A large crowd met in Forrest Place today to show their continued support for marriage equality. The rally organised by local activists organisation Equal Love had a substantially greater number of people attending compared to the last rally organised by the group.

The crowd, estimated at 1,500 people, heard from a variety of speakers including Green’s MLC Lynn MacLaren, Joey Cookman from Playgroups with Pride, Jess McLeod from the National Union of Students, Danny Cain from the Maritime Union of Australia, Sam Cavallaro – Convener of Equal Love, Farida Iqbal from Equal Love, trans activist Jayne McFadyen and Miranda Wood representing the United Agaist Bigotry and Racism campaign.

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Lynn MacLaren said stories that LGBTI people have shared about their experiences are starting to change the minds of politicians. MacLaren urged supporters of marriage equality to contact their local politicians and express how important this issue is to them personally.

MacLaren said that particualar attention should be given to four politicans who have not declared their thoughts on the issue listing MPs Christian Porter, Ken Wyatt, Melissa Price and Julie Bishop. MacLaren said politicians like the member from Brand Gary Gray showed that politicians can listen to the people their represent and change their mind.

MacLaren shared that she was recently in her birth country, the USA, where she could have wed her partner, but here in her adopted homeland of over thirty years that right does not exist.

“I could have made that committment and had that ceremony in the land of my birth. Now what makes me different because I stand here in Forrest Place and I don;t have that right. What makes us different from anyone of us who live in South Africa, who live in France, who live in Scotland, who live in Ireland, who live in the UK, who live in any one of the countries, including Catholic countries like Mexico. What makes us different that we have less rights, less recognition, here is Australia.” MacLaren said.

Trans rights activist Jayne McFadyen spoke about how the current marriage laws affect people who are transgender.

“I use the words marriage equality not same sex marriage,” McFadyen said, “Same sex marriage implies a two men or two women and some trans people can not get the gender recognition for various reasons… we need to make sure we always use the phrase marriage equality.”

McFadyen shared her personal story highlighting that the current laws foreced her to seek a divorce from her longterm partner to be able to transition gender. The activist shared her desire for the laws to be changed so she could remarry her partner.

McFadyen said that marriage equality would not change whether or not churches had to perform weddings. McFadyen said people had to ignore the slippery slope arguments put forward by conservative voices like South Australian senator Cory Bernardi.

“Marriage equality is about two consenting adults. His argument that people will want to marry their pet dogs, I’m sorry but whenever will a dog be a consenting adult. People talk about “well, it allow pedophillia through the marriage of child brides”, well I’m sorry – but that doesn’t involve two consenting adults. Marriage equality is about consenting adults being able to marry regardless of their gender.” McFadyen said.

There was also entertainment from musician Luke John O’Dell, satirical comedy from Prime Ministerial look-a-like Baloney Abbott and an uplifting performance from the Gay and Lesbian Singers of Western Australia (GALSWA).

After the speeches the crowd marched through the city before returning to Forrest Place to hear the choir sing a rendition of Sara Bareilles tune ‘Brave’.

Graeme Watson, images: Leigh Hill.

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Update: 11 August 2015 – This article was updated to include Farida Iqbal as a speaker.