“The more corrupt the Republic, the more numerous the laws” (Tacitus)

I have been mulling over whether I should write this piece. A few days ago The Conversation published an article by a philosophy lecturer. It is titled, Love thy neighbour: religious groups should not be exempt from discrimination laws, and it has stirred the pot quite a bit, so to speak, with nearly 500 comments discussing the argument forwarded by the author. In Australia there is a move afoot by the Federal Government to introduce a national  Bill, which is proposed to replace various Federal anti-discrimination legislation, consolidating them into one. The Bill was introduced by Australia's Attorney General, Nicola Roxon and the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, Penny Wong. A parliamentary inquiry is underway, which has received hundreds of submissions. 

Imagine you are sitting on public transport and opposite to you two men begin to kiss passionately and fondle each other's genitals You stand up and move to another seat. One of them withdraws his tongue out of the other man’s throat to shout after you, “Homophobic bitch!”, and releases his grip on on the other man's crutch to flip you his index finger. The other man follows with his own quip: “Get used to it, breeder”.   This is not fiction. It happened to a young woman on a train I was traveling on not so long ago.  I observed the terror and the tears on her face, as she looked down and visibly shrunk in her seat, cowered.