were told that, above all, they must be polite, even in the face of disagreement.
“Engage positively with people, it’s about conversations not debates,” Brady said. “You’re not there to beat anyone but to win equality and that’s not the same thing.”
It sounds simple but it was drummed into the campaigners: don’t call people who plan to vote against marriage equality homophobes. “Nobody ever changed their mind by being called a bigot,” Brady said.
Most of the votes are somewhere in the middle, neither strongly for or against same-sex marriage. Chat to people who want to know more but when you meet strident opposition smile and move on.
Smith was happy to turn the other cheek in the face of the first emphatic no voter we encountered but he probably wasn’t expecting the sudden embrace and kiss goodbye from the second man, the one who was worried about male and female role models.
And with that the Dogs fans drove away, off to watch the Raiders deal their team a 32-20 loss while the AME volunteers continued working their way up main street.
Many locals didn’t want to talk politics at all, understandable on a sunny afternoon in the middle of a marathon eight-week election campaign. “We don’t wanna buy it … oh it’s about politics? In that case we’re not voting.”
Brady said canvassing works because people respect you for turning up. “It puts a face on the issue. It’s easy to hate an idea but it’s not easy to hate a person.
“Going door to door reminds them marriage equality is about someone real, about people in their street and at their work. It’s not about what you’re asking them to vote for but who.”
This was borne out by our afternoon on the hustings. The number of people who immediately cited gay friends or relatives as their reason for supporting same-sex marriage was striking.
One woman did not have gay relatives but noted: “I have kids but, who knows, what about people who have grandkids and they turn out gay? It’s part of life now.”
Tom Sebo, the local AME coordinator, and volunteer Anna Wurth-Crawford encountered two bisexual girls (not of voting age), a lesbian couple from Canberra and a man whose mother is a lesbian.
Waz may be the most visible same-sex attracted person in town (he looks the part, wearing a leather jacket and an earring, and says he’s well-known through his hospitality business) but, as you would expect in a town of 23,000 people, he and Tom are not the only gays in the village.
AME’s strategy is to win marriage equality by personalising the issue, not politicising it. Brady and Greenwich had encouraged campaigners to remind Australians real people were depending on this change, to put a face to the cause.
The values of equality and fairness are the mantra of the campaign. That’s the message because they’re values everyone shares, regardless of political affiliation.
Both Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten support marriage equality.
Turnbull disappointed some by maintaining plans for a plebiscite after becoming prime minister in September. He expects the plebiscite will be conducted by year’s end and has said same-sex marriage supporters are “unlikely to be disappointed” with the result of a popular vote.
Party politics is not the focus of AME’s campaign.
Brady said: “It’s not party political. Some conservatives will vote for marriage equality not in spite of being conservative but because of it – we are the side of family values. Equality is both a liberal and a conservative value.”
Some people we encountered around Goulburn did identify same-sex marriage with a particular side of politics, though. One young heterosexual couple from Canberra explained: “We vote left – we’re across it.” Another couple told us: “We vote Greens, they’re the ones that are talking about it.”
Sebo was keen that I speak to some Goulburn residents who voted conservative and supported same-sex marriage, so he suggested local music promoter and businessman Geoff Bell.
Bell said he didn’t think support for marriage equality depended on political lines.
“There are people from the Labor party from the Christian standpoint,” he said. “They’re vehemently against it due to religious beliefs. It doesn’t matter whether you vote conservative or Labor.”
Despite the Coalition supporting a plebiscite, Bell wants a free vote in parliament. “You look at the polling numbers, 67% of Australians are in favour of same-sex marriage. If that’s not a mandate, I don’t know what is.”
But he has reservations about a parliamentary vote. “I don’t think you’d get a free vote, you don’t know if the Labor party would get a free vote and I’m sure the Liberals won’t,” he said.
Labor has committed to a free vote on same-sex marriage within 100 days if elected. Its policy is if the issue is still being debated in two terms’ time, then a pro same-sex marriage vote will be compulsory.
The Greens in federal parliament are unanimously in favour of marriage equality.
Bell said he would be prepared to stop Liberal MP Angus Taylor in the street and chat to him about same-sex marriage. It’s not a vote changer for him, though, because he’s sure it will become law and it’s only an argument about the mechanism now.
Is it significant that AME are pushing a parliamentary vote and the Coalition wants a plebiscite? “I don’t know – whatever is the best way to get it done is what we should have,” Bell replied.
Turnbull has pointed to polls that show Australians favour a plebiscite; most people we spoke to said politicians should get on with it. A few mentioned the expense of the plebiscite, a price tag of $160m.
AME wants to avoid an unnecessary and divisive plebiscite.
Debate in Australia has been marked by controversial material against marriage equality, including a pamphlet printed by a former MP claiming children of same-sex couples may be more likely to be victims of sexual abuse or abuse drugs; and a booklet sent to Catholic schools warning that “same-sex friendships” are very different from “real marriages”.
Psychiatrists are worried about the impact on LGBTI people’s mental health, particularly younger and more vulnerable members of the community.
But voters we met were very in favour of same-sex marriage and seemed less concerned about how it’s achieved, and that’s the challenge AME’s campaign faces.
Campaigners are putting the issue on the table before the federal election but, given the Coalition are favourite to win, it will likely end up being nothing but a curtain-raiser for the next campaign.
Perhaps part of the reason voters seemed unconcerned is they are sure, in the end, love will win. But, from AME’s perspective, Australia can do this the easy way or the hard way. They’re hitting the streets to convince us to take the short cut but laying the ground work for the long game too.
