How To Vote ‘Yes’ In The Same-Sex Marriage Survey

There’s currently a rumour spreading like wildfire through Facebook and other social media services that voting ‘YES’ in the upcoming same-sex marriage survey could result in your vote counting against legalising same-sex marriage. That is not the case.

You may have seen this post or a post similar to this pop up in your social media feeds over the weekend:

RE: PLEBISCITE

If it goes ahead, PLEASE READ THE QUESTION CAREFULLY. It could be phrased in such a way that voting ‘YES’ actually indicates NOT having marriage equality, for example if the question is ‘Should the Marriage Act of 1961 be upheld in its present form’, then a ‘YES’ vote is a vote AGAINST marriage equality, and a ‘NO’ vote would be for changing it.

PLEASE don’t put ‘YES’ just by reflex and make sure you understand how the question is phrased so you don’t ACCIDENTALLY vote against marriage equality.

I tried to track down the precise origins of the post but it appears that it is just being copied and pasted from user to user now, resulting in a whole lot of misinformation being spread around the place. So let’s set the record straight.

I agree that you should read the question carefully, but as we’ve reported previously, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) will be responsible for conducting the survey and they have already stated on their website that there will only be one question asked in the Postal Survey.

The exact wording of that question is:

“Should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?”

Therefore:

Voting ‘YES’ is a vote FOR marriage equality.

Voting ‘NO’ is a vote AGAINST marriage equality.

It really will be as simple as that.


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