Back in 1968, Melbourne journalist Keith Dunstan published a wonderful book called Wowsers (i.e. obsessive puritans). Evangelicals claim that the word ‘wowser’ is merely an acronym for the slogan ‘We only want social evils remedied/removed’, but this is false - see Dunstan’s first chapter for a more accurate etymology.

In his book, Dunstan examined all the major concerns of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century wowsers. There were the old perennials like ‘the Demon Drink’, tobacco-smoking, prostitution, pornography and gambling, but there were a number of other ‘Evils’ against which puritan divines fulminated and waged war. Among these were ‘the Evil of the Desecration of the Sabbath’, ‘the Theatre Evil and the Evil of Dancing’, ‘the Evil of Bathing’ and ‘the Evil of Cremation’.

Now, with regard to the last few Evils, it may have occurred to you that the old wowsers - the forerunners of today’s Religious Right - irretrievably lost every one of those battles. You can now do practically anything you like on a Sunday; theatre performances are pretty much open go - indeed, I can’t quickly remember the last cause celebre involving theatrical censorship; and as for someone being prosecuted for dancing, swimming in the ocean within sight of a member of the opposite sex, or cremating a (dead) relative - turn it up, mate!

Of the remaining wowser causes, tobacco-smoking is now frowned upon and to some extent restricted, but for good, medical (’secular’) reasons rather than religious ones. Alcohol consumption and gambling are still rampant, prostitution is generally legal or tolerated, and pornography is freely available via the internet and other sources. So far it looks like Evils 10, Wowsers 0.

However, if you ask some leaders of our modern Religious Right whether they’re winning the battle for Australia’s soul, they’ll unhesitatingly reply in the affirmative. The arenas of conflict look rather different from those of a century ago - pornography is still there, and prostitution to a lesser extent, but protests against gambling, smoking and drinking have practically diminished to lip-service status - except, of course, among more ‘liberal’, utilitarian-minded branches of the hydra-headed Christian church. But in addition to porn, the main targets of the Christian Right today are ‘anti-choice’ issues like abortion rights and embryonic stem-cell research, euthanasia, evolution, gay and lesbian (GLBT) rights, illegal drug use and religious vilification laws (here many of the groups, especially Protestant-based ones, are drifting towards thinly-veiled racism). There are other areas of Religious Right interest, like school sex education, but generally the groups don’t often spend much time here.

In several of these cases, there doesn’t seem much ground for the Religious Right’s optimism. If you ask them what progress they’re making against abortion rights, they’ll often focus on one or two aspects - e.g. the continued Federal Government ban on the RU-486 ‘abortion pill’; Health Minister Tony Abbott’s anti-choice speeches - while losing sight of the big picture. Similarly, if they’re asked about the state of the GLBT issue, they’ll immediately refer to 2004’s Marriage Amendment Act, which effectively restricted legal marriage to heterosexual couples; but this is only a small part of a very long struggle which on balance has moved strongly against them. Similarly with pornography, they’ll come up with Salo or some other censored film or computer game, totally divorcing these rather exceptional cases from the overall context of censorship in this country. Readers may recognise the creationist mindset at work here: focus on apparent weaknesses in the facade of the edifice, no matter how small, and gloss over the inherent strength of the structure itself.

But in two of their major areas of interest, the Religious Right will claim to have scored resounding general victories. They’ll assert that they have helped keep illegal drugs illegal; and that euthanasia is still a crime in Australia - just look at what happened to the Northern Territory’s euthanasia experiment in 1997.

Here we discern a touching faith in the power of law and a corresponding unwillingness to view such matters in a practical context. Realistically, how long would it take you to get hold of some marijuana? If you live in or near a city or large town and your answer is more than an hour or two, you’re not trying. Some of the more realistic supporters of groups like the National Civic Council (NCC) are aware of this:

[A University of Queensland professor has] pointed out that Australia has in fact decriminalised cannabis in a default way and added that ‘when you’ve got 60 per cent of young people using the drug, if you were to enforce the law rigorously you’d end up with most people before the criminal justice system.’ (Bob Denahy ‘Pot goes in the too- hard basket’, News Weekly, 9 Apr. 2005)

It’s a similar picture where voluntary euthanasia is concerned. Every Australian doctors’ or nurses’ poll of which I’m aware has revealed the existence of a substantial minority of medical personnel who will abide by a patient’s wishes in this matter. Former Liberal Health Minister Peter Baume estimated in 1996 that this amounted to about 7,000 doctors (Karen Middleton ‘MPs warned on death bill’, Melbourne Age, 13 Sept. 1996). A large 1997 study showed that almost 30 per cent of all deaths in Australia involved a doctor deliberately hastening a patient’s end (Pamela Bone ‘Conundrum: care or compassion?’, Age, 24 Feb. 1997). Again, more hard-headed Religious Right figures such as NCC President Peter Westmore are fully aware of the actual situation:

While attempts to legalise euthanasia have been defeated in Australia, medical practice here has too often succumbed to the utilitarian temptation. (News Weekly, 9 Apr. 2005)

The Religious Right’s fundamental problem here is that so many of its major causes are unpopular with the public. Most people want the right to have abortions, to view and read what they wish, to explore their own sexuality free of governmental interference, and to have access to voluntary euthanasia if and when they need it. The Religious Right would deny them all of these things. No wonder they have to take comfort from symbolic victories and legal fictions. The real world is simply too much for them.

Filed in: Abortion, Christian Right, Family Values, Stem Cell Research, Voluntary Euthanasia