BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE
Gay rights activist Rodney Croome believes that the Tasmanian government's proposed changes to relationships laws will give Tasmania one of the best set of lesbian and gay human rights laws in the world. As evidence of this, Croome cites the fact that there are "no exemptions or exclusions in the existing Anti-Discrimination Act".
In most Australian states and in other countries with anti-discrimination laws, churches, religious schools and welfare agencies have exemptions allowing them to discriminate against homosexuals. In some states all educational institutions are exempt.
"This is not the case in Tasmania, where it would be illegal even for the Catholic Church to excluded gay men from the priesthood [although this hasn't been tested in the courts] and the blood bank cannot prohibit gay men from giving blood", Croome told Green Left Weekly. The act also prohibits incitement to hatred in stronger terms than in other states.
"The proposed relationship law reform is unprecedented because it applies not only to same sex couples but to all 'significant personal relationships' including older companions, extended Aboriginal families and others. This will give these people more rights that they have anywhere else in Australia."
In addition to having all the legal rights currently available to de facto couples "people in all these types of relationships will be able to prove their relationships by official registration". This is not the case in other states where gay couples' relationships still tend to be challenged — particularly in emergency situations.
These legal changes in Tasmania come in a context where "only seven years ago they were banning gay films and only 14 years ago they were arresting gay activists in the Salamanca markets".
Tasmania, Croome observed, "became a byword for homophobia around the world because of the hard-fought and at times acrimonious campaign to remove our former anti-gay laws".
While the law reform is the most obvious change, Croome also points to dramatic changes in the policies of the state government's health and education departments. "Up until the late '90s, the education department had the most regressive policies including a complete ban on lesbian, gay and transgender teachers and bans on any discussion of homosexuality in classrooms.
"Now, the department has some of the most progressive initiatives in Australia, including a lesbian, gay, transgender reference group with community and departmental representatives. They have completely rewritten their policies including developing an anti-homophobia policy and they are overseeing a whole range of anti-homophobia initiatives.
"The teacher transfer policy now includes reference to same sex couples and one of the Tasmania Together benchmarks is for all teachers to receive anti-homophobia training in the next five years.
"The health department also has a reference group with community and departmental representatives and they have rewritten the department's policies to be more inclusive. For example, the equal opportunity policy has been rewritten and they are implementing anti-homophobia training — first to managers and equal opportunity officers and then to the rest of the department's 8000 employees."
Croome points out that how these changes were brought about "tells us about social change and how it happens". Change didn't come "from the top — it has come entirely from the bottom. Changes in laws and policies have only come from politicians and bureaucrats after changes in community attitudes."
Croome cites opinion poll results from 1988 when only 31% of Tasmanians were prepared to support gay law reform and anti-discrimination legislation (which was the lowest result in the country). Ten years later, almost 60% of people were in support.
"Community attitudes have changed", Croome said. "This is why the laws have changed. Each of these polls showed only a very small number of people undecided (around 7%), so that means that antagonistic people have become supportive.
"How did that happen? The answer is that there has been more debate on these issues in Tasmania than in other places in the world. Not one single Tasmanian could escape that debate. People were forced to think through the issues. Once people begin to think, they are forced to reevaluate their positions."
According to Croome, the campaign was one of "ceaseless community education", which had a "dramatic effect in a tight-knit community". The campaign was based on mobilisation, "not only by lesbians and gays but also our straight allies". Street "marches send a strong message".
"Gay law reform became a metaphor for Tasmania's future which resonated throughout the community. The achievement of gay law reform became a symbol for which direction the state would go in."
Croome explained that the struggle for legal recognition of democratic rights of lesbians and gay men was increasingly seen as party of "a broader reinvention of Tasmania", "a metaphor for a freer Tasmania".
"The real change happened in the hearts and minds of ordinary Tasmanians. Social change only comes about through building those relationships with people across the community. It was only through that relationship that any change could happen. If we had sat back and relied on abstract principles of justice and we wouldn't have got anywhere.
"This might sound odd because of our appeal to United Nations was based on abstract principles. But the importance of that appeal to the UN was in a broader context of changing community attitudes in Tasmania.
"The human rights movement has relied far too much on abstract and universal principles of human rights to achieve its goals and the result is Hansonism, Ruddock and Woomera. Quoting the Universal Covenant on Human Rights does not create social change. Pieces of paper like the international covenant mean nothing if respect for human rights is not taken to heart by the community.
"The only way to wipe [anti-democratic] policies and ideas away is to establish those relationships again; to accept that the most important people in any human rights agenda are ordinary people out in the suburbs."
Human rights activists need to "reach out to them, talk to them face to face, to locate issues in their own experiences, in the places people live and to mobilise them. That is the only answer. It is only in that context that pieces of paper like the international covenant can have any impact."
Bringing about progressive changes in the law and government policy takes a big effort and a lot of sacrifice by activists, according Croome "It is a big effort and it can't be done from an office. It means lots of travel, talking, public meetings, marches, demonstrations and placard painting. It requires a big investment for a big return."
From Green Left Weekly, January 15, 2003.
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