I really need some help to understand the collective mindset of Australians.
In November last year the majority of Australians voted in the Marriage Equality Plebiscite to allow same sex couples to marry. This was under the banner of the much touted catch cry of ‘Love is Love’. With the statement that ‘we don’t choose who we love’ the whole idea that Australia voted in favour of was that people can love whomever they want. A man can love a man and a woman can love a woman….and of course now get married.
So now just a few short months later, the nation is outraged and up in arms because our Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce, has changed who he is in love with, leaving his long term marriage to his wife Natalie and now is in love with his former staff member Vikki Campion. There are questions all through the media like, Is Barnaby Joyce fit to be a Politician and indeed is he fit to be our Acting Prime Minister next week when Prime Minister Turnbull is out of the country? Social Media, always rife with highly opinionated people, has been flooded with judgemental statements and or calls for his resignation or sacking. Some of the media are also asking the question of whether what Joyce has done ‘passes the Pub test,’ going on to make the prediction that it fails the said test:- which I guess means, if the question was asked about his suitability for public office in a local Pub, the beer drinking Aussies in the Pub would say no. Certainly the Opposition has made raucous calls for his sacking or for his resignation. Today as I was driving home, the news reports were saying that at this stage Joyce still has the majority support of his party….which the inference seemed to be that this was waning….which would mean that the supporters in his party are deciding that maybe he is not fit to hold office after all.
Here is what I don’t understand. Based on the fact that the majority of Australians think that ‘Love is Love’ and you should be able to love whomever you want…..shouldn’t we as a nation be celebrating the fact that Joyce has found new love, has successfully impregnated his lover who is now with child, and the only Pub test we should be talking about is how many beers Joyce is going to shout the drinkers at his local pub in Armidale.
See to my way of looking at it……Australians when it comes to their response to this Joyce story, are either supremely stupid, spectacularly gullible as they swallow whatever the media feed them or they are horrendously hypocritical.
I genuinely don’t know where I think my conclusion will lie. Isn’t love love? Can’t Joyce love whomever he wants? What’s the difference between being judgemental toward a gay couple – which Australia rejected – and being judgemental toward this couple?
I also want to just add a disclaimer here:- I do not agree with or condone the behaviour of our Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce. This blog is merely me scratching my head at the response of the Australian public.
Anyway, That’s what I think.
Peter
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Categories: Current Affairs
peterpilt 
Very well put Pete I am grieved by the way we as a nation are slipping away from our core values and beliefs
We seemingly so easily get sucked into the medias tripe and play the gullible fool game
Come on Aussies, let’s get fair dinkum again
Well said
Yes, a very interesting observation and a just question. I also must abhor his actions, but the media and public at large including many Christians seem to want to hold him to a higher standard than they themselves are capable of attaining. We have all fallen short of God’s standard and have needed His forgiveness. If my reading of statistics is correct 50 percent of people have had affairs while married. Judging Barnaby Joyce and openly condemning him is not the way to reach him. Showing understanding, grace and praying for him along with showing God’s love. Is more likely according to scripture, to lead to his repentance and salvation. It is Base human nature that wants punishment or revenge in the here and now. It is not the way God works.
When love hurts a party, then possibly love is not love. In the Joyce case, the victims are his wife and children and I suppose the media and the general public might be thinking about how they’re reacting to the fall out, more than “Hey Joyce has found a new love”.
Therefore my take on this, is that if there is an injured party in the mix, then love is not love. (Love does not dishonour others.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8)
People in public office are held to a higher standard and must be. They are running our country and the “common man” look to them for guidance, leadership and direction. The Australian public are well within their rights to expect more of him and others in similar positions. If they don’t want to be accountable to the public for their actions, they should not be holding positions of power. With power comes responsibility. No one cares if so-and-so is down the pub causing a riot on the weekend, but when our footballers do it, there are dire consequences for themselves and their clubs. These are footballers, who do sport for a living. But they are in the public eye and have a responsibility to their clubs and society at large. Why shouldn’t Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce be held to even higher standards? When it is someone in leadership in question, they cannot behave the same way the “common man” does, by virtue of their office. If he doesn’t want his life scrutinised, then step down.
BTW, I never agreed with that “Love is Love” argument. There are pedos out their that genuinely “Love” children in a sexual way. That is NOT love and can never be condoned by this country. I don’t care what religion you are, but we as a people have to uphold Values and Morals. Likewise, there are people who have made a commitment to their wife and children whom they LOVE. They need to stand by this commitment, and if they change their minds, there are legal ways to separate. Having an affair is not the way Love is shown to a new partner or a current partner. It’s bad form and morally wrong. Full stop.
While I may believe what you have written I want to play the devil’s advocate here. The average Aussie has morals and standards which in their own eyes are the right ones. Your morals are not right because they do not reflect the morals of the said people at the pub (me). I remove yours. There is now a moral vacuum and it is filled with new morals (mine which are far more realistic/reasonable/right- at least in my eyes and my mates at the pub). We go with them for awhile and along comes new blood to the pub and some upstart says my morals suck (how dare they). They throw my morals out and say they do not reflect their reality, are unreasonable, and wrong, The new void is filled with their far superior morals and values. Actually, rarely are values improved upon at each review, the values erode.
What we see here are values and morals in each individuals own eyes are the result of their life experience and world view. Our individual motives can be independently measured by ourselves (mine can because I am not the least bit biased and have ALL the relevant information necessary to make such a call). Clearly we can know a stranger’s motives and can see how wrong they are and have missed so many important factors (my individual circumstances, dreams and desires). Therefore – I will remove your morals and insert my own.
Add instant news, instant gratification, instant everything because I can’t possibly wait to hear ALL the facts from an unbiased view because the wait will kill me (you know – make my life miserable because I don’t get my ego stroked and I’m offended/fragile/you don’t know what I’ve had to deal with).
Until we have truth which never changes (the God of the Bible’s truth – outside this world) and we apply it universally across all sectors of life regardless of human whinges then we will remove your morals every time it doesn’t suit me and use my morals.
If we believe we should apply the said morals and values to any individual in office then we must also be able to apply them to the subjects not in office. Representing the average Aussie who doesn’t believe in the God of the Bible, my morals and values don’t say I have to stand by any commitment when I no longer want to. It’s not morally wrong in my eyes, and I am upholding my morals. I’ve done nothing wrong and as long as no one does it to me or my mates, I’m happy. And just to top it off, after a few beers, I have the right to pass judgment on any high and mighty person because they can’t stick to their morals and I can stick to mine.
As the male in Barnaby was enticed and the man in Barnaby followed, however wrong I think he was in this situation, I’ve yet to hear that there was any wrong committed by a woman who thought it was ok to engage in an affair with a man who was married with children – or do we only hold men in office accountable for their actions. If so, tell that to all us common pub folk who have had the same thing happen to us.,
https://newmatilda.com/2018/02/22/barnaby-joyce-model-modern-major-scandal/
Here’s some more wisdom for you just in case you’re still confused about what we don’t like about this pond scum of a man. https://www.theage.com.au/lifestyle/the-bitter-irony-of-barnaby-joyces-less-worthy-comments-20180222-h0wiku.html
Supporters of traditional marriage are against gay marriage. Some are so good at traditional marriage in that they do it again and again. Donald Trump, Rupert Murdoch, James Packer, Rudy Guliani. Still married to same woman Barack Obama. If it had not been for that homsexual Alan Turing (of enigma fame) many thousands would have died. It seems in the OT one could have a wife and concubines. In Unprotected Texts: The Bibles Surprising Contradictions about Sex and Marriage.Homosexuality was not the sin of Sodom, it was hospitality.Isaiah 1: 10-11and Ezekiel 16:49-50 say nothing about homosexuality. “There was the guilt of your sister Sodom:she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. They were haughty, and did abominable things before me; therefore I removed them when I saw it”Mark Jordan from Harvard Divinity School has written The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology.