Rally

Went to my first rally yesterday.

I wanted to stay for the mass illegal wedding, too, but I'm sad to say that I had other plans, and my legs were getting tired, so I bailed early. (Since I know Jal will huff in frustration and say it's not an illegal wedding, since they are allowed to have weddings, I want to make sure to include that so he doesn't huff at me.)

I was super psyched up for it. MrFodder and I picked up some rainbow coloured shoelaces from Rebel Sport a while ago, and I thought it would be a good time to finally change over my shoelaces.

There were so many people around. At the rally itself, they estimated around 15,000, but one newspaper said there were 20,000.

They had a bunch of people speak at the rally, including some politicians. One of them said that 70% of people who were polled about their voting preference said that they'd vote yes. 90,000 new voters have enrolled this year. A and I were being cynical and wondering whether this whole thing was a ploy to get people to enrol to vote.

One of the organisers said that the sea of people reached all the way down Swanston street, which was pretty amazing. I couldn't see that either from where I was standing. Everyone was really nice, and complete strangers were talking to each other, asking about their experiences. People were wearing some pretty creative T-shirts with funny slogans, or dressed up in fairy costumes and things like that. I heard people complimenting them, asking how much effort went into it, lots of supportive comments, it was really nice. There were even some churches who were there in support as well (and both Graham and Michael will huff at me for not mentioning that they told me there's nothing in the bible against homosexuality, so I'm going to leave this comment here, too).

The banners were great, too. My favourite was this one:

And they had a competition for the best one, with the winner being one that said, "Computer says yes". The runner up was one that listed all the countries who have legalised gay marriage. There were a couple (at least I think they were together) who had a sign saying "Taste the rainbow" and they had baked cupcakes in lots of different colours and were giving them away.

I can't remember the names of any of the speakers, and I was too far back to see anything (standing on the steps of the State Library of Victoria), but there were a few stories that struck a chord with me. One woman spoke about how she and her partner both campaigned heavily to be able to have her name listed on the birth certificate of their kids even though her partner was the biological mother. Which was quite fortunate, as unfortunately, her partner passed away, and she knew that if she hadn't been listed as a parent, she would have had to go through a lot of headache fighting for custody of her children.

Another woman spoke about how her husband had transitioned to being a woman. With the way the marriage laws are now, would that mean they would have to get divorced? The stories were really nice to listen to. It wasn't even the illegal wedding part and I was starting to tear up.

A lot of the speakers pointed out how unfair it was that they aren't allowed to get married just because they're both the same gender, something about John Howard changing the marriage act, and urging people to spread the word and encourage the people around them to vote. They mentioned how the younger generation, who would be more likely to vote in favour of gay marriage, are less likely to vote in a postal vote.

To be honest, I started to get bored after a while, it felt like the talking went for hours. I got there at 12:45, and left at around 2:30. Even the people around me were also getting restless, with quite a few people saying, "Can we just march now?"

The crowd got riled up once we started chanting "What do we want?" "Marriage equality" "When do we want it?" "Now!" "What are we voting?" "Yes!" (It'd be funny if on plebiscite day, the question is changed to, "Should it be illegal to marry someone of the same gender?" or something like that.)

I got to participate in my first rally chant!

We finally started marching, but it was getting a bit late, and I had some things I needed to do, so I joined them until the corner of Elizabeth and La Trobe and bailed.

Admittedly, while we were waiting around at the library, I kept thinking what if a bomb had gone off? I think it would have motivated anyone who was thinking about abstaining into action, probably in favour of marriage equality. Hopefully such dire measures won't be required.

I don't have a personal sob story about this cause, I just think it's something that's unfair. Michael challenged me to write a gender-swapped girl power story (male trying to succeed in a traditionally feminine role), and at first I thought to make my character gay. I interviewed a couple of my gay friends, and one of them said something that made me feel sad. When he came out to his parents, they were accepting of it, having guessed the truth a long time ago, but he later found out that his mum was heartbroken because she would never have a (biological) grandchild. It never even occurred to me that that would be an issue with having a gay child.

Then I think about my other friend, who actually talked me out of making the character gay, as he said it would undermine the message of the story (i.e. the only reason they want to do something feminine is because they're gay, not because it's OK for guys to want to do feminine things). He has gone through all the same kinds of relationship struggles that I have. He falls in love just like I do. He get jealous just like I do. Why shouldn't he be able to marry the person he chooses to spend the rest of his life with? It's not an amazingly compelling argument backed by facts, but it's enough for me to want to vote in favour of gay marriage.