Tory Shepherd: The ‘No’ campaign proves they have no reason or logic

IF the best the ‘No’ campaign against same-sex marriage can come up with is “Won’t someone think of the children!”, then this debate is over, writes Tory Shepherd.

IF that’s all the ‘No’ campaign has, the same-sex marriage vote is done and dusted.

They launched their damp squib last night, with earnest actors squelching through a vapid script.

Unsurprisingly (because they do not have anything resembling a solid argument against same-sex marriage) the advertisement had absolutely nothing to do with same-sex marriage.

The Coalition for Marriage’s advertisement has deployed that classic rhetorical flourish:

“WON’T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?”

Like so many keen insights into the human condition, that shout into the void was popularised by The Simpsons. It’s a tactic designed to appeal to emotion, to tap into parental guilt, rather than exercising any reason or logic.

Think of it as a sort of Munchausen-by-proxy; adults making up bad things happening to children.

These mums (and of course they’re mums; this is a campaign from those who would like to see us back in the 1950s) sadly decry things that have nothing to do with marriage.

They worry about a son being told he can wear a dress, and about Safe Schools and about role playing.

Has nobody whispered in their ears that the gays are already having children? That in this century, you can have kids without marriage? Quick, bring the smelling salts!

What this advertisements shows is that the ‘No’ campaign wants desperately to broaden the debate well beyond marriage. They want to make gays out as sort of icky, but they don’t really know why, they just get a funny feeling in their tummies when they think about it.

In their desperation, like the righteous Reverend Lovejoy’s wife, they are reduced to this futile cry about the children. It’s the real-life version of a two-dimensional, mean town gossip.

Originally published as Tory Shepherd: The ‘No’ campaign proves they have no reason or logic