I who may well be...

Musings from the perspective of a human being who may well be not locatable completely within the usual categories of male or female or gay or straight or transsexual or intersexed or exploiter or exploited or supplier or consumer or performer or spectator.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

More Troops = Less Health Care

What a sad indictment of our politician’s priorities, when we don’t have enough money for adequate public health care as it is, and they want to spend more money on more people killers! Yes, people killers. That’s what army troops are, not just spunky boys in uniforms, or exciting dress-up games with fireworks, but people killers. That’s their job, and our government, not content with our contribution to the slaughter in Iraq and Afghanistan, want to use more of our money for killing. Meanwhile, a close friend of mine is denied a scheduled operation due to lack of funding for the public health system.

It’s not just immoral to pour resources into killing people, it’s also unbearably draining on the public purse, and leaves more of us without adequate health care (or education, or child care, and so on). I’m alright now, but I plan to be older one day, and maybe in need of some public health care eventually. How about you?

Monday, August 14, 2006

PM pulls migration Bill

THANK YOU to all who supported the campaign against exporting orphans to desert islands. Byt the skin of our teeth, and enough energy lobbying people like Senator Steve Fielding to temper his fear driven protect-the-family agenda with the humanity of actually meeting a refugee and hearing their story (and family values) to swing him to take a braver, more Christian stance.

(What is called Christianity it more often the mouthings of hypocrites and modern pharisees. Actual Christianity is still as popular now as it was when Jesus was nailed up. It is not an electorally or physically safe course. For believers, however, uncompromising unconditional love and absolute personal integrity is the only course of action worth taking. And the alternative is just more fear and hate and war.)

the following report is from

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200608/s1714296.htm
Prime Minister John Howard says the Government will not be proceeding with its controversial migration Bill.

The laws, under which all asylum seekers arriving by boat would have been processed offshore, passed the Lower House last week but numbers were tighter in the Senate.

It would have taken just one Coalition senator to cross the floor, or two to abstain from the vote, for the Bill to be lost.

Mr Howard says he is disappointed the Bill will not go ahead, but it could not succeed.

"What has happened is that the Labor Party and a small number of Coalition members and senators have together - not acting together, let me make that clear - but their views have virtually coincided, that combination means we would not secure passage of the legislation," he said.

"In those circumstances I recommended at a special Cabinet meeting that the Government not proceed with the legislation.

"So it will not, of course, be debated in the Senate and there will be no further process in the Senate in relation to the Bill."

Labor's migration spokesman, Tony Burke, has welcomed the scrapping of the Bill.

"You don't protect Australia's borders by surrendering them," he said.

"That's what this Bill did, it was about pretending as a nation that we had no border. It was about pretending as a nation that it is wrong to lock children up in Australia, but fine to cause them to be locked up in Nauru."

The Refugee Council of Australia says it is relieved the Bill has been dropped.

The Council's chief executive, Paul Power, says many people were worried about the impact of the Bill.

"There's been a lot of community anxiety about the legislation for the past four months," he said.

"Many organisations have been raising concerns and, in fact, the list of concerns that people had were very, very long, there were lots of factors in the legislation that were particularly poorly thought through."

Friday, August 11, 2006

Marriage Equality Rally Taylor Square 1pm This Sunday 13 Aug

I will be speaking and singing at this rally this Sunday, http://www.caah.org/nda/2006/pdfs/posterdraft.pdf
about terrorism and love.

I'll be at the Hyde Park end of the Rally, around 3pmish.

It's a funny battlefield, marriage, which ironicly I'm fighting at the same time as equal access to Sex On Premises Venues!

Of course, as a Christian, I can't personally endorse marriage ("There is no marriage in Heaven", "In Heaven there is no slave or master, Gentile or Jew, male or female"), but I support the rights of all people in this secular society to have equal opportunies to screw their lives up as they see fit.

Whatever your views on marriage, this is about equality.

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

norrie on Triple J Hack Census night

I was on Triple J's Hack show Census night 5:30pm right across the island continent, talking about androgynous identities and the census: question 3: Male or female, tick one only!

Monday, August 07, 2006

Petition to stop the killing in the "Middle East"

Dear friends, Right now a tragedy is unfolding in the Middle East. Thousands of innocent civilians have been killed or wounded in the bombings in Lebanon, Palestine and Israel and the death toll is rising every day. If the US, Syria or Iran get involved, there is a chance of a catastrophic larger war. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has called for an immediate ceasefire and the deployment of international troops to the Israel-Lebanon border, and been strongly supported by almost every world leader. This is the best proposal yet to stop the violence, but the US, the UK, and Israel have refused to accept it. I have just signed a petition calling on US President Bush, UK Prime Minister Blair, and Israeli Prime Minister Olmert to support Kofi Annan's proposal. If millions of people join this call, and we advertise our views in newspapers in the US, UK, and Israel, we can help pressure these leaders to stop the fighting. Go to the link below and sign up now! http://www.ceasefirecampaign.org

Friday, August 04, 2006

Open letter to Senator Fielding re jailing&exporting refugees

I am sick of my religion being used to justify homophobia and xenophobia. The fundamental importance of Christianity to me is encapsulated in the parable of the Good Samaritan, which shows how a civilised person gives aid to the needy stranger, rather than just care selfishly for their own kin. Please, Senator Fielding, show your fellow Australians what a Christian really is, and shame to the hypocrites who spout pious while condemning children to jail.


norrie mAy-welby

Lay Member, Uniting Church of Australia, Waterloo Parish (Sydney NSW)

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Sex-on-premises venue accused of discrimination


This post also appears on Eunuch Love, my more personal blog, but it is appropriate to both, being about my love life (that blog), and my public/political life (this blog), for the two intersect when the police are called and the law is broken by those who want to keep androgyny or gender ambiguity away from their preciously gendered spaces.
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from http://www.evolutionpublishing.com.au/sxnews/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=682&Itemid=41

This week's SX news weekly (Sydney gay paper)

Thursday, 03 August 2006
Sex-on-premises venue accused of discrimination
KATRINA FOX
Transgender activist Norrie May-Welby (pictured) has lodged a complaint with the Anti-Discrimination Board of NSW (ADB) against sex-on-premises club The Pleasure Chest on George Street in the city after s/he was refused entry to the venue’s cruise lounge on the grounds she was “not a man”.

Police were called to the scene on Sunday after May-Welby, who identifies as “androgynous, not a man, not a woman, a man and a woman”, refused to leave the premises.

“A staff member told me [the cruise lounge] is a men-only area,” May-Welby told SX. “I told him this was a breach of the Anti-Discrimination Act of NSW. He wouldn’t let me in and asked if I would leave. I said I was not leaving. The staff member called the manager, who turned up after about an hour with three armed police.”

After discussion with police officers, May-Welby was eventually admitted to the cruise lounge. “The police pressured the manager to let me in,” May-Welby said. “I told them the law is being broken every minute I’m not allowed in there; it’s being broken every second I’m being treated differently to anyone who’s not considered a man.” [Blog editorial note: that sentence works better if the "not" is dropped]

Under NSW law, a venue must gain an exemption from the ADB if it wishes to operate a single-sex policy. May-Welby said s/he expects The Pleasure Chest, which currently does not have such an exemption, to apply for one, but urged the GLBTI community and the ADB to oppose this. “Trannies should be allowed to go somewhere too,” s/he said. “Who’s got the right to decide what I am?”

A spokesperson for The Pleasure Chest told SX it was investigating the matter at press time.