In 2004, over 300 kilometres off the coast of Queensland, a new, all-gay nation was created: the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands.
That year was a tough one for queer people in Australia. In May 2004, the Howard government introduced an amendment bill to “protect the institution of marriage” by defining marriage “the union of a man and woman to the exclusion of all others”.
The petty move followed Aussie same-sex couples trying to get their overseas marriages recognised here. The Howard government passed the amendment bill, explicitly banning same-sex marriage.
Fed-up activists board The Gayflower
In protest, a group of Queensland queer activists seceded. They formed the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands.
The group boarded a seaplane they’d christened The Gayflower. They flew to a tiny patch of sand and grass – Cato Island – in the Coral Sea islands off the Queensland coast.
In June 2004, Emperor Dale Parker Anderson I officially declared the existence of The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands.
The group laid a plaque that read, “On the 14th day of June 2004, at this highest point in the Coral Sea, Emperor Dale Parker Anderson raised the gay rainbow flag and claimed the islands of the Coral Sea in his name as homeland for the gay and lesbian peoples of the world. God Save our King!”
The new gay micronation was born, completely independent of Australia and with marriage equality for all.
The Kingdom’s capital was Heaven, named for the gay nightclub. Its national flag was a rainbow. Its coat of arms was the pink triangle. The Kingdom’s currency was the pink dollar, and Gloria Gaynor’s I Am What I Am was the national anthem.
The group picked the island because of an obscure law granting “the right to self-determination and self-government” to an oppressed people who occupy an External Overseas Territory, like the uninhabited Coral Sea islands.
‘We are people, first and foremost’
The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom’s Declaration of Independence called out Australia’s “appalling laws against gay and lesbian people.”
“Homosexuality is not a behaviour to be regulated. It is an identity to be respected,” the Declaration read.
“We are people, first and foremost. We work, we have lives, we love and have relationships. We’re family.
“Homosexual people have honestly endeavoured everywhere to merge ourselves in the social life of our communities to be treated equally. We are not permitted to do so.
“In vain we are loyal patriots, our loyalty in some places running to extremes; in vain do we make the same sacrifices of life and property as our fellow citizens; in vain do we strive to increase the fame of our native land in science and art, or her wealth by trade and commerce.
“We are still cried down as strangers in countries where we have lived for centuries. In the world as it is now and for an indefinite period – we shall not be left in peace.”
They sent copies of the Kingdom’s Declaration of Independence to Prime Minister John Howard and then-Governor-General Michael Jeffery.
By September 2004, the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom declared war on Australia over its stance on marriage equality.
‘The flag of a hostile nation’
Over ten years later, Liberal Senator Eric Abetz famously brought up the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom in a tongue-in-cheek exchange during a Senate Estimates hearing, during a homophobic crusade against a government department flying the rainbow flag.
“This particular flag, you will realise, is the flag of the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands, that declared war on Australia,” Senator Abetz said at the time.
“It is the flag of a hostile nation if we are to believe them.”
Later that year, Australia held its excruciating and completely unnecessary postal survey on same-sex marriage.
Politicians finally inked marriage equality into law back on the mainland. The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom formally dissolved on November 17, 2017.
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Didn’t know about this. Fantastic effort by those to give us the opportunity to marry with the same opportunity as straight people.
The Emperor should be knighted!