The Greens candidate for the federal seat of Canning has been accused of politicising the massacre of 50 people in a nightclub in Orlando, Florida on Saturday night after using the tragedy to promote support for gay marriage and the controversial Safe Schools program.
In a Facebook post Aeron Blundell-Camden challenged Canning’s Liberal and Labor candidates to “publicly acknowledge and condemn the horrific attack on the LGBTI community” and to support “marriage equality and the Safe Schools program so that we can fight hateful homophobia and transphobia in Australia”.
Mr Blundell-Camden defended the post, saying the tragedy in Orlando was caused by homophobia, which is a problem in Australia and in the Canning electorate.
“Really, it's about degrees; obviously what happened in Orlando is an extreme degree of homophobia, but homophobia is still there and it's still making people's lives harder,” he said.
“I'm certainly not putting people who oppose Safe Schools and marriage equality in that same category as the alleged assailant because that's horrific, but sometimes they're not necessarily realising the implications that their views or their opposition to those things can have on people's lives.”
He rejected the allegation he was politicising the tragedy.
“I've certainly avoided politicising the issue as much as possible,” he said.
“I think Malcolm Turnbull's comments when he mentioned John Howard and gun control, that to my mind is politicising that issue.”
Mr Hastie reacted angrily to Mr Blundell-Camden’s comments.
“This is nothing more than rank opportunism from the Greens party,” he said.
“This demonstrates why they operate on the fringe of Australian politics, and why they are unfit to govern.
“The Orlando shootings appear to be inspired by Islamic State and their abhorrent worldview. They have been executing gay people in Syria and Iraq for years now and posting it on social media.
“Omar Sateen's call to 911 and pledge of allegiance to IS before the shooting suggests, at the very least, there was a strong ideological connection.
“This has nothing to do with Australian politics and to suggest otherwise is an absurd form of moral logic and a pathetic attempt at wedge politics.”
Mr Hastie, who was an SAS officer before entering parliament, also said: “In my previous career, I would have had no hesitation being the first through the door and putting my life on the line to protect that community of people”.
Mr Blundell-Camden said he believed a link to Islamic extremism was “very vague”, but the Orlando massacre was clearly a homophobic hate crime.
“The thing to bear in mind is that most homophobic hate crimes perpetrated in America have not been perpetrated by Muslim people, most have been perpetrated by Christian people, many in name of Christ,” he said.
“Homophobia isn't just the realm of one religion or another, this is something that permeates all manner of society and that's why confining it to just saying it's Islam really absolves other people from having to tackle issues in our own backyard.”
Labor candidate Barry Winmar said he unequivocally condemned the actions of the Orlando assailant.
“I’m not about to politicise it or link it to any political movement; it’s an attack on humanity and senseless violence,” he said.
“I was shocked and saddened by those reports.
“My thoughts and prayers are with the families and friends of those killed and injured.”
Nathan Hondros
Senior Journalist for the Mandurah Mail, Australian Community Media, and Fairfax Media.
Senior Journalist for the Mandurah Mail, Australian Community Media, and Fairfax Media.
