Me, on my way to vote Green at the last election. Apparently.
Stephen Fielding has labelled the Greens 'extremist', among other things for their policy of allowing gay couples to adopt children and behave like normal people instead of hiding behind the facade of the priesthood or a loveless heterosexual marriage.
Here's some great examples from the news of what Fielding has called 'the best environment' in which to raise children. Well? They're straight, aren't they?
Family First make me sick. Their friendly, innocuous-sounding name belies a simmering mess of hatred and bigotry that's just busting to boil over and coat the wider Australian community in its sticky strands. It's Labor's fault Fielding was elected to the Senate in the first place; the Greens actually received more votes, but Labor's preferences delivered the seat for Fielding.
I feel they owe us a fucking apology for inflicting this scumbag on our parliament. As if it wasn't bad enough to begin with.
9 comments:
On behalf of ALP voters I apologise.
I should point out - I left the Democrats because they did the exact same thing.
The Liberals directed their preferences to two other Christian far right parties then they went to Family First.
For some reason people in Vic don't like the Greens.
I don't know why. If it wasn't for their defence and foreign policy I'd likely be a green instead of ALP.
First comment: Sarah, sometimes I think I should just look at the pictures not read your posts :) (I saw the pic and read "Steve Fielding")
Second comment: People, let the fiasco of Steve Fielding being elected over a Greens senator be a lesson to think your senate vote over very carefully.
The whole way the election of the last couple of senators per state works is pretty confusing, but here's a suggestions: If you plan to preference ALP or Liberals ticket as number one then you know there will be some votes that spill over after they've elected their first 3 or 4 people (in states) so their preferences are really important to know ahead of time. In the case of the 2004 election it was safer to preference Greens as #1 knowing that the vote cast will be filtered past that party before it could go to Family First.
I was that annoyed with the preference deals done at the last election I recall numbering all the senate candidates from 1 to forty whatever it was to avoid FF getting any portion of my senate vote.
It annoys me too, partly because I see myself as a *potential* Labor voter and I feel I shouldn't have to be so careful as to go out of my way to label every single box in one of those senate sheets in order to avoid electing a right-wing psycho! For some reason Labor saw the Greens as more of a threat than the Liberals at the last election- or at least an easier target. But the harder they bludgeon the Greens, the less likely they are to win back the support of voters they lost to them in the first place.
Mikey- did the Dems do the same thing and preference Family First above the Greens? Talk about barking up the wrong tree.
I label every box and make sure to put festival of light, aka "No Poofters", last everytime.
"For some reason people in Vic don't like the Greens."
Uh.. Mikey, we're the highest polling mainland state for Greens (if it wasn't for that pesky Tasmania, who incidentally has one electorate that has the highest Green vote in the entire world) we'd be the highest in Australia.
Latest poll showed 13% (Fairfax, statistically on par) and 7% (News Corp, pulled out of arse). Both put Family First at 1%.
Fairfax's ACNielson also had Greens 22%, Lib/Nat 25% for 18-24 y/o's.
Here the first prefences of 2004 Federal:
ACT 8.79% (2 seats, no chance)
TAS 8.43% (SENATOR ELECTED)
VIC 8.13% (Nothing, wtf?!)
WA 7.03% (SENATOR ELECTED)
NSW 6.79%
SA 5.36%
QLD 4.77%
People in Vic do like the Greens, it's just Labor (and the Dems) that don't.
And the Democrats did also put FF before Greens in Vic, here's where they put all put Fielding and Risstrom: (Lower is better obviously)
LAB: FF: 8 GRN: 21
DEMS: FF: 12 GRN: 23
LIB/NAT: FF: 14 GRN: 50
GREENS: FF: 55 GRN: 1 (duh)
Labor did put the rest of FF a bit further down, but still all before Greens.
That's really interesting seeing it laid out like that, Larry. It really does stink. Almost a Greens lockout by doing that but presumably was to get the preferences of all the "new age evangelical" voters whose votes would be filtered through FF first.
The new media laws are a classic example of why we would prefer a Greens senator to be the one the Libs have to deal with rather than a FF senator who doesn't give a shit about anything much beyond making abortion harder.
Ahhh the senate. Almost proportional voting, but not quite...
I wish everyone went under the line, it would clear up this whole dodgy preference mess in a jiffy.
you want voters to think? don't be silly. putting less effort into researching your vote than you would on buying a box of washing powder is what democracy is built on.
Sorry Mr Watermelon. I meant 'other politicians' don't seem to like the greens.
I like the greens. And I certainly agree with 99% of their policies.
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