Remember in high school when you would pump yourself up for the big party happening on the weekend? Then you’d get there and it was too big. You know, you lost all your friends, all the beer was gone and a drunk guy would spew on your shoes. Big parties aren’t necessarily the best parties, or the only ones worth attending.

It’s the same with political parties.

There isn’t just the party at Tony’s place where like, everyone is going to be and then like, the party at Julia’s on the same night where like, everyone who isn’t at Tony’s is going to be. There’s other parties on too. That’s right, hippies, science kids and racists also have gatherings.

These kids grew up and joined, or created, political parties. And they’re worth checking out if you can’t take any more sniping about budgie smugglers or ranga jokes. Here’s a guide to some of the minor parties that should make what could have been a two party preferred election ordeal into a much more interesting quandary.

You can insert the usual jokes about the Australian Sex Party, but they’ve got some pretty sensible platforms.

No they don’t want people to start having sex in the streets and the installation of a brothel on every corner.

What they do want is to fight the negative connotations that come with sex, whether you’re using sex as a noun or a verb.

They want to prevent the sexualisation of children via a national sex education curriculum.
Unsurprisingly, they support same sex marriage and gender equality in the workplace (including, shock horror, parliament) and it makes sense.

Their stance on drugs and voluntary euthanasia, not their sex-related policies are their most controversial, namely the decriminalisation of personal use of currently illicit drugs, drug testing at music festivals and ending the use of sniffer dogs.

While Rover might be out of a job under an Australian Sex Party government, you can’t deny that the party with the most explosive name might actually have some of the most logical policies you’ll ever see.

The Australian Fishing and Lifestyle Party (AFLP) is a great option for those of you who hate the environment and want to trash it with your motorbikes and other toys while fishing the river into oblivion to show it who’s boss.

Okay slight exaggeration.

The AFLP supports the use of the environment by humans, which it argues is a natural right.
Which is great for outdoorsy types, but not so great for the hippies who will constantly be butting heads with them over how to use our rivers, national parks, estuaries, oceans, mountain ranges, dams, camping sites and basically anything else outside.

While it endorses the establishment of marine parks, the use of terminology like ‘small and representative’ indicate they wouldn’t be too stoked if they happened to be in an area where the best tuna could be caught.

Basically the AFLP and the Greens aren’t the best of friends and will never agree on anything.

But the argument for the controlled and responsible use of the environment for everyone is a good one, so if you love your fishing and camping and think the Greens might be have indulged in a little too much green and have become paranoid, give this party your thumbs up.

The Secular Party.
Sorry, you wanted some more explanation?
I thought the name might have said it all.
For those of you who found the name a little ambiguous, here goes. These anti-religionites think that there is no true separation of Church and State yet in Australia and support the promotion of secularisation.

They are pro- everything: same-sex marriage, lesbian IVF availability, abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research and basically anything that Tony Abbott and his mates at the Vatican disapprove of.

They want censorship gone, religious school funding canned and the Queen given the boot.

All of these aren’t radical or new ideas, but bundled together in a complete package is a little bit frightening for those of us who are friends with the big guy upstairs, or any of the big men/women/beings up in the clouds, or used to be friends but haven’t been replying to their facebook posts or texts for a while.

They’re not moral-less deviants, they just want you to be nice to everyone because everyone agrees that’s the right thing to do, and not because Jesus said.
For haters of the major parties’ conservatism.

There you have it kids. They’re not as crazy as you thought were they? If any of these parties tickle your fancy remember that a vote given to them is one not counted for Tony or Julia. So if all you want to do this election is show the terrible twosome that you’re not interested, then don’t be afraid to vote a little outside the square. Who knows, if everyone embraced the rebel inside of them some of these parties might actually get in. Then we could be in for a real political shindig.