Last week, The Age ran a story about an elderly gay couple living in Port Melbourne who were forced to take down their rainbow pride flag.
While the apartment complex’s body corporate’s letter demanding the couple remove their pride flag from their balcony which the couple flew on celebratory occasions claimed the ban on flag waving was part of a uniform policy prohibiting “advertising”, it is unclear what the gents were supposed to be spruiking apart from their gayness.
Murray Sheldrick, 78 and James Bellia, 72, received the threatening email from their body corporate who claimed the flag had violated their Port Melbourne apartment building’s rules by hanging the flag over their balcony, who demanded they take the flag down or face legal action in VCAT.
The former interior designer couple, who have been together for 50 years and are now retired, bought the Port Melbourne apartment in 2004. The couple moved to Port Melbourne after Mr Sheldrick, who suffers from Parkinson’s Disease was the victim of a brutal hate crime in 1998 in the snow town of Mansfield which left him in intensive care.
Thankfully, following the outrage spurred by The Age’s story, a host of lawyers have come forward offering to represent the couple in court on a pro bono basis.
In the meanwhile, we can only hope someone takes it upon themselves to give the Rouse St apartment where the men live a DIY rainbow of their own in solidarity.
Perhaps at least its a sign of progress if the gay bashing back in 1998 didn’t make headlines, but in 2015 the right to proudly wave a flag makes the news.
Over the weekend, the annual GLOBE Awards black tie gala honoured LGBTIQ people helping gay people across many fields of endeavour from the Media Person of the Year Award which went to MCV Editor Rachel Cook to Switchboard Victoria, the volunteer-run telephone counselling service that for 24 years has been providing support to gay, lesbian, bi and trans people to outgoing MQFF Festival Director Lisa Daniel who was awarded Artist of the Year while Jason Ball was named Sports Person of the Year. While long serving Australia Lesbian and Gay Archives president Dr Graham Wilhett was awarded the People’s Choice Award, the winner of the GLOBE GLBTI Person of the Year went to transgender activist Sally Goldner.
The first trailer for SBS’ comedy adaptation of Benjamin Law’s first book The Family Law has been released. The comedy, adapted by Matchbox Pictures, tells the story of teenage Ben growing up secretly gay in his Chinese family on the Gold Coast. The six part series will air on SBS in early 2016.
