|
The other night I was doing an interview on Joy 94.9's Gay News Week and came in on the tail end of a conversation about Prime Minister Gillard's acceptance of an invitation from the Australian Christian Lobby to speak at one of their up coming events.
She has spoken to the ACL a number of times. In fact she even launched their election website in 2010.
Now as a political party I couldn't ask her to speak at one of our events but what about Sexpo? It is attended by tens of thousands of people who may hold somewhat different beliefs to the attendees of the ACL conference.It would be a great way to get to a wide range of young voters as the average age of Sexpo attendees is 24.
Actually, I think her attending Sexpo would help her in the polls. Lets face it, it couldn't hurt!
the next day I spoke to a senior ALP member and asked what he thought about the PM attending Sexpo, he rolled his eyes and said I doubt that very much. I asked why she would attend an ACL conference but not Sexpo. "Because they are much meaner and nastier than you" or words to that effect. Pretty much sums it up!
I wrote anyway.
Dear Prime Minister,
We note your recent agreement to address the Australian Christian Lobby conference on 6th October. We also note that this is the second time you have agreed to address this lobby group.
The ACL holds many views on sex and sexuality that are not shared by the majority of Australians, so we congratulate you on being prepared to address a minority morals group, as well as other more mainstream community groups. Your media advisor is quoted as saying “I can say that the Prime Minister addresses a wide range of groups, and has addressed the ACL in the past.”
We would like to invite you to address a much larger group of people who would pretty much represent a collective view that was diametrically opposed to the ACL. This is the annual Sexpo Adult Lifestyle Exhibition at the Melbourne Conference & Entertainment Centre between Nov 30th and December 2nd. We would propose that you address a selected group of 300 VIP patrons at the annual Eros Shine Awards on the 30th November. We would rebroadcast the address to the 60,000 patrons who will attend over the next four days.
Most of Sexpo’s patrons are young couples from the suburbs and young people living in and around Melbourne.
We would propose a 15 minute talk with 15 minutes of questions from the floor.
Many younger voters are concerned about prohibitions on their sexual lives these days and the rise of the nanny state. This would be an excellent way for you to address such concerns.
Of course we would treat the occasion with the utmost dignity and professionalism.
Thank you for considering this request and we look forward to hearing from you soon.
Yours truly,
Fiona Patten
Gillard agrees to address Christian lobby
14 August 2012 AAP
PRIME Minister Julia Gillard has agreed to address the Australian Christian Lobby conference on October 6.
ACL managing director Jim Wallace said the organisation had a policy of alternately inviting a major political party leader to its national conference.
"The prime minister's engagement is part of the political process and Australian Christians represented in the community should have a right to expect that the PM would want to address them," Mr Wallace said in a statement.
The prime minister, an avowed atheist, is expected to speak on the theme of "religious freedom in a secular democracy" on October 6 in Canberra.
|
