Who gets your vote?

Election candidate Tess Corbett who said pedophiles would be next asking for rights after gay people? Or Bernard Gaynor who said images of Sydney Mardi Gras would be used to defend child sexual abuse in court? Or National MP John Williams who said he wouldn’t support gay marriage because he doesn’t believe there is ‘a lot of stability in their relationships’?

Corbett, Gaynor and Williams are all nominated in the ‘most outrageous political/law comment’ in Australia’s Gloria Awards, for which voting opened today.

The Gloria Awards started in 2010 by lesbian Labor politician Penny Sharpe to bring attention to the worst examples of homophobia in public life in Australia.

‘Every day GLTBI people and their families are subject to homophobic and transphobic comments from people in public life,’ said Sharpe when the nominations for this year’s awards opened in March.

‘These awards are a chance to turn the tables and put the focus back on to those people making discriminatory comments.’

In the international category this year, American Family Radio host Sandy Rios is nominated for saying LGBT-themed books are ‘raping the innocence of our children’, as is UKIP election candidate John Sullivan for saying being gay could be prevented by regular exercise and the president of the Gambia Yahya Jammeh for saying ‘homosexuals are not welcome in the Gambia. If we catch you, you will regret why you are born’.

The other categories cover media (the Daily Mail’s Richard Littlejohn is nominated for saying about trans primary school teacher Lucy Meadows ‘he’s not only in the wrong body… he’s in the wrong job’), religion (Family Voice Australia for saying ‘students who are “smoking-attracted” should not be encouraged in an unhealthy habit. Neither should same-sex attracted students be encouraged to embrace a lifestyle associated with serious health risks’) and sport (Seattle Seahawks’ Chris Clemons for saying ‘I’m not against anyone [in football coming out] but I think it’s a selfish act. They just trying to make themselves bigger than the team’).

A final category highlights the ‘silliest GLBTI comment from within the GLBTI community’. For this category Australian singer-songwriter Anthony Callea is nominated for saying he’s not interested in LGBT activism. ‘I think if you make something an issue, then it becomes an issue [in] society,’ he said.

The ‘winners’ will be announced at a ceremony in Sydney on Wednesday 8 May.

Last year right-wing columnist Miranda Devine was awarded with the dubious honor of a Golden Gloria for linking lesbian parenting to the London riots.