It could well be argued that the ABC’s hosting of Vote Compass represents a significant mission stray for an organisation that is, after all, just a broadcaster, and a taxpayer-funded one at that. But let’s lay that aside for the moment – VoteCompass is, after all, very popular and it’s been going since 2013.
Let’s also lay aside any idle speculation as to how the VoteCompass designers, a Canadian outfit called Vox Pop Labs, come to conclusions such as that the Greens think that Australia should spend only ‘somewhat’ less on its military, or that the LNP and the ALP are on the same page on the subject of how many immigrants Australia should admit. Vox Pop Labs has gone to the trouble of preparing an eight-page document explaining the methodology they use, so let’s trust their algorithms, consultation processes, etc, are all up to snuff.
And let’s not dwell too long on why the question about how close Australia should be to the USA is posed in the poll section rather than as one of the 30 policy propositions – with the result that at the end we don’t get to compare our response with the position of any of the parties.
Instead let’s hone in on one particular proposition, and what it tells us about the outfit the ABC’s partnered with here (and the ABC itself).
That proposition is:
Now, ‘transgender women’ are actually men. So is that description of them heavily biased? Of course it is! Are there more neutral terms for men-who-say-they’re-women? Of course there are! Even ‘transwomen’ would be a step in the right direction.
It gets worse: now let’s look at what happens to your fit in the political landscape should you have the temerity to submit that men-who-say-they’re-women should not be able to compete in women’s sporting leagues. Just for fun, I responded to all propositions except this one with answers that coincided exactly with the position of the Greens (or what Vox Pop Labs thinks is the Greens position). And here’s what I got:
So I slipped down the progressiveness pole because of defending women’s sex-based rights? How perverse is that?
Vox Pop Labs says it ‘promotes civic engagement and democratic participation’. It doesn’t tell us it promotes gender-identity ideology, but for the sake of transparency it should. Not that that would’ve deterred Aunty from partnering with them. On the contrary. Anything for a gold star on the forehead from trans lobby ACON.