Senior Tasmanian public servant, Robert Williams, gave a compelling defence of gay equality and dignity in an address to the Tasmanian Anti-Discrimination Tribunal today.
Mr Williams, who is a deputy secretary in a major Tasmanian government department, took a case against homophobic materials distributed to some Tasmanian households in 2013.
He alleges the materials, which claim that homosexuality is abominable and that gays and lesbians have lower life expectancies, breach Tasmania’s strong anti-vilification provisions.
Mr Williams told the Tribunal,
“I remember once turning on the TV news during the campaign spearheaded by Rodney Croome, Nick Toonen, and others, to see my mother being filmed signing the petition in Salamanca Place to remove criminality from same-sex people’s lives. ”
“People in the gay community didn’t fight and win these freedoms, only to continue to be subjected to the vile and hateful material that is the subject of todays hearing. ”
“If my dear old mum could stand up for what is right so must I.”
Mr Williams then went on to give the Tribunal statistics on the impact of hate and prejudice on gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex people.
The man who distributed the materials, James Durston, challenged the authority of the Anti-Discrimination Tribunal and claimed his free speech is protected by the Australian Constitution.
A verdict is expected soon.
Robert Williams: Why am I here today?
This is not about marriage equality, important as that issue is, it has no relevance to my case today.
Todays case is a demonstration that bigotry, prejudice and hatred are still a plague in our community.
This material has cased me and the people named in my witness statement to feel insulted and ridiculed, sickened.
I have worked hard in my life to contribute positively to society through a life of public service always working to assist those in the community who are disadvantaged find better opportunities. I have sound and valued relationships with my family and friends. I have been fortunate to have a decent education and a strong professional career.
I remember once turning on the TV news during the campaign spearheaded by Rodney Croome, Nick Toonen, and others, to see my mother being filmed signing the petition in Salamanca place to remove criminality for same sex peoples lives. People in the gay community didn’t fight and win these freedoms, only to continue to be subjected to vile and hateful material that is the subject of todays hearing. If my dear old mum could stand up for what is right so must I.
The Impact of prejudicial and hateful material cannot be underestimated, not just for young people trying to understand where they fit in the world, or for those who struggle with sexual identity, but for all gay, lesbian, transgender, and intersex people who deserve to live their lives free of discrimination, prejudice and hated.
Research from Beyond Blue
LGBTI people have the highest rates of suicidality of any population in Australia.
• Same-sex attracted Australians have up to 14x higher rates of suicide attempts than their heterosexual peers.17 Rates are 6x higher for same-sex attracted young people (20-42% cf. 7-13%).18
Discrimination and exclusion are the key causal factors of LGBTI mental ill-health and suicidality
• The elevated risk of mental ill-health and suicidality among LGBTI people is not due to sexuality, sex or gender identity in and of themselves but rather due to discrimination and exclusion as key determinants of health.24 This is sometimes referred to as minority stress.25
• Exposure to and fear of discrimination and isolation can directly impact on people’s mental health, causing stress, psychological distress and suicidality.26
• Up to 80% of same-sex attracted and gender questioning young Australians experience public insult, 20% explicit threats and 18% physical abuse and 26% ‘other’ forms of homophobia (80% of this abuse occurs at school).29
• The most common types of heterosexist abuse experienced by LGBT people during the 12 months prior to a 2011 survey were non-physical: verbal abuse (25%), harassment (15%), threats of physical violence (9%) and written abuse (7%).30
Anti-Discrimination Act
This is not about marriage equality, important as that issue is, it has no relevance to my case today. This is about stopping such vile attacks on the lives of gay people.
This is about clear breaches of the Anti_discrimination act which is designed to protect everyone from conduct that is not acceptable in today’s Tasmania. The Parliament in its wisdom has passed these laws for good reason.
Mr Durstan has already argued that this Tribunal is unconstitutional, however I ask the Tribunal not to hear such arguments today as it is my submission that this Tribunal has no power to question its own legal validity. In fact it’s a curious line of argument that he uses about her majesty Queen Elizabeth II as being the genesis of why he has a right to say anything he wants to about people, because the Bible talks about sodomites and other such arcane notions. On 17th July 2013, the Defender of the Faith, head of the Church of England, Queen Elizabeth II gave her royal assent to the Bill which then became Britains’ The Marriage (Same Sex Couples Act 2013.
Freedom of speech has never been without limitation in the history of our legal system. The doctrines of defamation, libel and slander are clear and well worn legal doctrines that make this clear. In a similar vein, the Anti-Discrimination Act in Tasmania also limits what people can say or do that will harm others. The notion that Mr Durstan puts forward that the Bible somehow authorises him to say or do anything to others, is spurious, delusional and not in line with both the long standing common law tradition of our system, nor specific statutes.
Mr Durstan before this Tribunal has accepted that he is the person who published this material under the guise of 3WM – the ThreeWise Monkeys. Unless the tribunal wishes to pursue this further I don’t intend to say more on that.
On face value, it is almost otiose to have to argue that the statistics published by Mr Durtstan are fallacious, not scientific, and are designed to harm others. It’s a bit like asking the Tribunal to hear submissions about the earth being flat.
However, for the sake of completeness, and before I address the specific legislative provisions, I would like to point out how these statistics have been viewed by the scientific community and indeed how the author has been discredited by every scientific organisation he has ever been part of.
CITE THE ORGANISATIONS WHICH HAVE EJECTED Dr Paul Cameron
It goes without saying that any reasonable education person would know instinctively that:
• The life expectancy of gay males is not 42 as compared with married males at 74. It is not scientific and doesn’t fit with any of the average life expectancy statistics for Australia or America
• It is also lunacy to suggest that lesbians are 466 times more likely to die in traffic, than non lesbian women.
His reaseach and he personally have been decried as fallacious, and not following any accepted scientific methodology .
I respectfully submit that Mr Durstan has breached the following sections of the Act:
17. Prohibition of certain conduct and sexual harassment
(1) A person must not engage in any conduct which offends, humiliates, intimidates, insults or ridicules another person on the basis of an attribute referred to in section 16(e), (a), (b), (c), (d), (ea), (eb) and (k), (f), (fa), (g), (h), (i) or (j) in circumstances in which a reasonable person, having regard to all the circumstances, would have anticipated that the other person would be offended, humiliated, intimidated, insulted or ridiculed.
16. Discrimination on ground of attribute
A person must not discriminate against another person on the ground of any of the following attributes:
(c) sexual orientation;
(d) lawful sexual activity;
“warned that Homosexuality should not be tolerated”
“Scripture rejects homosexuality as utterly abominable”
Publication of false statistics – impacts on
• Community attitudes
• For example getting life insurance
• Mis-informing people about gay people
19. Inciting hatred
A person, by a public act, must not incite hatred towards, serious contempt for, or severe ridicule of, a person or a group of persons on the ground of –
(c) the sexual orientation or lawful sexual activity of the person or any member of the group; or
Mailing to households – around 4000
inciting hatred by promoting that being gay has serious health impacts that are not true.
20. Promoting discrimination and prohibited conduct
(1) A person must not publish or display, or cause or permit to be published or displayed, any sign, notice or advertising matter that promotes, expresses or depicts discrimination or prohibited conduct.
Has published by printing and mailing
A notice or advertising matter
Prohibited conduct as above in 17
Remedy
89. Orders
(1) If the Tribunal finds after an inquiry that a complaint is substantiated, it may make one or more of the following orders:
(a) an order that the respondent must not repeat or continue the discrimination or prohibited conduct;
(h) any other order it thinks appropriate.
(1) Apology in writing to myself, Mrs Roberts, Mr Devine – for publishing such offensive material and acknowledging the harm that it can and has caused.
(2) That Mr Durstan make a public apology for the material by public notice in the major Tasmanian newspapers, but especially the Mercury.
(3) That Mr Durstan provide myself and the tribunal with a written statement acknowledging his breach of the Anti-Discrimination Act and that he will undertake not to do so again and that he now understands the provision of the Act
Summary
• Published false, offensive and hateful material
• Has personally offended me and many others
• Has Breached the Act in a number of ways
• I seek the remedies outlined
Australian Marriage Equality national director, Rodney Croome
