Too often, as we approach the end of the year, we find ourselves wishing we had accomplished more in the preceding 12 months. We can look at the defeats, the things left undone, or half-done and have a sense of regret or disappointment that we didn’t achieve everything for which we had hoped.
We can also look at society around us and think that it has fallen further and further away from what is good, true and beautiful. We can become saddened at the attacks on truth, on human life and freedom and even tend to despair.
But, as I have been reflecting on the year, I can’t help but think the tide has begun to turn on the contentious social and cultural hot button issues, even if ever so slightly, and we are beginning to see a bit of a return to normality. As 2024 comes to a close; I really do think we have reason for hope.
I’ll offer just a few examples from the year just passed.
First, there was the defeat of the federal government’s misinformation and disinformation bill. If passed, that bill would have required digital media platforms to censor “misinformation” deemed to be “harmful.” As I wrote in this column previously, both “misinformation” and “harm” are in the eye of the beholder and the law would likely have seen over-censorship. The defeat of the bill was an indication that the opposition and cross bench will not take threats to freedom of expression lightly.
Then there are the small but positive signs when it comes to the protection of vulnerable human life. While obviously, the big news this week is Queensland Premier David Crisafulli’s unprecedented and anti-democratic move to ban all debate on abortion during this term in parliament, there are still some signs of hope. In the federal parliament, a recent attempt to remove the Babies Born Alive bill from the notice paper without debate was also defeated. As its name suggests, the bill would require doctors to provide babies born alive after an attempted abortion with the same medical care that a “wanted” child born at the same gestation would receive.
The bill has almost no chance of passing parliament, but at least the debate will continue, and MPs will advocate for these precious lives on the floor of parliament. In South Australia, a bill that would have protected babies otherwise destined for abortion only missed passing the upper house by one vote. This bill would have required that women who wanted to terminate their pregnancy in the third term would do so by delivering the baby alive, rather than killing the baby in the womb before delivering a corpse. As the bill’s architect, Professor Joanna Howe noted, it took euthanasia advocates seventeen attempts to pass euthanasia and assisted suicide laws in that state. That this bill came so close on its first try is a very good sign and we just need to persist in this fight. As Dr Howe said, “That’s how much they love killing; we need to love life even more.” And speaking of euthanasia, the newly-elected Chief Minister of the Northern Territory has put any push for euthanasia in that jurisdiction on hold. Instead of rushing to implement the laws that have now been passed in all other states and territories, Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro said that the legalisation of euthanasia was “certainly not an immediate priority” for the government, which would instead focus on “reducing crime and rebuilding our economy.”
Then there was the government’s decision to put the Australian Law Reform Commission’s report around legal protections for faith-based schools in a drawer. The Commission had recommended the scrapping of existing laws that allow religious schools to preference the hiring and promotion of those who share the faith of the school and seek to live that faith. For example, one recommendation would have required schools to allow even their religious education teachers to teach alternative positions, if they so desired. The trade-off for keeping these protections is that the long-promised religious discrimination bill was also abandoned. However, any religious discrimination bill that would have garnered sufficient support in parliament would have been largely ineffective in protecting people of faith from any real threats.
Apart from these, I also see more challenges to the gender movement. From the release of the Cass Report in the UK to the increasing number of countries banning the use of puberty blockers on kids, to the election of Donald Trump, the days of those pushing so-called “gender-affirmation” for children are numbered, because the more we know about gender affirmation, the more we see its dangers.
The tide is turning and so, in this season of hope, let us take a moment to take in these hopeful signs as well. Happy and Holy Christmas, dear friends.