J18 2005 "& which side are you on?"

by - Fri Jun 17, 2005 13:35

isn't there?
Does one not think there is a possibility of a wee exchange of views?

So far no. There are very few states in the world which have legalised same sex union contracts, and they are all amongst the richest.
A contract which is for various purposes called "marriage", which publically binds two tax payers in their citizens' responsibilities and rights, neatly tying up little difficulties such as "who has the word on switching off the life support machine?" joint bank accounts and so on so forth. The only state of such liberal places as - california, switzerland, germany, france, nederlands, sweden which calls the "same sex union civil contract" - "marriage" is spain. And what really gets up the fascist/ecclesiastic/rightwing nose is that the legal definition of "marriage" for a hetrosexual couple is the same as a "same sex" couple.
And this means:- "the right to adopt".

Now I'll bring you through this slowly over the next days, but an example will suffice for the moment.
You are (hypothetically speaking put on your imagination cap) a "lesbian". Yes imagine you are "a gay girl", "a sapphic woman", who has in the course of her life had children perhaps even been "married" to a "man" (it is not important whether or not he was / is "gay or straight") and he is now hypothetically "dead" (= not alive). In the meantime you have fallen in love with and committed in a "life long relationship" to another "lesbian". You have joint bank accounts, a mortgage, you've talked about "who will turn off the life support machine?" and all of it, and you want to formalise your "life long commitment" by signing the relevant documents in front of the local mayor at the city council.
JUST ONE THING.
If you do this in France, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, California et cetera... the guardian rights for the children you had, stay with the father (dead) and thus his family. It is they who would in the horrible eventuality of you being a car crash and dying who would complete the task of "parenting" your children, and Lord Forbid! deciding whether or not to turn off the life support machine your children are now on, for having been in the back seat for the car crash AND NOT WEARING THEIR SEATBELTS.

Of course the church is completely against all this.
And they love making things simple, thats what orphanages, nuns and mary magdelene homes are for. But there not so simplistic as to actually formulate a policy.

All the popes men, and all aznar and fraga's retainers have not come upwith anything more politically useful than saying "we are for the family and against gay marriage". And then gurgling about the end of family values. They haven't suggested a referendum. They haven't even produced any evidence that homosexual couples in spain have asked "to adopt" children (other than those who are already their own children).

No, instead they are focussing on prejudice.
we call this homophobia.

by gurggling Fri Jun 17, 2005 14:36

:-) how terribly sexist of me to have only thought about YMCA type male h-o-m-o-s-e-x-u-a-l-s.

by .:. Fri Jun 17, 2005 21:10

official warnings:
http://www.madridpress.com/home/DetallNews.jsp?id=36630&static=0
http://madrid.metrodirecto.com/nx.asp?noti=34389

The Brazilian carnaval man Carolinhos Brown will meet Zapatero tomorrow morning informally at the palace of the monclao and afterwards bring his brazilian carneval mobile, an impressive juggernaut laden with speakers and dancers in traditional latin american costumes on a walk and dance through the spanish capital.
http://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2005/06/17/espana/1119032083.html

At the same time the RC church shall also be in procession, but without traditional pointy hat costumes
and will probably be displaying their children with pride as part of the "for the family" iniative.

http://www.informativos.telecinco.es/dn_6501.htm

Mr Brown is a hetrosexual, who grew up in a very deprived area of mostly shantytowns during the military dictatorship of his country when infant mortality peaked in south america. His one of those voices of "popular music" whose message of peace, love and friendliness won praise from all sides of the political divide, even earning special cheers from the leader of the PP in Barcelona's city council, Señor "polo-boy" Al Diaz for his funkyness. Mr Diaz however will be marching in the other direction.

not a lesbian parent - still his lifestyle is not everyone's cup of tea. ah go on. you'll have your cup of tea.

by ·.· Sun Jun 19, 2005 00:46 "really is a wonderful country"

organisers claim 1.5 million "for the family"
and 1 million for the "family day out" carnival.
wow!
Police say 166,000 "for the family" Madrid council say 700,000.
Council say 300,000 "for carnival".
yeah! still wow! this is why we need kids with aspergher's syndrome to do the counting.

meanwhile in Barcelona 3,000 people marched against the "for the family" march but "for the family" in the afternoon lesbian mothers to the fore.

& then 5000 marched "for a sea of rights" to mark the end of the mediterranean social forum and were led by saharan families who've been very good at attracting attention to their plight. [the peoples of western sahara are being daily brutalised by morrocco]

Great country. they've a lot to be proud of. all of 'em.

by X "archiving material from our greater european community - so that it may be useful someday to the Irish people, a writer's job" Thu Jun 23, 2005 18:09

on the 22nd of june 2005, though it was felt the next day that the law would again pass the Congress on the 30th June 2005 and thus be ratified by Congress alone.

The votes to apply a Senatorial veto was
131 (PP, CiU y PAR), the PP joined forces to achieve majority with 3 CiU senators and the senator for the small Aragon party José María Mur who said "we can not equalise through judiciary that which is naturally different".

and 119 senators voted against PSOE (zapatero's socialists), E. C.P. an independent catalan senator, PNV (the basque mainsteam party who saw its Lehendakari elected the following day) , CC (the communist senator)

there were two abstentions from within the chamber from the CiU party (the catalan opposition party which ruled for 23 years till 2003 -comparable to Fianna Fail) who thus both voted with the veto and abstained.

and two illegal abstentions or absences [the senators are obliged to vote yes/no or abstain in the chamber
[ from Francisco Vázquez (PSOE) and Mercedes Aroz (PSC) (catalan psoe) who chose not to register either their support of their parties or vote for the veto.

Mercedes Aroz had described the use of the word "marriage" as being too socially divisive.

***************************

There is still no clear data on how this will effect the future, whether or not spain will become a holiday destination for those blala blaaa blaa ribbid ribbid.

one academic (a psychologist) has been expelled from his professional body / guild for asserting that homosexuality was an illness.

Emotions are not running as high as some would like , and for others its running too high.

There are many concerns.

And discussion in society on the nature of adoption, (since other than the word "marriage" this seems to be the point of division) and the moral issues it includes beyond even that of suitablity of *any parent* to children which are not naturally their own, would reflect popular sentiment in at least most islamic countries. whereas the general feeling in south and central america would be a tad different.
Its a big issue.

normalisation of a minority and the extention of rights which do not neatly fit into one economic, ethnic, religious, or any other social category is rife with difficulty as in spain as it might be in ireland some day.