Speaking at the Australian Open Inspirational Series Brunch in Melbourne, Vogue editor-in-chief and tennis fan Anna Wintour blasted Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s record on LGBTQ rights and said the stadium named for Australian tennis homophobe Margaret Court should be renamed.
Said Wintour of Morrison: “I have been alarmed by your prime minister’s record on LGBTQ rights, which seems backward in all senses. That no one can be expelled from school for their orientation, should not require clarification. A government should protect its people, not make it unclear whether they will be accepted.”
In October, Morrison reversed a previously held position that religious schools should be able to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.
Wintour also threw her support behind the renaming of Margaret Court Arena.
Said Wintour: “I find that it is inconsistent with the sport for Margaret Court’s name to be on a stadium that does so much to bring all people together across their differences. This much I think is clear to anyone who understands the spirit and the joy of the game. Intolerance has no place in tennis.”
Court has been a vocal opponent of LGBTQ equality.
Said Court in 2017: “I sense at the moment you can put a Yes sign in the window, everything’s all right, but if you put a No sign you get a brick through your window. We already have 36,000 gay couples in this nation, that’s not a lot of people when you think about the 25 million. They already have civil union. They want marriage because they want to destroy it.”
She added that the consequences of same-sex marriage would lead to the abolition of Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Easter and Christmas.
In June 2017, Court said that the “US gay lobby” was behind the idea of renaming the court named after her in Melbourne Park, home to the Australian open.
