From the "Monty Python couldn't have written anything funnier' dept.
The Labor Party National Platform provides a stark vision of what Australia would look like under a Bill Shorten Labor government.
These policies are set to extend Labor’s radical changes to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 introduced in 2013 by Labor’s Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus.
Those changes removed the definitions of man as “a member of the male sex” and woman as “a member of the female sex” from the Sex Discrimination Act. In their place, a person is defined by their sexual orientation and their gender identity, their “gender‑related identity, appearance or mannerisms, or other gender-related characteristics of a person (whether by way of medical intervention or not), with or without regard to the person’s designated sex at birth”.[1]
This definition means a man can self-identify as a woman, or be on a gender spectrum somewhere between male and female, or have a non-binary gender identity like agender, pangender, gender queer, androgynous, or self-identify as genderless.
This profound redefinition of the human person has become the foundation of a radical extensive policy platform to enforce transgender ideology across wide areas of society.
Labor’s platform aims to drive the transgender agenda into schools. “Labor believes our schools must be safe environments that enable all students to learn – including same-sex attracted, intersex and gender-diverse students. Labor will continue to support national programs to address homophobia, biphobia, transphobia and intersexphobia in schools. This includes ensuring gender diverse students are able to express the gender they identify with, including through preferred name and dress.”[2]
Furthermore: “Labor is committed to making sex education inclusive of all sexualities and gender identities. Labor will ensure the sex-education curriculum is kept up to date and reviewed regularly by both nongovernment organisations and experts working in LGBTI health.”[3]
This appears to confirm Labor’s promise to recommence federal funding for the highly controversial Safe Schools, which the Turnbull Government axed, or similar programs that promote gender-fluid ideology in all schools and require schools to allow boys identifying as girls and vice versa to wear the uniform of their choice, as well as enforcing the transgender person’s preferred pronoun: that is, people must refer to a girl identifying as a boy as “he” or use non-gendered pronouns for those who don’t identify with any gender, such as “ze”.
Labor’s platform will put more pressure on the health budget. It states: “Labor acknowledges the right of all Australians, including transgender and gender-diverse people, to live their gender identity. For many, this includes accessing specialist health services and for some people can involve gender affirmation surgery. Cost should not be a barrier to accessing these services and/or surgery, and Labor commits to removing, wherever possible, out-of-pocket health expenses for transgender people incurred in relation to their gender identity.”[4]
At a time when there are already enormous pressures on the health budget, prioritising transgender services for medical sex changes will mean that those requiring essential health procedures such as hip replacements are going have longer waiting queues.
Labor’s platform extends transgenderism into sport. “Labor require effective policies and practices to prevent discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or intersex status (including women athletes with intersex variations), whether affecting participants in sport or their families, or employees and volunteers in the sector, including by making such action against discrimination a condition of Commonwealth funding.”[5]
If competitors cannot be discriminated against on the basis of their gender identity, Labor is ensuring that men who identify more as women would have legal protection to compete in women’s sporting teams, unfairly disadvantaging and endangering female competitors.
Labor’s National Platform appears to target religious-based organisations. Under the heading, “Removing discrimination”, it states: ‘Labor believes that no faith, no religion, no set of beliefs should ever be used as an instrument of division or exclusion, and condemning anyone, discriminating against anyone, vilifying anyone is a violation of the values we all share, a violation which can never be justified by anyone’s faith or belief. Accordingly, Labor will review national anti-discrimination laws to ensure that exemptions do not place Australians in a position where they cannot access essential social services.”[6]
It appears that tenuous religious exemptions in anti-discrimination and other laws will face review. This is reminiscent of Labor’s 2012 attempt to consolidate all federal anti-discrimination laws, which saw 30 LGBT, human rights and legal lobbies make submissions saying they wanted no exemptions, or draconian restrictions on exemptions for churches, schools, community groups, let alone businesses.[7]
Labor’s National Platform targets the workplace. Under the heading, “The contemporary challenge”, it states: “Labor believes in improving wellbeing and productivity through safe, socially inclusive workplaces, that value diversity and are free of discrimination, including on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or intersex status.”[8]
Does this mean that workplaces will have enforced transgender language, or transgender toilets and change facilities, or fewer exemptions for businesses and religious organisations when it comes to employment?
Furthermore, the platform states, Labor will “continue to recognise that gender-diverse Australians face unique stigma and mental-health harms through the gendering of government documents, workplaces and facilities such as public toilets. Labor is committed to breaking down barriers to social inclusion for transgender Australians.”[9]
Labor will “review documentation requirements, including passports and birth certificates, as they affect transgender and intersex people, to facilitate their equal enjoyment of human rights without discrimination and to promote identification options beyond binary male/female.”[10]
These policies appear to be an attempt to intensify pressure on the states to fall into line with the changes Labor made in 2013 to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984. Following those changes, Attorney-General Dreyfus introduced the Australian Government Guidelines on the Recognition of Sex and Gender, which requires all federal government documents to carry a new sex identifier Male, Female, X (Indeterminate, Unspecified, Intersex).
Indeterminate means “someone whose biological sex cannot be unambiguously determined or someone who identifies as neither male nor female. Many terms are used to recognise people who do not fall within the traditional binary notions of sex and gender (male and female), including non binary, gender diverse, gender queer, pan-gendered, androgynous and inter-gender.”[11] This is how people are now recognised on passports, ATO forms, Medicare and all other federal government forms. Labor has been pushing for the states to give the same transgender recognition in all areas of state and territory jurisdiction.
Labor’s platform aims to fund assisted reproductive services for all LGBTI couples. “Labor will … ensure access to assistive reproductive technology programs is not determined by economic circumstances or any form of discrimination, whether on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or relationship status.”[12] “Labor will seek national agreement on the recognition of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex parents, based on the principle that LGBTI-inclusive couples should be able to access assisted reproductive technology, to adopt, and to enter into domestic surrogacy arrangements, on an equal basis to cisgender heterosexual couples in every Australian state and territory” and “allow for inter-country adoption by LGBTI parents on an equal basis to cisgender heterosexual people”.[13]
Labor’s platform targets free speech. “Homophobic, biphobic, transphobic and intersexphobic harassment by the written or spoken word causes actual harm, not simple mere offence, to people who have suffered discrimination and prejudice, and causes particular harm to young same-sex-attracted, or gender-questioning and intersex people, and considers such harmful harassment is an unacceptable abuse of the responsibilities that come with freedom of speech and must be subject to effective sanctions. Labor will consider whether current anti-discrimination law provides such effective sanctions.”[14]
How far is Labor going to extend anti-discrimination laws? Australians have already seen an attempt under Tasmanian anti-discrimination law to prosecute Catholic Archbishop of Hobart Julian Porteous for distributing materials supporting natural marriage.
Labor’s platform will intrude further on the rights of parents and medical practitioners. Labor will “ensure that child protection authorities acknowledge attempts to ‘cure’ same-sex attracted or gender-questioning children and young people as serious psychological abuse; and acknowledge these harms, when suffered within the family, as domestic violence against the child”.[15]
What does Labor mean by saying that attempting to “cure” gender questioning is a form of domestic violence? If this is referring to children with gender dysphoria, then the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 5 (DSM-5) lists gender dysphoria as a psychological disorder. Alexander Korte et al. surveyed the incidence and treatments of gender dysphoria in medical literature and found that between 80 per cent and 97.5 per cent of children with gender dysphoria have resolved their identity uncertainty by adulthood and identify only with their biological sex recorded at birth.[16]
Is Labor instead suggesting that gender dysphoric children should be socially and medically transitioned instead of assisting them to manage their condition until they are adults capable of making their own decisions?
Labor will also establish a National Gender Centre to advocate for transgenders;[17] investigate establishing a Commissioner for Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Intersex Status;[18] and look to impose sanctions on nations where homosexual conduct is illegal and “will work strategically to support and assist both local and international civil society organisations in promoting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex human rights”.[19]
Labor’s National Platform presents a sobering insight into how Australia would look under a Labor government. Its transgender agenda indicates draconian legislation that will severely curb the freedoms and rights of any one disagreeing with their agenda.
