A man came up to me as I stood at Brisbane's Pride Fair Day on the weekend after an Australian Marriage Equality forum. "I just can't believe it," he said to me. "We've come so far." His words are particularly apt.

At Fair Day, more than 2000 people gathered in the heart of Fortitude Valley. Joyful straight supporters, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex community members stood alongside speakers from all levels of Australian government and paid tribute to the resilience and strength of the LGBTI community. These qualities have been amply demonstrated in calls for marriage equality.

Brisbane Pride Festival march 2016 in Fortitude Valley.? Credit:Wendy Hughes

To say that we've come a long way in a short time might be something of an understatement. The gains of the LGBTI rights movement in Australia have occurred at a dizzying pace. Within my lifetime, even till the early 1990s in Queensland, gay men could still be imprisoned. Lesbians were barely even publicly spoken about and had to wrestle with both stigma and invisibility.

The widespread acceptance of marriage equality is a barometer of just how far we have come. In 2004, John Howard amended the Marriage Act to prevent same-sex marriage. His Attorney-General, Phillip Ruddock said the government has listened to, "significant community concern about the possible erosion of the institution of marriage."