Moral reform organisations in Australian: a political response to the sexual revolution

© 1997 Dr. Maxwell Rowland EdwardsThe 1960s and 1970s were a period of profound social change in Australia and throughout the Western world. One of the most obvious manifestations of cultural upheaval was the so-called 'sexual revolution', whereby several formerly tabooed behaviours including abortion, homosexual practices and the sale of pornography were publicly debated and progressively legalised. Governments which had previously supported traditional Christian standards of sexual morality suddenly seemed powerless to prevent the changes, and even encouraged some of them by actions such as the liberalisation of divorce and censorship laws. The denominational churches were deeply divided over many of these developments and failed to mount an effective campaign against them. Many conservative Christians, both Protestant and Catholic, were deeply disturbed by the advent of the 'permissive society', and banded together in voluntary organisations independent of ecclesiastical control in an attempt to save what was left of the old 'Christian' social order, to alter public attitudes and to reverse the legal changes which had already occurred. Among the better-known groups are the Australian Festival of Light, the Society to Outlaw Pornography and the Right to Life Association. Guided by outspoken leaders such as Fred Nile and Margaret Tighe, these bodies participate actively in politics and their opinions are frequently sought by the media on a wide range of public issues, from prostitution to in vitro fertilisation. Moral reform organisations of this kind have existed in Britain since the seventeenth century and in America since the early 1800s, but were comparative rarities in Australia until 25 years ago. While they have made little tangible impact on the increasingly secularised culture of this country - owing to their limited resource base and the sheer immensity of their actual target (namely, modernisation) - they are able to exert a degree of leverage in certain political contexts e.g. when parliaments are debating the abortion issue. Also, despite their distaste for major aspects of the modern world, many groups employ the language and technology of modernity in ways designed to enhance their prospects of success