SYDNEY, Australia — Fiona Patten believes the majority of today’s politicians pretend not to be human. This is why she has no qualms about revealing exactly who she is. Ms. Patten is a politician based in Melbourne and the founder of the Australian Sex Party, which she deregistered this week, while unveiling a new party, named Reason, that she hoped would reach more voters.

She established the Sex Party, which represented one of the electoral regions in the state of Victoria and had 7,500 members, in 2009 after becoming increasingly frustrated with issues such as gender equality, same-sex marriage and government censorship.

“There was this growing frustration that the community was traveling in one direction, and politics was traveling in the other,” said Ms. Patten, who is 53. “So we made the decision that we would take these issues to the ballot box and form the Sex Party, which people thought was mad.”

Despite being a small party with a provocative name, she said, members were able to “punch above our weight” and really get attention because they fought for issues other parties would not touch. Those ranged from establishing a royal commission to investigate child sex abuse in religious institutions to abolishing the prohibition on adult computer games. The first thing Ms. Patten did when she was elected to the Victorian Legislative Council, she said, was to establish an inquiry into end-of-life choices.