The war on religious freedom.

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Cooldude said:
Fall short of making adultery a criminal offence (again), don't want Barnaby to go to jail with Johnny Depp's dogs
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The one I particularly like is that if a student at a religious school becomes an agnostic, he can be punished with detention, etc.
Now that's freedom of conscience for you.

Apart, of course, from the general legalisation of bigoted and offensive abuse of, just as an example, the disabled - merely for being disabled.
 
FredLeDeux said:
The one I particularly like is that if a student at a religious school becomes an agnostic, he can be punished with detention, etc.
Now that's freedom of conscience for you.

Apart, of course, from the general legalisation of bigoted and offensive abuse of, just as an example, the disabled - merely for being disabled.
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To me this seems to totally fly in the face of Section 116 of the Australian Constitution. Not to mention how many other anti-discrimination laws, bullying and harassing laws this breaks. Have fun being a lawyer when it comes to addressing the lawsuits when they pop up.

Also submit your thoughts on the bill here https://www.ag.gov.au/Consultations/Pages/religious-freedom-bills-second-exposure-drafts.aspx
 
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GreyWind said:
To me this seems to totally fly in the face of Section 116 of the Australian Constitution. Not to mention how many other anti-discrimination laws, bullying and harassing laws this breaks. Have fun being a lawyer when it comes to addressing the lawsuits when they pop up.

Also submit your thoughts on the bill here https://www.ag.gov.au/Consultations/Pages/religious-freedom-bills-second-exposure-drafts.aspx
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The High Court has never knocked down any legislation under s116, and I don't think it likely that it will with this monstrosity either.
 
At woolies today was tempted to contribute to bushfire victims fund

then I saw it was Salvation army And thought twice. Do the churches think they wont get a backlash?
 
FredLeDeux said:
A summary of the worst, most obnoxious effects of the Religious Privilege Bill:

As well as an explainer about the bill’s provisions, it includes examples from the government’s explanatory memorandum (EM) and stakeholders about what people would be allowed to say or do if the bill passes.

Statements of religious belief will not be found to breach other federal, state and territory discrimination laws.
Examples:

A Christian may say that unrepentant sinners will go to hell, an example cited in the EM which mirrors the facts of Israel Folau’s case
A doctor may tell a transgender patient of their religious belief that God made men and women in his image and that gender is therefore binary (EM)
A single mother who, when dropping her child off at daycare, may be told by a worker that she is sinful for denying her child a father (Public Interest Advocacy Centre)
A woman may be told by a manager that women should submit to their husbands or that women should not be employed outside the home (PIAC)
A student with disability may be told by a teacher their disability is a trial imposed by God (PIAC)
A person of a minority faith may be told by a retail assistant from another religion that they are a “heathen destined for eternal damnation” (PIAC).
Caveats – statements must be made in good faith; not be malicious or harass, vilify or incite hatred against a person or group; not advocate for the commission of a serious criminal offence.

Discrimination against a person on the basis of religious activity is unlawful.
Example: public evangelising/street-preaching – even where this is in contravention of council bylaws (EM, Just Equal).

Unless it is against the law to refuse treatment, health practitioners can conscientiously object to providing a health or medical service and no professional rules can override that right.
Examples:

A Catholic doctor refusing to provide contraception to all patients (EM) or to prescribe hormone treatment for gender transition (Equality Australia, Just Equal, LGBTI Health Alliance)
A Catholic nurse refusing to participate in abortion procedures (EM) or to provide the morning-after pill to a woman admitted to hospital after a sexual assault (Equality Australia)
A pharmacist refusing to provide the pill to women for contraceptive use (EM), or hormone treatment (Public Interest Advocacy Centre, LGBTI Health Alliance)
A doctor refusing to prescribe post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) within the required 72-hour window to a patient whose condom broke during a sexual encounter on the basis of religious beliefs that forbid sexual activity outside marriage (Equality Australia)
A psychiatrist saying to a woman with depression that “she should be looking forward to the kingdom of heaven”. Under the proposed laws, the psychiatrist could challenge their deregistration as religious discrimination, while the patient could have her disability discrimination complaint refused (Equality Australia)
A law passed by a state parliament that banned the promotion of programs that seek to “convert” LGBTIQ people could be overridden by the federal attorney general as an infringement on “statements of belief” (Just Equal).

Religious discrimination in employment is permitted to continue:

Religious hospitals, aged care providers or accommodation providers such as retirement villages may discriminate against their staff on the basis of religion both in terms of hiring and to set codes of conduct requiring them to act in accordance with that faith
A religiously affiliated business may require senior leaders to hold or engage in a particular religious belief or activity where that is an inherent requirement of those positions (EM)
An Anglican public benevolent institution could require its employees, including volunteer workers, to uphold and act consistently with Anglican doctrines and teachings at work (EM)
Domestic duties – a person hiring a live-in nanny or in-home carer services may require that they be of the same religious belief or activity as that person (EM)
An employer can ask a prospective employee whether they observe any holy days during which they can’t work to determine if they can fulfil the inherent requirements of the work (EM).

An office worker could declare on social media that a fellow employee is in a wheelchair because they are sinful and urge them to attend a faith healer. The workplace inclusion policy would be overridden by such a “statement of belief” and any action taken against the offender could be appealed to the Human Rights Commission as “religious discrimination” (Just Equal).

Schooling
A Jewish school may require that its staff and students be Jewish and accordingly refuse to hire or admit someone because they were not Jewish (EM)
A student attends the same religious school through their primary and secondary education. At 16 they lose faith in the religion of the school and tell a teacher that they are now agnostic. The school would be able to expel, suspend or otherwise punish, for example, give detention to the student (PIAC).

Religious camps and conference sites may discriminate against another person on the ground of religious belief or activity in the provision of accommodation. This is an exemption lobbied for by the Sydney Anglican church with reference to this example: Anglican Youthworks should be able to reject an application for the First Church of Satan to hold a black mass at one of its campsites.

There is also an exception for the provision of accommodation so that a homeowner seeking a tenant for their spare room may require that the tenant be of the same religious belief or activity as the homeowner (EM).

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ralians-be-allowed-to-say-and-do-if-it-passes
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I have to say there's not too much there that should be made illegal by the government. Why the f**k shouldn't someone be allowed to say whatever they think their imaginary friend says? That might make them a complete dick, but that doesn't mean the government should step in. A pharmacist not selling a particular product? Good for them. They probably won't last long in the business. A Jewish school only employing Jewish staff? Sure. As long as they get no government funding they can do what they like.

My major concern is the rights of employers to control behaviour at work. If I go to Coles and get preached at by the check out chick, i'd expect the employer to have the right to impose disciplinary action. A pharmacy employee not giving a customer the pill because of their beliefs? The pharmacy should be able to * them right off.

I'm a little bit skeptical though that the law allows an employer to employ who they want on the basis of religion but also not employ who they want on the basis of religion at the same time. It's either a really s**t worded piece of legislation or the guardian are talking s**t. Both are plausible.
 
On the other hand just six years after the govt did the right thing and uncovering decades upon decades of humrights abuses against children in the neme of religion, an australian government seeks to virtue signal that such institutional and cultural myscogeny can be condoned if it appears to be so in a holy book

to misquote john howard ‘thats five minutes of moral sunshine’ from our federal government
 
Cooldude said:
If this goes through, I'm starting my own business err I mean religion

Gonna base it on something stupid, like Mufasa

Donations welcome, it's all for charity wink wink nudge nudge
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like I said. Our indigenous friends should be codifying a religion s we speak

atheism should lodge too
 

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General Giant said:
So why are the nutjobs trying to change it then?
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That's easy to answer but no one on either side of politics has the guts to say it.

The last census in 2016 had the Christian population falling to 52%. So barely a majority. This is continuing a downward trend from 80% back in the early 1980s and 95%+ a hundred years ago. By the next census (2021) or the one after (2026), Christians will be a minority in Australia for the first time since the early days of British colonisation.

On the other hand, the non-religious population is growing exponentially. Off the top of my head: 11% in the 2006 census, 19% in 2011 and 30% in 2016. The likelihood of it being high 30s or even in the 40%+ by 2021-26 is highly probable. Give it a decade or so from now and we'll be talking about the majority.

So this is having two effects:
1) Those not attracted to or abandoning Christianity (and all religions in general for that matter) are more likely to be moderate average day people who weigh up the evidence and realise humanity via science and technology can explain the hows and whys of life, the universe and everything without the need to resort to baseless supernatural beings, ancient mysticisms and superstitions from the middle ages.

2) As the religious population shrinks, those who make up and dominate it will be more and more the fanatical and extremist types. The ones who arrogantly love to rant that having no religion means you have no values; that western civilisation will die without Christianity even though the beginnings of western culture predates the beginnings of Christianity by about a 1000 years; that the increasing population of non-religious is due to some left-wing conspiracy imposed on our youth by those lefty teachers, academics and the media; and of course my favourite rant - that all non-believers are all communists and hate Western culture. Greg Sheridan is the first one to come to mind spewing out this nonsense.

As usually, it always comes back to fear. They fear becoming the minority which is just around the corner. They are trying this desperate final stand to impose and enforce by law their religious beliefs onto the rest of the population in some deluded attempt to fight off the inevitable. That's why these nutjobs are trying to change it.


As an aside: This episode is ironic as the exponential rise in the Christian population in the 3rd century ultimately lead to it becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire by 312AD and replaced Paganism. The pagans tried to prevent the inevitable with some of the worst persecutions against Christians occurring just 50-60 years before this change in society and their beliefs was cemented. In some ways Western history is repeating itself, except the part of Christians of the past is now taken up by the exponentially growing non-religious population while the modern Christians dying out equate to the old pagans.
 
mighty tiges said:
That's easy to answer but no one on either side of politics has the guts to say it.

The last census in 2016 had the Christian population falling to 52%. So barely a majority. This is continuing a downward trend from 80% back in the early 1980s and 95%+ a hundred years ago. By the next census (2021) or the one after (2026), Christians will be a minority in Australia for the first time since the early days of British colonisation.

On the other hand, the non-religious population is growing exponentially. Off the top of my head: 11% in the 2006 census, 19% in 2011 and 30% in 2016. The likelihood of it being high 30s or even in the 40%+ by 2021-26 is highly probable. Give it a decade or so from now and we'll be talking about the majority.

So this is having two effects:
1) Those not attracted to or abandoning Christianity (and all religions in general for that matter) are more likely to be moderate average day people who weigh up the evidence and realise humanity via science and technology can explain the hows and whys of life, the universe and everything without the need to resort to baseless supernatural beings, ancient mysticisms and superstitions from the middle ages.

2) As the religious population shrinks, those who make up and dominate it will be more and more the fanatical and extremist types. The ones who arrogantly love to rant that having no religion means you have no values; that western civilisation will die without Christianity even though the beginnings of western culture predates the beginnings of Christianity by about a 1000 years; that the increasing population of non-religious is due to some left-wing conspiracy imposed on our youth by those lefty teachers, academics and the media; and of course my favourite rant - that all non-believers are all communists and hate Western culture. Greg Sheridan is the first one to come to mind spewing out this nonsense.

As usually, it always comes back to fear. They fear becoming the minority which is just around the corner. They are trying this desperate final stand to impose and enforce by law their religious beliefs onto the rest of the population in some deluded attempt to fight off the inevitable. That's why these nutjobs are trying to change it.


As an aside: This episode is ironic as the exponential rise in the Christian population in the 3rd century ultimately lead to it becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire by 312AD and replaced Paganism. The pagans tried to prevent the inevitable with some of the worst persecutions against Christians occurring just 50-60 years before this change in society and their beliefs was cemented. In some ways Western history is repeating itself, except the part of Christians of the past is now taken up by the exponentially growing non-religious population while the modern Christians dying out equate to the old pagans.
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and as christianity diminishes, ‘christian morals’ practice by agnostics gets stronger and stronger

(except 1914-1946, funny how it wasnt deemed nessecary for the son to pay another visit then)
 
Maggie5 said:
Can they do that, is it constitutional?
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Down the track I think the High Court will be deciding this on a case by case basis; cases will probably arise where a non-religious person is discriminated against and he/she/supporters feel strongly enough to take it all the way, and state governments will join in on one side or the other
 
FredLeDeux said:
Down the track I think the High Court will be deciding this on a case by case basis; cases will probably arise where a non-religious person is discriminated against and he/she/supporters feel strongly enough to take it all the way, and state governments will join in on one side or the other
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or two different sets of nutjobs butting heads
 
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