Money speaks, so let it talk about marriage equality - Women's Agenda

Money speaks, so let it talk about marriage equality

Over the last two days I’ve received a bevy of messages about Kevin Rudd, something that is becoming less common these days. His changed stance on same-sex marriage has caused quite a stir, especially among my straight friends.

Even my mother giddily spoke to me on Tuesday morning about Rudd’s new-look ideas on marriage.

Still, my response to most of this has been, “great, who cares?”. Because frankly I don’t.

Rudd might have broad public appeal, but he doesn’t represent me. His electorate of Griffith is about 4,000 kilometres from where I live in Western Australia. While I’m happy for more MPs to support marriage equality, I just don’t care about each individual one.

While the Greens are putting forward a bill to amend the Marriage Act on June 6, convincing someone who is left (even by ALP standards) to support the bill is, to say the least, pretty insignificant. While there are a number of high-profile supporters of LGBT issues within the Federal Parliament, advocates aren’t playing the game right: the socially-progressive left aren’t using the numbers to convince us all of the benefits of marriage equality.

If we’re going to make a big push for marriage equality the business case needs to be made. While marriage is thought to only impact the two involved in the union, there are significant economic gains that can also be made.

Shelley Archer, National President of Parents and Friends of Lesbian and Gays, has consistently noted the prevalence of “pink dollars” for weddings. In the United States the friendly divorce lawyer is excited for marriage equality because for them it means an injection of US$9.5 billion to their industry. New York City received an immediate economic injection of $250 million around travel, tourism and wedding services following its move to marriage equality.

But LGBT campaigners continue to focus on the social policy outcomes instead of the economic benefits – which are really needed to convince members of the Coalition, industry leaders and wider society.

Marriage equality might not seem like a women’s issue, but gender equity is a broad church, and this step is central to demystifying many issues surrounding women’s and LGBT issues.

Marriage equality bills are likely to fail in Australia, just like they have in other countries. But we get closer to achieving this goal by changing tactics: returning the focus to how we can all economically benefit from love.

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