THE Hume Supports Marriage Equality group will hold their official campaign launch at the Goulburn Club on Friday night.
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Independent NSW MP Alex Greenwich will be a special guest speaker at the event, partnered with Marriage Equality Australia.
Group spokesperson Tom Sebo said the meeting was open to all interested in the cause.
“Our group is a non-partisan grassroots campaign and we hope to attract people of all different ideological persuasions,” Mr Sebo said.
“At the end of the day it’s one of those issues that doesn’t fit anywhere on the political spectrum.
“It is nothing to do with left or right as far as the economy goes and it’s not really a moral issue as it’s not to do with the beginning or ending of life like abortion or euthanasia. It’s an issue of social and legal equality, personal freedom and liberty.”
The group, active since late May, has already rallied some 570 supporters on Facebook.
But, Mr Sebo said more active members are needed to build momentum.
“One thing we do need is volunteers. At the moment we have a lot of supporters but as the campaign progresses we need people to become more active,” he said.
Over the weekend, Marriage Equality Australia will hold training workshops with interested volunteers, a petition to Hume MP Angus Taylor will begin circulating and campaign initiatives launched, including a special Facebook-inspired campaign, Humans of Hume.
Modelled from the popular Humans of New York, the movement is encouraging community members to speak up in favour of equality.
Posted as a photo gallery on the Hume Supports Marriage Equality Facebook, subjects say in their own words why they support law reform. While results up until now have varied, compassion is the common thread.
Among those already interviewed for the campaign include John and Rona Dorman (see above), Malcolm Green, Judy Collins, Gloria June Smith and and former Goulburn Mulwaree Senior of the Year Pat Spilsbury.
“I’m 81-years-old and in July my husband Brian and I will have been married 63 years,” Mrs Spilsbury said.
“We have four children, nine grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren and if any of them became involved in a same-sex relationship and wanted to get married, I’d hope they’d have the same opportunity Brian and I did all those years ago.”
For more information or to RSVP to any of the weekend’s events, visit www.australianmarriageequa lity.org/marriage-equalitycomes- to-goulburn.
Alternatively, contact the group via their Facebook page ‘Hume Supports Marriage Equality’ or email marriageequalityforhume@ gmail.com.
To be featured in Humans of Hume, email a photograph of yourself and your views to the group.
Humans of Hume: Rona and John
JOHN and Rona Dorman (pictured left) have been married for 62 years. John is 89 and Rona is 90, but both believe in equality.
“It’s about the law, whether you agree with it or not doesn’t matter,” Mrs Dorman said.
“It’s not your life, it’s theirs… I think it’s wrong for people to abuse gay couples that want to marry. They should have the same rights as everybody else.”
“I see no reason why if two people want to make a permanent union, why they shouldn’t be allowed to,” her husband added.
- Photo and quotes supplied by Tom Sebo