Last week, a Canberra couple made international headlines when they declared they would get divorced if gay and lesbian couples were allowed to get married. In essence this was the Groucho Marx approach to marriage: if they can join, I don’t want to be a member anymore. Of course, like most same sex couples when I heard the Christian couple Nick Jensen and his wife Sarah had promised to end their ten-year union out of spite if same sex couples were able to legally marry in Australia, I thought “Look at all the fucks I give about your marriage” and promptly got on with my day. After all, nothing demonstrates the sanctity of marriage than divorcing your spouse to prove a point about people who don’t affect you at all. Several people commented that Nick Jensen might in fact have had his own homosexual tendencies. Someone cheerfully helped hurry up the divorce by creating his own Grindr profile for Nick. Meanwhile, his own brother slammed the protest and another acquaintance publicly declared she had uninvited him to her wedding in October.
This week, ABC’s Q&A hosted their first LGBT-themed panel discussion which was only half-jokingly nicknamed #qandgay this week. Along with a panel of prominent LGBT people including chair Tom Ballard, veteran political scientist, author and activist Dennis Altman and Paul Capsis, the producers of course decided to invite the Reverend Fred Nile along to throw some shade around.
While many of those enjoyed the idea of having Nile there basically for the lolz, to put it in perspective this is a man who has basically dedicated his life to homophobia. In the 1970s, he campaigned as the leader of the Festival of Light organisation against the decriminalisation of homosexuality, and tried to have Australia introduce laws that would have allowed gay and lesbian public servants and teachers to be fired. Every year since Mardi Gras, Fred Nile literally prays for the good Lord to rain on our parade, literally. He holds an annual vigil on the day of the parade, an anti-Mardi Gras where a few hundred Bible bashers and bigots come together to protest against the “blasphemous” parade. While you might think such views are laughable and irrelevant these days, it is worth remembering that Fred Nile is still a sitting member of the NSW Parliament, and has been for most of the last 40 years. If ever you wanted a living embodiment of how far we’ve come, Fred Nile sitting on a panel of openly gay and lesbian people on the verge of being able to wed is pretty much as good as it gets.
Elsewhere in the world, Lithuanian dance music producer Ten Walls proved you can kill a career in the music business with a single utterance when it emerged that he had made a series of virulently homophobic comments on his own Facebook page. In a since-deleted Facebook rant, Ten Walls wrote: “I remember producing music for one Lithuanian musician, who tried to wash my brain that I don’t need to be so conservative and intolerant about them… When I asked him ‘what would you do if you realized that your 16-year-old son’s browny (anus) is ripped by his boyfriend?’ Well he was silent.”
Ten Walls, real name Marijus Adomaitis, then went onto compare homosexuality to paedophilia and claimed that “in the good 90s…these people of different breed were fixed.”
The fall out was swift and brutal. Ten Walls apologised for the comments and said he was taking a break from music. Within days, the producer went from being on the bill of some of the world’s biggest music festivals and having a hit track to being persona non grata just about everywhere. Sonar, HARD Summer, Creamfields, Pitch and Urban Art Forms all removed him from their lineups, Coda dropped him from their books and his record company cancelled pre-orders of his LP. Quite apart from it being 2015, and the idea of having an inherent problem with someone just because of their sexuality is archaic at best, it is particularly hypocritical to be a homophobe in the world of electronic music. After all, it was gay men in Chicago underground clubs who invented house music – hence the name came from the original Frankie Knuckles’ club Warehouse.
He also got slammed by many of the world’s best DJs and producers, including Tiga who summed up the sentiment beautifully on Twitter when he wrote: “ah, the hate that lies behind the mask of soulless white-bread anodyne emo-landfill-tech-house. Ten Walls go fuck yourself.”
This Friday June 19 CLOSET returns for the first soiree of the winter months with a Miley Cyrus-themed party in homage of the 22-year-old coming out as bisexual in Paper Magazine, which she donned the cover mud-wrestling her pet pig. DJs Mafia, Salvador Darling and Mimi are joined by newcomers Luke Agius and Estee Louder on the decks at Little & Olver, 393 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy. Doors open 10pm. Entry is $15 on the door. Full details: facebook.com/closetpartyoz.
TROUGH X: XVIII will bring its dark handsome self to Club 80 on Saturday June 27 for a night of men’s only fun at the sex-on-premises venue from 5pm until 2am. DJs for the occasion include Kiti, That Fahri Guy, Gavin Campbell and Misty Nights. Club 80 is 10 Peel Street Collingwood. Tickets are $60. For full details visit troughx.com.
If you fancy something a little less dark and dirty, and more inclusive, queer disco The Outpost is back on the same night at The Gasometer for the brilliantly named Wintour of Our Discoteque party. The Gasometer, cnr Smith St and Alexandra Pde in Collingwood. Djs Steven Weir, Whiskey Houston and J-NETT. Tickets on the door are $15.
Melbourne Cabaret Festival is also kicking off this month, and Jessica McKerlie is presenting her a cabaret journey through gender fluidity called Gender Spanner. The Butterfly Club from Wednesday June 17 – Saturday June 27. For details, visit thebutterflyclub.com.
