Photos from same-sex weddings around the world show Australia is lagging.
Married same-sex couples worldwide have called for Malcolm Turnbull to stop blocking marriage equality in Australia in a new crowdfunded TV advert launched yesterday on Sky News.
The couples are all members of All Out, a global group fighting for the rights of lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people. They submitted their wedding photos to push for Australians to be granted the same rights as other gay and lesbian couples worldwide.
“All Out members from Canada to Uruguay and South Africa to Belgium have sent their beautiful same-sex wedding photos to Malcolm Turnbull to remind him that Australia is lagging on marriage equality,” said Leandro Ramos, Interim Executive Director of All Out, a two million-member global movement for love and equality. “The photos will be aired in a TV ad on Sky News to urge the Prime Minister not to stand in the way of love, and instead allow a free vote on marriage equality in Australia.”
Gay and lesbian couples submitted their photos to All Out through Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for the new TV ad. The advert opens with the message “To Malcolm, with love” and then shows same-sex wedding photos from Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United States and Uruguay.
The wedding photos pile up throughout the TV ad, demonstrating how Australia lags behind its global allies by dragging its feet on marriage equality. The TV ad’s closing message is, “The world is saying ‘yes’ to marriage equality. It’s time you do the same. Now.”
450 All Out members chipped in individual donations to pay for the production and airing of the advert. The advert will play 17 times on Sky News – screened inside the Australian Parliament buildings – starting from Thursday 3 December, in slots just ahead of news programmes such as AM Sportsline, PM Agenda, News Now and the Friday Show.
Pro-equality Australians had high hopes for marriage equality when Malcolm Turnbull took over Tony Abbott in September. In the first couple of days after Turnbull became Prime Minister, thousands of All Out members in Australia called for him to allow a free vote on a cross-party marriage equality bill.
But he refused and instead laid out plans for a plebiscite on marriage equality after the 2016 election.
Pressure on Turnbull is mounting after the Senate officially backed a motion in November that rejects a marriage equality plebiscite and urges the Prime Minister to grant his Liberal Party a free vote on the issue. The state parliaments of Tasmania, New South Wales and Western Australia have supported the same motion.
To Malcolm, with love. from All Out on Vimeo
To see the crowdfunding for the TV ad, click here
Click here to see an album of same-sex wedding photos submitted by All Out members.
