Living in Australia, gay man Mícheál Ó Curraoin does not have the right to vote in the marriage equality referendum, but he and his fellow Irish queers in Sydney are shouting out for equality back home.

Something queer is stirring in Sydney’s Irish LGBT community. It sashayed into town last March on the sole of Panti’s six inch stiletto as her Irish-themed Mardi Gras float gave gay people from the Auld Sod, many of whom would never grace the more traditional, ‘daggy’ (Australian slang for scruffy and unfashionable) Irish pubs and venues, a more contemporary banner of Gay-lickness to gather under.

Gather they did, with their non-Irish, non-LGBT friends, for theirs is not an insular version of Irishness or of Queerness. Decked out in their finest biodegradable green, white and gold-sequined lamé, they paraded down Sydney’s Oxford St to the sound of U2’s ‘In the Name of Love’, competing for airspace with the cheers of 600,000 spectators. Their energy was infectious – like so much on Oxford St – and would not be quelled. After enjoying their 15 seconds of fame on the mainstream Australian news headlines, they floated on to win the best entry at the Sydney Paddy’s day parade a few days later.

The Irish Marriage Equality referendum has afforded Irish gays in Sydney a new banner under which to gather. Frustrated we are denied a vote on a right that directly affects the status of our closest relationships, a few of us set up the Irish YesEquality Australia campaign and Facebook page. Our aims are two-fold: firstly to encourage Irish citizens in Australia to donate much needed funds to the YesEquality campaign in Ireland; secondly, to create a forum to support each other in getting our friends and families in Ireland to vote Yes.

Making Our Voices Heard At Home

As part of this initiative, and on an uncharacteristically grey Sydney day, members of our group gathered at Sydney’s iconic Opera House and Harbour Bridge – all at the drop of a social media hat – to hold aloft an array of letters proclaiming: “We can’t get home to vote. Please #useyourvote.” Defying the gloomy weather with positivity, patience and good humour our intension was to make our voices heard in Ireland.

Ireland, unlike many other jurisdictions, does not allow citizens living abroad to vote in an election or referendum. Our gathering was largely driven by the fact that most of our party had been living outside of Ireland for over 18 months and were therefore not eligible to vote. As an indication of the importance of this referendum for Irish LGBT people abroad, two of the guys who were still eligible had booked fairly expensive flights back to Ireland in order to vote.

Healing, Acceptance and Pride

The rest of us can only watch from afar, tracking the progress of the Equality Bus far too closely as it winds its way around the country. We try to analyse the public mood during the Late Late debate – one minute in tears, the next punching the air with pride – as our fellow citizens Colm O’Gorman and Una Mullally show the best of who we are. Not the best of who we are as gay people, or as Irish people, but as courageous, loving and unbowed human beings.

Witnessing the horrific No campaign posters on Facebook and the small-mindedness still evidenced in declarations by the churches and related fringe groups, we cry our emigrant tears. They are however no longer tears of sadness or of anger. They are tears of healing, acceptance and pride in our homeland as it takes an historic step towards equality.

Tread softly Ireland because you tread on our dreams.

To join the forum for Irish people in Australia supporting the ‘Yes’ vote please ‘like’ this Facebook page. Sydney fundraiser, Friday, May 8 at 6-9pm, The Bar at the End of the Wharf, Sydney Theatre Company, Hickson Road, Walsh Bay. Melbourne fundraiser, Saturday, May 9 at 2:00pm – 2:30pm, Luna Park Melbourne, 18 Lower Esplanade, St Kilda.

See the #votewithus video created by article author Mícheál Ó Curraoin and his civil partner Gary below.