Last night the Head of the Australian Christian Lobby Jim Wallace featured on Channel Ten’s The Project to justify PM Gillard’s stance on the new Anti-Discrimination Act. Gillard has assured that religious institutes will still be able to discriminate based on sexuality, this means schools and hospitals will be entitled to fire/refuse to hire members of the LGBT community.
Arguing against the panel of presenters, Wallace stuck to his guns on the topic; Dr Andrew Rochford posed the question:
‘One of those wonderful values that I took away from catholic schooling is “do unto others as you would do unto yourself”, surely you wouldn’t want to be discriminated against so why is it okay for you guys to discriminate against anyone?’
With conviction, Jim Wallace rebutted, ‘I’m not aware of any Christians trying to be employed in any gay bars or gay institutions and I would expect the gay population should be extending that same privilege and courtesy to Christians.’
Fellow presenter Gorgi Coghlan argued ‘Jim, when you talk about political affiliation… When I vote Greens, it’s because I choose to vote Greens, when I vote Liberals, it’s because I choose to vote Liberals but if I’m gay that’s not a choice, so is this really fair?’
Receiving astounded laughter for his response, Wallace stated ‘well that’s arguable because we haven’t really found a gay gene’.
Presenter Charlie Pickering also piped up, asking ‘I’m curious to know how a gay person answers the phone at the high school any differently to a straight person?’, Wallace responded with ‘You always reduce it to the lowest common denominator, the receptionist or the gardener, but we’re talking here perhaps more fundamentally about the teachers and what they teach the children. We’re talking about the example that they set for children in their moral lives and for a Christian school for instance’.
OIP Staff
