In October last year, Premier William Lai (賴清德) told the public that he had not given up on drafting a proposal to legalize same-sex marriage by the end of the year. He promised not to delay the issue and said he would do his best to push it forward.
While it would have taken a really naive person to take his words at face value, it is still disheartening that nothing has happened at all, with only three months left until the first anniversary of the historic ruling by the Council of Grand Justices instructing the government to legalize same-sex marriage.
In the meantime, Australia legalized same-sex marriage in December last year, while last month, the Taipei High Administrative Court rejected the third lesbian couple who attempted to register their marriage since October last year. The court said that since the amendments legalizing same-sex marriage had not cleared the legislature, it had no legal basis to approve the marriage application.
While same-sex couples would automatically be granted the right to marry once the two-year period stipulated by the council is over, the delay gives the opposition plenty of time to cook up schemes that are not likely to work, but are simply insulting to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community, as well as the Constitution, as restrictions on same-sex marriage have been ruled unconstitutional by the council.
When the Referendum Act (公民投票法) was amended in December last year, lowering the thresholds for initiating, seconding and passing referendums, it was almost expected that the groups opposed to gay marriage would jump on it to further their agenda.
They have wasted no time, as the Alliance for the Happiness of Future Generations on Friday last week submitted a proposal for a referendum on same-sex marriage, garnering 3,549 signatures — about 900 shy of the one that proposed changing the nation’s Olympic team name from “Chinese Taipei” to “Taiwan.”
The group urged the government to let the public decide whether to legalize same-sex marriage, saying that most Taiwanese do not support changing the definition of marriage in the Civil Code, which appears based on its own survey conducted prior to the ruling.
Nevertheless, the law trumps public opinion and even the most conservative poll conducted before the ruling showed that 52 percent of Taiwanese supported same-sex marriage.
There is no point arguing against these groups, as they are not likely to stop even after gay marriage is formally legalized, but it just continues to highlight that the government has not taken action to turn the ruling into law.
The government is not helping itself by continuing to brush aside the gay marriage issue.
Taking action on same-sex marriage is a simple way for the government to show sincerity and salvage some of its reputation.
Same-sex unions would be legalized in May next year in any case, unless the government has other ideas, as Lai might or might not have suggested late last year when he said that it will take time to seek appropriate proposals due to societal reservations on the issue.
People should not dismiss the issue of gay marriage only because it will eventually be legalized. It is a human rights issue, and the long wait is simply agonizing to the LGBT community — many of whom desperately need to marry for legitimate, practical reasons — and the people who support them in their fight for equality.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) continues to bully Taiwan by conducting military drills extremely close to Taiwan in late May 2024 and announcing a legal opinion in June on how they would treat “Taiwan Independence diehards” according to the PRC’s Criminal Code. This article will describe how China’s Anaconda Strategy of psychological and legal asphyxiation is employed. The CCP’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) conducted a “punishment military exercise” against Taiwan called “Joint Sword 2024A” from 23-24 May 2024, just three days after President William Lai (賴清德) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was sworn in and
Former US president Donald Trump’s comments that Taiwan hollowed out the US semiconductor industry are incorrect. That misunderstanding could impact the future of one of the world’s most important relationships and end up aiding China at a time it is working hard to push its own tech sector to catch up. “Taiwan took our chip business from us,” the returnee US presidential contender told Bloomberg Businessweek in an interview published this week. The remarks came after the Republican nominee was asked whether he would defend Taiwan against China. It is not the first time he has said this about the nation’s
In a recent interview with the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily, former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) called President William Lai (賴清德) “naive.” As always with Ma, one must first deconstruct what he is saying to fully understand the parallel universe he insists on defending. Who is being “naive,” Lai or Ma? The quickest way is to confront Ma with a series of pointed questions that force him to take clear stands on the complex issues involved and prevent him from his usual ramblings. Regarding China and Taiwan, the media should first begin with questions like these: “Did the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)
The Yomiuri Shimbun, the newspaper with the largest daily circulation in Japan, on Thursday last week published an article saying that an unidentified high-ranking Japanese official openly spoke of an analysis that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) needs less than a week, not a month, to invade Taiwan with its amphibious forces. Reportedly, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has already been advised of the analysis, which was based on the PLA’s military exercises last summer. A Yomiuri analysis of unclassified satellite photographs confirmed that the PLA has already begun necessary base repairs and maintenance, and is conducting amphibious operation exercises