All people are created equal. Except faggots...

Do you ever get the feeling that things are going backwards in this country? You know, the feeling that, rather than making progress on important social issues, we are heading back toward the dark ages?
For those that missed it, the Victorian Attorney-General Rob Hulls announced yesterday that a compromise had been reached over the proposed changes to the Equal Opportunity Act, striking a balance between religious freedom and freedom from discrimination. It sounds promising, I mean, we like compromise don't we? The proposed changes to the Act will prevent religious groups from discriminating against an individual "on the grounds of race, disability, age, physical features, political belief or activity and breastfeeding". Again, that all sounds fairly positive to me. But wait, what's this?

"Religious groups would continue to be able to discriminate on other grounds including sexuality or marital status if it was in accordance with their beliefs."

And here I was thinking that we were talking about the Equal Opportunity Act - silly me. Seriously, how does this even happen? I'm all for religious freedom - you can believe whatever you want to believe - but not if it's going to be at the expense of other people's job prospects.
Let's keep things in perspective here - we are sacrificing the modern ideal of equal opportunity for the sake of religious dogma that was written between 4000 and 1500 years ago, depending on your monotheistic doctrine of choice. Isn't the idea of giving everyone a "fair go" one of the foundations of our national cultural identity? 91% of Australians seem to think so, according to a Roy Morgan survey.
Where do we draw the line here? If I am an employer in a "religious group" and it is my opinion that Ephesians 5:24 should be interpreted and adapted for use in my workplace, am I justified in employing women only in the lowest-ranked positions within my company? After all, women are always subordinate to men so how could a woman ever be in a position where she might be in charge of men? I don't wanna hear about Women's Suffrage or anything like that, I can do what I like because my actions are in accordance with my religious beliefs.
Sure, it may be a pithy example but the point should be fairly obvious - if "religious belief" is justification enough for actions that might be contrary to the values of our secular society, hasn't something gone wrong with the system? Let's shift gears a little.

The other night after work I flicked the TV on and switched to SBS. Being after 10pm I was fully aware of the risk I was taking - chances are I was to be greeted by some ultra-weird Swedish arthouse film or some thinly-veiled soft-core pornography. It happened to be the latter, a Spanish film named Cachorro, translated into English as Bear Cub. The film followed a "bear" who assumed responsibility for his young nephew after the nephew's mother was imprisoned for drug smuggling. The film's opening five minutes contained the most graphic gay sex scene I have ever seen on Australian television and the following 90 minutes were littered with many more such scenes.

I'll admit that I found the sex in the film a little confronting - not because of the explicit nature of the scenes and obviously not because of some philosophical or religious objection to homosexuality but because, well, I'm just not used to seeing gay sex scenes. It's probably the same feeling I had when I saw my first heterosexual sex scene in a film.
As I discussed some months ago, it is pretty clear that our society is still not used to seeing displays of affection between gay couples and more often than not, such displays of affection are cause for major controversy. In fact, in spite of the concerted efforts of the last few decades, western society seems intent on forever ostracising members of the gay community.

Having experienced the ins and outs of "working class culture" in a cricket club environment over the last decade I have it on fairly good authority that being a "poofter" or a "faggot" is pretty much the worst thing you can be. You know the sort of guy I mean - the bloke that doesn't smash a slab of VB every weekend after playing footy with his mates. Oh, and the guy that doesn't slap his mate on the arse after kicking a goal? Gay. The guy that won't shower with the boys after a win? Must be a homo. And don't get me started on the guy that won't let his team mates piss on him in the showers after the game - what a faggot.
I wish I was making this stuff up, but if you head to the change rooms of any football or cricket club in the country you will soon see what I mean.

I know I'm being overly idealistic in my attempts to foster a greater sense of respect for the gay community, especially among footy and cricket players - it's a far bigger issue than a semi-informed rant can hope to deal with. On the flip-side I also know that there is not nearly enough positive exposure to gay culture in the modern media and that SBS should be commended for having the balls to run films like Cachorro. Finally, I know that in the struggle toward equal opportunity for all, regardless of sexuality, the decision to prioritise religious freedom over freedom from discrimination is certainly not going to help...