On Wednesday morning, local time, Australia learned the results of the postal survey on same-sex marriage. An overwhelming majority of Australians — 61.6%, more than 7.8 million people — voted ‘yes’ to the question “Should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?”
All that remains now is for the government to act on the poll results and pass the necessary legislation — which the Prime Minister is pushing to have done before Christmas.
And Eurovision stars are celebrating the results along with ordinary Aussies, sharing plenty of rainbow emojis and kind words.
Delta Goodrem (Australia JESC 2015 songwriter)
Crying with happiness ??????????
— Delta Goodrem (@DeltaGoodrem) November 14, 2017
Isaiah (Australia 2017)
?
— Isaiah (@isaiahofficial) November 14, 2017
Anja Nissen (Denmark 2017)
Dustin the Turkey (Ireland 2008)
Thinking of me good pals Skippy & Emu tonight. #Proud pic.twitter.com/TTav8Mwdvr
— Dustin The Turkey (@DustinOfficial) November 14, 2017
Lee Lin Chin (Australia’s points spokesperson)
As a newsreader for a public broadcaster I'm meant to have zero opinions so I'll just say this… GOOD! ABOUT TIME! SUCKED IN OPPOSING VIEW!
— Lee Lin Chin (@LeeLinChinSBS) November 15, 2017
Saara Aalto (Finland 2018)
Australia? World? Love?#loveislove pic.twitter.com/7TVe4WBsYB
— Saara Aalto (@saaraaalto) November 15, 2017
Myf Warhurst (Australian commentator)
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSS
— Myf Warhurst (@MyfWarhurst) November 14, 2017
Julia Zemiro (Australian commentator 2009-2016)
YES! ???. Resounding YES. In the UK, Tears as I watch my feed full of friends’ relief sadness anger and happiness. Now let’s get out of their way and legislate.??#MarriageEquality #ssm pic.twitter.com/sWiI9ZipwN
— Julia Zemiro (@julia_zemiro) November 15, 2017
Joel Creasey (Australian commentator)
So stoked. So relieved. So gay. ????
— Joel Creasey (@joelcreasey) November 15, 2017
I actually like how some people get triggered over such articles every time. 🙂 Congratulations to Australia.
So you like people being annoyed? Sympahtic attitude I must say….or rather not!
Thanks Robyn and Wiwibloggs <3
As a heterosexual woman, I must say that I’ve never seen so many men wanting to be married (joke). Congratulations! In my country Romania will be a referendum to change the constitution that now says marriage is only man+woman, but we don’t know when, and nobody knows what result will be.
As long as people who don’t want to participate or provide for the ceremony aren’t forced to, more power to ya’ll.
And to those celebrating the world cup- soccer is a stupid game.
Now let’s not to make priests or whatever as oppressed because it’s the other way round.
Hey Pollaski, long time no see. How’s life in Trumpland? You don’t have to answer that. The marriage equality movement has been about civil marriage, nobody has been forcing religious institutions to comply with anything against their will. They can keep their religious vows, and leave legal marriage to the rest of us. Of course anybody who works for civic authorities will have to comply with the law and not discriminate. The system would grind to a halt if everybody behaved like that nutty clerk from Kentucky. I guess bakers can refuse to bake cakes and such, but while that… Read more »
Yeah right! The biggest sports in the world is stupid. I guess your country can’t even enter this game.
My country can’t even beat Trinidad & Tobago. Therefore its a stupid game.
@ Pollaski: Well, we have homophobia (not in this thread though), we have hetereophobia, and now….footballphobia!
and rockphobia sometimes too, I forgot to mention. Not often fortunately, but some fans seem to dismiss anything which is rock in ESC.
There is so much Eurovision news in Wiwibloggs but some ridiculous bigots purposely came to this article, trying to make a big deal about how they hate the connections between Eurovison and LGBTs. If you easily get infuriated by LGBT news, man, you’re not a hater but a pathetic fan.
Well said.
Maybe you are the pathetic one Dew, who obviously can’t accept people having different views than yourself, but go on insulting others.
If you call being an homophobic ‘an opinion’, I guess the homonym of the frogis the pathetic one…
@ Dew: I prefer to answer your message politely. Who has been homophobic or rude in this thread? Not any straight ones at least. So practise what you preach please.
If anyone is rude here, it’s those folks who get angry whenever straight fans actually “dare” to have the slightest element of critism.
Get marriage won AND Australia qualified to the World Cup today on Steve Irwin day. He must be watching over his fellow Australians.
Gay* marriage. Ducking autocorrect.
get wouldn’t be wrong at all, lots of aussies will be also able to get marriage 😉
A world cup with no US, but Australia. Kind of strange. Nice they made it in the end. I doubt Honduras (which they played in the play offs) would have that much impact in the World Cup anyway. I personally hope for England, as they always underachieve in the tournaments. Despite the potential.
So? Next information please. More eurovision stories…
There have been three Eurovision stories already posted since this article went up, so this happy news has really has not disturbed regular readers of this site at all – most of whom will be delighted to see Australia do the right thing and will be only too happy to stand in solidarity with their antipodean friends – unlike you, apparently. That is the “so”.
Yep! This is “gay news”. Not “Eurvision News”. Nice for the gay people in Australia though.
But why make such a big deal whenever there is the slighest possibility to add fuel to the ESC / gay stereotypes? We have often seen that, on an otherwise great ESC-site – I should add 🙂 ESC is not a gay event, even if there are many straight male fans. I say this with respect for gay people, but I don’t like stereotypes around ESC / the fan culture.
Even many of my gay male ESC-friends are bored with it actually.
Just say congratulations Australia and shut up lol
Music is the key,
Get a grip. You’ve trotted this sh!t out in the past. No, The contest is not a “gay” event, and nobody thinks it is. Not least the many heterosexual women who love the show, although for some reason from your male-centric point of view, they don’t seem to matter to you.
I do understand your terrible plight, though, God forbid anybody mistake you for a gay person. Please examine yourself and grow.
Jonas – you might not like what I write, but there’s no needto be downright rude is it? Speaking of “growing up….” I often disagree with you on this case it seems, but it doesn’t mean I feel I have to be “educational”. People should accept different views without problems. For a start, of course I know many females(lesbian, straight whatever) love the contest. I by no means “underestimate” them. Rather the opposite. At least, good you also agree that ESC is not a “gay thing”. There are people who think so. Which isn’t very inclusive, when we know how… Read more »
Y’see, the thing that’s obnoxious is you using this news to shoehorn your unconnected views about your perceived “gay” image of the contest – the fact is that his news story fits perfectly with Eurovision’s stated aim of inclusivity and celebrating diversity. We are one. Building Bridges. Celebrate Diversity. Come together. All aboard.
Ring any bells?
Finally, this plebiscite result is “nice” for more than just gay Australians, it is “nice” for all Australians – especially the 62 percent who voted “yes”. The rest can suck it.
Those slogans are not meant to be about “gay people” though. They are just what they are. About how ESC unites people.
I can understand how some people get bored with this ESC – gay connection. It’s getting tiresome in the long run
What gay connection? Please elaborate. I’m sorry that it’s “tiresome” for you, perhaps it would be easier for you if we all transported back to the 1950s?
I never said those slogans were exclusively for the gay rights movement, but it is wilfully ignorant to deny that this article fits in with the general sentiments.
In any case, YES won and will continue to do so, and that’s all that really matters. Like Conchits said, we are unstoppable.
@ Hazar – exactely!
What is the point of doing what people complain about? Really backward thinking.
Btw – I won’t stop reading or writing here. Why should I? (or we) Like you said, such things dont happen often. But maybe you should try to take constructive critism a bit more differently. When I comment – I mean generally now – I might be critical sometimes.(as well as often positive) But at least I try to not get too OTT, “off topic” or “angry”. Instead I try to explain WHY I mean the things I do. Many people don’t even bother explaining…which is fair enough. But maybe not so “discussionable” the way I see it. However, I… Read more »
Look at this poor, oppressed heterosexual whining because if the Eurovision is associated with LGBT culture, his manliness will be triggered. 🙁
@ Polegend
A good friend of mine said, the wise person is the one who leaves the discussion, when argumentation gets stupid. So therefore – I leave it.
I give up threads like this I guess. Some people just can’t argue without using the exactely the same whining themselves, as they accuse others for…
#ProudToBeAustralian #YES #LoveIsLove #LetsDoThis
So happy (and relieved) for my LGBTQI family and friends. The months of the ’ hateful and highly misleading ‘No’ campaign has been absolutely brutal on them. I hope today’s result of a resounding ‘YES!” will help the community know that they are loved, valued and supported.
It hasn’t been approved yet lol it was a $122 million survey by the government asking if they should get married, now as the result is yes the gov can choose what they want to do with the result, act on it or not
Wouldnt be considered a democratic country if they didn’t listen to the people.. right?
Our conservative government doesn’t care what the people think, and they didn’t have to spend $122 million to conduct a postal survey to know that two thirds of the country wanted marriage equality- a previous prime minister changed the constitution by himself quickly in 2005 updating the marriage part, the govt and prime minster who back SSM could’ve done the same and got it over with
Didn’t the representatives of each district state they’d vote according to their district’s opinion? Well, if so, same-sex marriage won in 90+ districts and only lost in 17…
Nope each member of parliament can do whatever they want, and it depends on which bill is proposed
Turnbull turned down the conservatives’ bill, so…
Depends on how they twist the results. This could still be off the table if they shine a particular light on it.
However before that can be done, they still need to fill the seats of the politicians caught up in the citizenship saga.
Yaaaas, Great job Australia!
Correct me if I am wrong though but didn’t Australia have gay marriage and then got rid of it? I somehow remember that. 🙁
Its 2017 dudes, love should always win. And human rights over religious views always. And @Robyn and @charles. In NL, Those who refuse to marry gay couples get fired.
#lovewins!
It was never defined until 2004 when the then Prime Minister John Howard updated the law to only allow hetero couples to marry.
The ACT government then tried to change it within their jurisdiction only to have the Prime Minister of the day Tony Abbott issue a High Court challenge and win because it went against the constitution.
What took them so long? Every Western country has legalized it. I’m surprised Australia didn’t legalize it long time ago.
Its like Math Denis, the more religious people in a goverment, the less chance people get equality. Thats why countries like Netherlands, Spain, Denmark, Sweden etc all got lgbt rights so fast. Being pretty much atheist countries with a state and church seperated.
Spain is far from being irreligious, people are just very open-minded and kind-hearted there.
“Every western country has it…” except Northern Ireland!
Not all Western countries have legalized it. Italy and the Czech Republic are still missing among the countries where the public opinion is for same-sex marriage. Austria will get it done in early 2018 after a supreme court ruling, and Switzerland has it planned for as late as 2020.
Congratulations to Australia. 🙂
A bit worrying though that 38.4% of the votes were for homophobia, effectively!! Harsh place!
Well, older people voted more heavily than the under 45s, and the predominantly Muslim districts in Sydney had a huge impact on New South Wales’ results.
It’s not Muslims it’s bogans in western Sydney and dumb people in general 😛
Those are poorer areas regardless.
Well about damn time Australia kept up with the rest of the world! even on their neighbor New Zealand its already legal lol 😉
The result is amazing, poor the ‘no’ campaigners spending all those millions to lose like that. Finally the last major anglophone country has same-sex marriage too! 🙂
Austria is supposed to legalize marriage equality as well by early 2018, according to their supreme court ruling! <3
The no voters did not loose, Christian priests still are able to refuse to marry gay people in Australia.
Marriage has always been a religious institution.
Gays will never be married in heaven when they die.
I have nothing against the LGBT community, but this lie that they cant love unless they are married is extremely funny, so they are saying that many people that are not married but live in defacto relationships cant love.
I think millions would have something to say about that.
”Christian priests still are able to refuse to marry gay people in Australia.”
Is there a country where priests are forced to marry LGBT? If yes, I don’t think is right. Separation between state and church. Secular law should have nothing to do with religion.
I’ve heard that in France, the state/secular public employee refused to marry a French woman with an Moroccan man because there were suspicions that he only wants French citizenship. And this is legal, to deny people civil marriage if there are suspicions like that.
Look, in a country that’s 30% irreligious like Australia I don’t think many gays wish to be married in church anyway.
Correction: Not all of the UK has same-sex marriage yet. (Northern Ireland doesn’t have it.)