The Australian Christian Lobby has called upon Tasmanian Legislative Councillors to not compel speech.
Instead, acting state director Dan Flynn is urging all Council members to vote in favour of Tania Rattray MLC’s “free speech” amendment, to remove Clause 9(a) and (b) of the Justice and Related Legislation Bill 2018.
“The current Clause 9(a) and (b) would make gender expression a protected attribute and extend the scope of Tasmania’s anti-discrimination fines into many everyday situations where no offence is intended,” warned Dan Flynn.
“Failing to use the correct pronoun for someone can unintentional occur in many settings. However, under the current bill it wouldn’t matter whether the person intends to give offence or not.”
“This is a dangerous precedent to set, which is why we are encouraging all upper house members to vote in favour of removing Clause 9(a) and (b),” said Mr Flynn.
“Pronouns are also becoming far more numerous and varied, especially for those who identify as genders that do not sit anywhere on a male–female spectrum. It is unreasonable to expect that people will never unintentionally fail to use the correct language to address someone.”
