Current Affairs

Australian MP: If gays can get married, why can’t I marry the Eiffel Tower?

Aug 18 2017
Written by Nick Duffy

A senior anti-gay marriage MP in Australia has claimed that same-sex marriage is unfair because he can’t marry the Eiffel Tower.

The claim comes from Senator Eric Abetz, an influential right-wing member of Australia’s governing Liberal Party and the former Leader of the Government in the Senate.

Abetz, one of the party’s most outspoken opponents of equal marriage, used a column in an anti-gay marriage pamplet World Family News, which was republished by Buzzfeed.

Abetz wrote: “It is a matter of regret so many others can’t see through the glibness of ‘love is love’ and “marriage equality’.

“If these glib meaningless phrases are to be given any genuine meaning, then ‘love is love’ in all situations and ‘marriage equality’ should be open to all – as the Greens assert.

“If this is the standard then who is to judge the quality/type/validity of any love – within families, with more than just one other, or indeed why not the Eiffel Tower?”

“As dissenting judges in the US Supreme Court highlighted – once you deconstruct marriage from its essence, anything becomes justifiable.As Dame Enid Lyons (the first woman elected to the House of Representatives and the first female Cabinet Minister) said, ‘The foundations of a nation’s greatness is in the homes of its families’.

“So, destroy the family – destroy the nation.Conversely, protect the family – protect the nation.That is our cause.”

Of course, there is a very compelling reason why Abetz can’t marry the Eiffel Tower – it’s already married.

Erika, a woman who has a fetish for inanimate objects, held a ‘marriage’ ceremony with the Tower in 2007, changing her name to Erika La Tour Eiffel.

Equal marriage became law in France in 2014, but the Eiffel Tower’s union is still firmly unrecognised.

Abetz previously insisted letting gay couples have legal rights would open the “floodgates” to people rushing to marry the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

In a interview he said: “I would like to think that that is taking the argument to the limit, but the issue is if we are judging this solely on a person’s view of what love is to them, and people [ask] me, ‘how can you judge somebody else’s love?’, then I think you’ve got to accept that love is love and that’s the slogan.

“I think our society would not accept people being able to marry the Eiffel Tower, but if you just limit it to people then there are issues in relation to polyamory.”

The conservative politician’s history of homophobic comments was exposed on live television earlier this week.

In the past Abetz has insisted homosexuality can be ‘cured’, saying that people who are ‘cured’ should be celebrated as public role models.

The politician also previously suggested that even if the public votes for equal marriage in a referendum or plebiscite, he would try to block it in Parliament.

He added: “There will be people in the parliament who could not support the outcome of a plebiscite whichever way it went.”

Abetz also has ties to a group that supports ‘gay cure’ therapy, has claimed gay weddings would harm relations with Asia, and played a key role in censoring an LGBT anti-bullying programme in schools.

His brother Peter Abetz is also a politician, and has compared same-sex parenting to stealing children from Aborigines.