Talk:Suffrage in Australia

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Description of extension of suffrage to 18-year-olds

The introduction states that "Today, the right to vote... is enjoyed by all citizens of Australia over the age of 18 years", but there is no mention of this age in the rest of the article.Rscragun (talk) 02:17, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

There has been some improvement on this. I am considering changing the date when NSW changed its voting age to 18 from 1970 to 1973 to reflect that the law commenced on 21 March 1973 despite being passed in 1970 and cite the original law (Parliamentary Electorates and Elections (Amendment) Act 1970) or the Gazette announcing its commencement date (GG No 36 of 21.3.1973, p 883).Rscragun (talk) 21:24, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

Compulsory voting

I came to this article hoping to find whether voting in the NT (Reps only — it was "Silent Sam" Calder when I arrived) was compulsory for Aborigines as it was for us "blow-ins". An Aboriginal co-worker in Darwin once said it was voluntary, but I doubted him at the time and still do. Doug butler (talk) 23:15, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Racial restrictions on voting

Hello all

I have clarified the racial restrictions on voting by adding material from the article [[Commonwealth Franchise Act 1902]]. The poresentarticle has a lot of inaccurateand repetitive material which I will try to tidy up over the next few days.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:11, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Sounds great. Your corrections (and the article in general as it has been until now) tend to err towards minimisation of the racial components. Please try to ensure the article is clear that only some people/women (ie mostly just European descent, or "White" people) were granted those rights in that time period. Also, just FYI, the common modern convention is to refer to "New Zealand" as "Aotearoa New Zealand", or variations of that. Moduletor (talk) 01:41, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

I agree and I apologise for the second revert which was unintentional. I have responded in detail on your Talk page, and we can discuss my revisions to the article here if required. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:07, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

My apologies, I added the "some" to the South Australian sentence by mistake.

However I'm unclear on how you think that "Some women won the vote in Western Australia in 1899, with racial restrictions" is incorrect. It says within the sentence that there were racial restrictions, which means that saying "women" at the beginning of that sentence is incorrect and misleading as it implies "all women". This applies anywhere that "women" is said when only a specific category of women were actually included. Having the "with racial restrictions" tacked on at the end of the sentence minimises the fact that only a very specific category of women gained the right to vote. I am unclear on how you would like this specific category of women to be referred to.

I'm also unclear on why you reverted the entire sentence "European women won the right to vote in the other states after federation, although racial restrictions for both men and women were introduced with the same legislation (discussed below)." Again, I am unclear on how you would like this specific category of women to be referred to. Also the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 did introduce racial restrictions for both men and women, so I'm unclear why you have a problem with this part of the sentence. Moduletor (talk) 11:44, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I've changed some of the wording in the article to emphasise that women received equal voting rights to men, with all that entailed in terms of racial restrictions, property ownership, age, etc. Hopefully that addresses some of your concerns without becoming too pedantic – as you pointed out, even now not all (adult) women necessarily have the right to vote. I think we should mostly treat them as discrete issues within separate sections, e.g. the 1902 act did not specifically bar non-white women, it barred both men and women so is best dealt with in the sections on racial discrimination. If there has been academic discussion of say, voting rights for Indigenous women specifically, then happy for that to be included. I T B F 💬 15:08, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I support your changes. It seems the best way to deal with the gender issue without getting into repetitive discussions on the race issue. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 21:49, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Your use of the word "equal" is still misleading. "Equal voting rights" is typically used to suggest that there is no longer discrimination in that area, as per this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equality_before_the_law. When you use "equal" it is reasonable to expect people to assume that this is meant. This is not what happened. I would accept something along the lines of "the same".

Your repeated use of the phrase "women" when in reality only referring to specific categories of women is still inaccurate and misleading. If you are arguing that everywhere it says "men" the article should also be more specific as to which men are included, I would support this as an improvement in accuracy and clarity. If you are arguing that "some men", "some people", etc should be added as well as "some women" (or variations thereof), since people from most racial backgrounds, prisoners, and some people of "unsound mind" were or continue to be excluded, I agree that this is the most accurate, clear, and concise method. Moduletor (talk) 00:01, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

I have summarised and moved most of the content you added about Indigenous voting rights in South Australia. This is a high level article about suffrage in Australia. Detail about how many Aboriginal people voted in one election in South Australia belongs in the articles about Voting rights of Indigenous Australians or specific articles about South Australia. There is also no need to hammer the same point over and over again in an article. We only need to make a point once and concisely. There were also problems about copying your source word for word and in some cases misreading the source. For example, it wasn't 100 Aboriginal women who were enrolled to vote at one South Australian station in 1896, it was 100 Aboriginal people. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:23, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

@Moduletor Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:26, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

You have yet to address this concern, so I'll repeat it. Your repeated use of the phrase "women" when in reality only referring to specific categories of women is still inaccurate and misleading. If you are arguing that "some men", "some people", etc should be added as well as "some women" (or variations thereof), since men and women from most racial backgrounds, prisoners, and some people of "unsound mind" were or continue to be excluded, I agree that this is the most accurate, clear, and concise method.

Also, why are you insisting that the section on women suffrage exclude anything that doesn't include "white" women (you still haven't discussed what your preferred term is here), without labelling it as such? Moduletor (talk) 09:47, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

See Racial bias on Wikipedia, Wikipedia:Systemic bias, and Wikipedia:Systemic bias Moduletor (talk) 11:10, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

I have already explained at length on your Talk page why your preferred wording is unsatisfactory. The current wording you object to was introduced by ITBF as a compromise and they fully explained their reasoning. As for "systemic bias", the article devotes much more space to the racial and other restrictions on voting than it does to who was entitled to vote. There are also separate articles on Voting rights of Indigenous Australians and Women's suffrage in Australia where these aspects are discussed in more detail. I think your argument about the use of the word "equal" is wrong. "Equal" is a common English word, it is the word used in most reliable sources, and does not imply any specific legal meaning. The article makes it clear that we are talking about women being granted the vote on "equal terms with men" including all the racial and other restrictions fully detailed in the article. There is no need to introduce pedantic explanations in every sentence. We can assume that readers of average intelligence and English language ability are capable of reading the whole article in context. I still think the wording of this article can be tweaked, but mainly to further reduce the needless repetition of points already fully discussed in this article and the related detailed articles. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:29, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

It seems we will need to agree to disagree. I have made additional adjustments to the female suffrage section that satisfy my concerns. Moduletor (talk) 22:38, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Rationalising article

Hello all

I have cut quite a bit of repeated information and some irrelevant information. The article only needs to state each development in Australian suffrage once, accurately and with a reliable source. This can then be summarised in the lead. The article still has a structural problem in that there are separate sub-headings for women and Indigenous Australians which aren't ideal because they confuse the chronology, make repetitions necessary, and are covered in detail in separate articles. A better structure would be to consider local, colonial, state and federal suffrage in separate sections. However, I will stick with the current structure for the moment as it will take considerable time to re-write the article with a more rational structure. I will also try to progressively add reliable sources and rationalise the citations.

Happy to discuss. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:50, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks and agree with the above. I think possibly this article should be moved to Voting rights in Australia, as that would line up better with other articles. I T B F 💬 08:42, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

I have further rationalised the article by combining the two sections on female suffrage in order to reduce repetition.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:55, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Northern Territory

Hello all

I have moved this section to the history section where it more logically belongs. I have added content on voting rights and have moved some content about the details of political institutions to the article on History of the Northern Territory where it more logically belongs.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:36, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Disenfranchisement of people with disabilities

Given that there is a section in this page on disenfranchisement of prisoners, it seemed remiss that there wasn't also a section for people with disabilities. In the future I hope this topic will have it's own page. Moduletor (talk) 09:09, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I have removed your unsourced editorial comment and provided a more accurate summary of the source. As previously discussed on your Talk page please take note of policy on Neutral Point of View and reliably sourcing statements of fact and opinion. Given that the discussion is about the unsound mind provision, I have changed the subheading to reflect this. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 10:35, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

South Australian female voting rights

Hello all

Following discussion with another editor, @LPascal, I have added a note clarifying the year in which South Australian women were granted the same voting rights as men. I have also added a notes section to the article which might come in useful if further detailed explanations on other points covered by this article are required.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:04, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Looks good to me. LPascal (talk) 06:45, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Voter suppression

I have started a section on voter suppression, as the page otherwise only really discusses voter suppression in the form of disenfranchisement. This section requires more work. Moduletor (talk) 22:43, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

I have no problem with a section on voter suppression per se, but I am not convinced that it improves the article as the article does already discuss other forms of voter suppression so you have increased the repetition of information which is already a significant proble with the article. For the moment, I have moved the section to a more logical place where specific franchise issues are discussed. I have moved some content from elsewhere in the article to this section to reduce repetition. I have used more concise wording. I have removed the unsourced statement about voter suppression of youth. Also please note that of the citations I looked at, only one specifically mentioned voter suppression in Victoria. As editors we should not combine different sources to reach a conclusion not specifically stated in the sources. So you really need to find reliable sources (preferably academic ones) which specifically state that voter suppression was a major problem that especially targeted indigenous people. (I would have thought other racial groups were equally affected.) See WP:ORIGINAL RESEARCH and WP:RELIABLE Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:31, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Property restrictions and voting age

Hello all

As these are quite separate topics, I created separate sub-heading for each. I have replaced a dubious website with more reliable sources. I have corrected and summarised some information to reduce redundant repetition of content.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 10:00, 9 September 2024 (UTC)