Reasonable Bystander

Peter Slipper the Clown Prince of Parliament?

I have been reading with some consternation now for the last few weeks about the carryings on of the current Speaker of the House of Representatives of the Parliament of Australia the Honourable Peter Slipper. To me it would seem that he is intent on reducing the office of speaker to a laughing stock.

Since being appointed to the role by the Gillard led minority Labor government now independent formerly Liberal National Party MP Peter Slipper has reintroduced robing and a ceremonial processional from his office to the chamber once a week. He obviously equates the theatre associated with his role as speaker with importance.

His antics have, however, been lambasted in the local press - and by local I mean Australian press and he has become a favourite of cartoonists and satirists nation wide. Why are you doing this to the hitherto respected office of speaker of the house? In the words of a former - former liberal party candidate who made it as an independent- ‘Please explain.’

Marriage, sexuality, discrimination and give a damn.

Since the institution was first developed marriage has been between unmarried members of marriageable age of the opposite gender. Those raised in the Judeo-Christian tradition will recall being taught that the purpose of marriage is to legitimise the union of two people for the purpose of bringing forth the next generation. Other traditions took a more political approach looking upon marriage as a tool for consolidating power by building family ties with similarly influential or powerful families. Whatever the reasoning for it marriage was always between a man and a woman again for reasons of procreation and ensuring that property acquired by reason of all this power-broking stayed within the family line. Family was an important thing.

Then when society became more complicated and populations larger and it was necessary to regulate the conduct of human affairs by legislation the various legislative instruments dealing with marriage and its nature and characterisation reflected the age old formulation of one man and one woman. Sure there was a gloss put on the definition such that in Australia under the Marriage Act 1966 marriage is defined as ‘the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of others voluntarily entered into for life’.

The churches still look upon marriage as a sacrament but people can get married these days without intervention of the church as long as they fall within the legislative definition of marriage set down by the legislature. Religion no longer has a monopoly on marriage yet people still get married according to traditional religious ceremony and observance. Why? Because that’s what it means to get married to them and the tradition in which they were raised.

The world wide web is a sensitive place

I was recently involved in a discussion on Gizmodo about a recent defamation claim made on the Australian Tech and lifestyle forum ZGeek.com.

The thrust of the article is that the world wide web is a dangerous place to shoot from the hip when commenting or ranting about things because it invites the sensitive or litigious internet user to make a claim for defamation in relation to the offensive post.

Whilst that may be true it is limited to those circumstances in which the identity of the person at whom the rant or offending comment is aimed being identifiable by other readers of the comment whether by name or through some identifying particulars mentioned in the post. It is not enough for a disgruntled reader to say ‘I resemble that remark!’ and be able to run off and file a claim in the court of their choice.

Of course anyone can file a claim in a court of competent jurisdiction the question of course then is - will the claim stand up to scrutiny?