The 2026 census won't count LGBTQI+ people, but why?
www.abc.net.au
Labor has moved to dump proposed questions that would create the first estimate of Australia's LGBTQI+ population, with advocates saying it renders the community "invisible".
  • IlandarOP
    14·
    3 months ago

    The Albanese government has really been putting the L in Labor.

    The ABS organised an advisory committee to help it form new questions that would include the LGBTQI+ community in the 2026 census.

    But on Monday, the bureau’s head statistician, David Gruen, announced that the testing phase of the 2026 census, when the new questions were to be trialled, was scrapped.

    “Given the government’s announcement yesterday that topics will remain unchanged from 2021, I have made the decision that the upcoming test will not proceed,” Dr Gruen said.

    “The test would have included topics that the government has now decided will not be in the 2026 Census.”

    Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles said on Wednesday, “we don’t want to open up a divisive debate in relation to this issue”.

    “We’ve seen how divisive debates have played out across our country, and the last thing we want to do is inflict that debate on a sector of our community right now,” he said.

    Labor’s 2023 national platform states the party “believes that LGBTIQ+ Australians should be counted as part of the national census” and commits to the 2026 census gathering relevant data on LGBTQI people.

    • zero_gravitasEnglish
      13·
      3 months ago

      Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles said on Wednesday, “we don’t want to open up a divisive debate in relation to this issue”.

      ‘Instead we’re just going to pretend you don’t exist.’

      👍👍👍👍

      • IlandarOP
        10·
        3 months ago

        Translation: “We don’t want a repeat of the First Nations Voice to Parliament culture war this close to an election. Our jobs are more important than delivering on election promises you may have voted us into government for.”

  • NaevaTheRat [she/her]@vegantheoryclub.orgEnglish
    32·
    3 months ago

    Since the census is now identifiable I would never answer honestly anyway, and would encourage any member of a politically precarious minority to falisfy their census data if it did ask.

    • ZagorathEnglish
      3·
      3 months ago

      census is now identifiable

      Uh, no it isn’t?

      would encourage any member of a politically precarious minority to falisfy their census data

      This is a terrible idea. If you were somewhere that you might actually face legal repercussions for being gay that would be reasonable…though those places are also not likely to ask for your sexuality on the census. But in Australia, not being honest is a fantastic way to see that your demographic gets ignored.

      • No1
        3·
        3 months ago

        census is now identifiable

        Uh, no it isn’t?

        Oh, my sweet summer child…

        I was pissed at the last one because it felt like an invasion of privacy lol.

        • NaevaTheRat [she/her]@vegantheoryclub.orgEnglish
          1·
          3 months ago

          Idk what the current status is but last I checked they literally keep addresses and names in a Totally Secure ™ government database and just like hash (or some other “one way” crypto encoding) them when distributing subsets to researchers. Have they actually changed that policy of direct retention?

      • NaevaTheRat [she/her]@vegantheoryclub.orgEnglish
        21·
        3 months ago

        you should read research on deanonymising data. The government lies, they literally introduced a bill in 2018 trying to bam cryptography because some researchers embarrassed them by proving you could re-identity census data.

        Idk what planet you live on but the nsw government literally does eugenics on trans people. I had to get steralised to not have all my ID out me all the time and get the right title etc.

        You are young, things can change fast the pendulum of tolerance swings back and forth, Whig history is demonstrably false.

        here is a reasonable summary of concerns https://www.salingerprivacy.com.au/2016/03/17/census-no-longer-anonymous/

        and here is recent research on deanoning datasets https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-10933-3

        edit: also defending the census because of overreliance on it is stupid. We should not make important decisions on unverifiable data. If not being on the census means no funding then the funding model is broken, not the person who doesn’t want to be recorded. Censuses have historically been used for extremely bad shit, Australia is a nation founded in exploitation and genocide. There are extremely good reasons why certain people might lie or hide.

  • TheHolm
    15·
    3 months ago

    Why it should be there? I guess at this time no one give a f%&k about someones sexual orientation in Australia. And I fail to see any reason to register it for healthcare/taxation or similar purpose. IMHO questions of nationality should go away too.