Marriage Alliance CEO and Coalition for Marriage spokesman, Damian Wyld, spoke to Raf Epstein of ABC News Melbourne yesterday morning.
“People talk to me all the time about the consequences of changing the Marriage Act. People need to be aware that changing the Marriage Act is about more than changing a piece of paper, changing a few words. It actually has an effect on a huge swathe of the Australian community.”
Pressed for examples of these consequences, Damian replied:
“Let’s look ahead to where same-sex marriage has been legalised abroad like the UK. They’re some years down the track ahead of us in terms of what could happen. There is a Jewish school in London right now who, because they don’t want to teach a Safe Schools like program in the aftermath of marriage being changed.”
Jumping in to defend the UK educational authority decision, Epstein declared that all that was required was that the school teach that “homosexuality is just as much a part of life as heterosexuality; that’s not Safe Schools.”
Wyld responded with concerns echoed by many parents in faith-based schools; that the State would be intervening into what is being taught in schools.
“We’re able to debate and discuss Safe Schools at the moment; that won’t be the case once marriage is changed. It simply won’t be the case.”
Moving on from education, Epstein and Damian also discussed the issue of freedom of belief, particularly when it came to the wedding service providers who did not want to participate in same-sex weddings. Epstein proposed that there was a similarity between a baker declining to bake a wedding cake, and the recent boycott of Coopers Brewery. Damian explained the difference:
“The difference is it’s radical in nature: a one-off instance of “I don’t want to support this particular act” versus “I want to take down a company because they don’t agree with my opinion and I want to force them to change their opinion.” That’s grossly offensive, surely.”
You can listen to the full interview here.