Atralian Court Dismiss Challenge to Gay Marriage Postal Survey

ATRALIANS’ SUPPORT OF GAY MARRIAGE WEAKENS NEW POLL

CANBERRA, Atralia (AP) — Support for legalizg gay marriage Atralia has weakened jt as a natnal postal ballot asks voters where they stand on the ntent issue, acrdg to a new opn poll. The ernment said Monday has sent ballots to all of Atralia's more than 16 ln voters askg whether the natn should lift s prohibn on same-sex marriage. Rults of the ballotg that began Sept. 12 will be announced Nov. 15. A poll by Sydney-based market rearcher Galaxy Rearch published The Atralian newspaper found support for gay marriage had slipped five weeks om 63 to 57 percent. Opposn had grown om 30 to 34 percent. The survey of 1,695 voters was taken om Thursday to Sunday. It had a 2.4 percentage pot marg of error. If most of the ballotg rpons favor same-sex marriage, Parliament will vote wh a month on legislatn to lift the ban. But some lawmakers have vowed to vote down marriage equaly regardls of popular opn. If most of the mailed- rpons oppose same-sex marriage, gay rights advot fear that marriage equaly uld be off the polil agenda for years. A close rult will amplify qutns about how accurately the postal ballot reflects popular opn. Ireland and Atralia are the only untri to put the qutn of gay marriage to the general populatn. Market rearchers argue that an opn poll uld more accurately gge Atralians' attus at a actn of the 122 ln Atralian dollar ($97 ln) price tag of the postal ballot. Reports have emerged of someone markg others' ballots "no," stolen ballots beg dumped and people attemptg to ctn their ballots on webs. There are also ncerns that shg a torch through the return-envelop n reveal the vote si, meang postal workers uld potentially dispose of ballots they disagree wh. Opposn lawmaker Warren Snowdon said someone picked up a bag of mail the Outback Aborigal muny of Gunbalanya his Northern Terrory electoral divisn last week and filled out other people's ballots. In remote muni, letters are not livered to hom but are llected om a mail center. Snowdon said a "reputable person" had wnsed the potentially illegal tamperg wh others' mail, but did not name that wns. People n fill out others' ballots, but only if thorized by the addrsee. "It's not peculiar, I don't thk, to Aborigal muni the Northern Terrory. I thk there is a potential for this to happen across the board," Snowdon said. "This is absolutely rptg the procs." The Atralian Bure of Statistics, which is nductg the postal survey, said had vtigated the Gunbalanya allegatn and found no evince of d. The bure released no tails of what s vtigatn had found. "The ABS warns Atralians theft or tamperg wh mail is a crimal offence and rri ser penalti," the bure said a statement. Reports of pil of ballot papers beg found streets of the ci of Canberra and Melbourne have been put down to theft om mail box. Atralians who have not received their ballots by Monday n apply for replacements. Each ballot is dividually bard and mailg a replacement ncels the missg origal. Most of the opn poll published on Monday was nducted after former Prime Mister Tony Abbott, a vol "no" vote advote, said he was head-butted by a "y" mpaigner on Thursday. Both sis of the bate nmned the vlence that left Abbott wh a swollen lip and his alleged assailant wh an asslt charge. * gay marriage opinion poll australia *

Whether that was accurate or not, that is how many the gay muny felt. Dpe the emotnal turmoil and pa, many LGBTIQ people went to that vote feelg, the entire mpaign for a y vote was about hearts and mds — actively pulled at the heartstrgs of Atralians who had a gay child, uncle, niece or work mate.

Returng to Pearson's central premise — that a Voice would rce racism Atralia — let's look at the only parison we have: the same sex marriage end homophobia? However, the bulk of the public bate seems to be based on tuive or speculative perceptns of the tras of people who are likely to oppose or support same-sex marriage, or on anecdotal ed data om the Hoehold, Ine and Labour Dynamics Atralia Survey (HILDA) to asss trends the gree of support for same-sex marriage, and to ascerta the characteristics of those Atralians who do, or don't, support dataIn 2005, 2008, 2011 and 2015, the HILDA Survey asked s natnal panel to rate their gree of agreement wh the statement "Homosexual upl should have the same rights as heterosexual upl do" on a sle om one (strongly disagree) to seven (strongly agree) HILDA data has strengths and weakns pared to recent poll data. Examatn of the 2015 HILDA Survey data revealed marked differenc the gree of support for equal rights for same-sex upl across populatn support was signifintly greater among:women;non-heterosexual (gay/lbian, bisexual) people;younger people;people wh gree-level or year 12 as their hight tnal qualifitns (pared to lower than year 12, or a profsnal qualifitn);non-relig people;people born Atralia or an English-speakg untry (pared to people born a non-English-speakg untry);people wh higher ; andpeople livg major ci (pared to those livg regnal/remote areas) the factors were acunted for, there were few and small differenc across Atralia's stat and ss on the fence?

This analysis foc on whether people around the world thk that homosexualy should be accepted by society or not.

POLL SHOWS ATRALIANS BACK GAY MARRIAGE BUT NOT REFERENDUM PLAN

A majory of Atralians support gay marriage, an opn poll on Wednday found, but they do not back the ernment's plan to hold a natnal vote on whether should be allowed. * gay marriage opinion poll australia *

Homosexualy should be accepted by society OR Homosexualy should not be accepted by society. The term “homosexualy, ” while sometim nsired anachronistic the current era, is the most applible and easily translatable term to e when askg this qutn across societi and languag and has been ed other cross-natnal studi, cludg the World Valu Survey.

Dpe major chang laws and norms surroundg the issue of same-sex marriage and the rights of LGBT people around the world, public opn on the acceptance of homosexualy society remas sharply divid by untry, regn and enomic velopment. As was 2013, when the qutn was last asked, attus on the acceptance of homosexualy are shaped by the untry which people live.

ATRALIA’S GAY-MARRIAGE VOTE IS DIVISIVE, EVEN FOR GAY-MARRIAGE BACKERS

Those Wtern Europe and the Ameris are generally more acceptg of homosexualy than are those Eastern Europe, Rsia, Ukrae, the Middle East and sub-Saharan Ai. In many natns, there has been an creasg acceptance of homosexualy, cludg the Uned Stat, where 72% say should be accepted, pared wh jt 49% as recently as 2007.