Tweet
h/t petey. The Austrian parliament legalized civil unions today! The vote was 110-64, so it passed by almost a super-majority. Congratulations, Austria!!!
Austrian civil unions are not equal to marriage, since CU’d couples aren’t allowed to adopt or use artificial insemination, and couples have to register in the coat closet rather than the regular registry office. Still, this is a huge and excellent start. We know that these prohibitions will fall away in time.
Couples may begin registering January 1, 2010. Starting to treat your LGBT citizenry with dignity is one great way to ring in a new year, is it not?
Austria joins the following countries in offering civil unions/partnerships: Andorra, Colombia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland, Luxembourg, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Slovenia, Switzerland, Wallis and Futuna, United Kingdom, Uruguay.
And these countries have full marriage equality: Belgium, Canada, Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, Spain, Sweden
12 Comments
Yay!Now we can combine the honeymoons and the Sound Of Music location tour. Two great gay things that go great together.
dancin’ in the steets….a waltz http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…
Wallis and Futuna?Here I thought I was a geography nerd, and I don’t know where that is! But hey, good on the Austrians, and the Wallis and Futunites, too.
Das ist ja toll!And Portugal is likely to be next for marriage.
Thanks for the updated list, Lurleen.
We always marvel at crossing the border into and out of Canada and how different our status is on either side of that border. It’s shameful.
I hadn’t heard about Portugal!So, hopefully Granite Staters will be celebrating with both Austria and Portugal this January.
An online friend….. her lover is PortugueseThey are gonna PLOTZ, they were NOT treated well by her family, when they traveled there together for a funeral, the women there DETESTED THEM BOTH.
My grandmother (with her parents) immigrated from AustriaIt’s a pretty place, but it was and IS overwhelmingly Catholic. It is a very wealthy country. I know my family came through Ellis Island, but I also remember her telling me that they had staterooms on the ship. Her brother confirmed this. With the money they brought with them, within a few days they were able to start a successful business upon settling in Chicago.
Until they get over the Catholic thing, and most Austrians today are not church-goers and are at best lukewarm about the Catholic church, we’ll never see full marriage rights in Oesterreich. This is a start, however.
I would also like to correct one very common misconception.
In the movie, The Sound of Music, the impression was given that a majority of Austrians were opposed to the Anschluss – the German occupation of Austria. This is NOT TRUE.
A vast majority of Austrians welcomed the union with Germany and were only too happy to have Hitler (himself Austrian born and raised and remaining an Austrian citizen until the eve of his election as Reichschancellor of Germany) assume the role as head of state and government.
He was wildly cheered when he visited Vienna in March 1938. When WWII ended, most Austrians did a 180 and disavowed their support of the union.
It should also be noted that unlike Germany, Austria never underwent a De-Nazification process, where Nazi party officials were removed from positions of power. One result of this error was the elevation of Kurt Waldheim to Secretary General of the UN and subsequent election of Waldheim to Chancellor of Austria.
and now children… the geography lesson of the dayCongratulations to Austria! Hurray! To answer peteyPronpig’s comment, Wallis and Futuna are tropical Pacific islands that belong to my country of adoption, France. They are territories (like Guam is a US territory and not a state). When the PACS (civil union) was made law in 1999, it wasn’t initially extended to French overseas territories (Wallis, Futuna, New Caledonia). This “civil wrong” was corrected in April 2009. Thus, the inclusion in this article’s list? Oddly, other French overseas territories are still non-civil union zones: French Polynesia (think Tahiti) and the Indian Ocean island of Mayotte. French overseas departments like the Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique do have civil unions. Click here to read the Wiki article. Scroll down the page for the paragraph on Wallis and Futuna.
Hopefully, the next European nations to pass full marriage equality will be Portugal and France. Hopefully, very soon.
And now children, it’s time for today’s geography lesson.Congratulations to Austria!!! Hurray! Civil unions really do make a difference. They change lives and society’s attitudes for the better. To answer peteyPornpig, the tropical Pacific islands of Wallis and Futuna belong to France, and as such probably shouldn’t be listed here separately, but probably got listed because until early this year, they couldn’t perform civil unions. When the French government created the PACs back in 1999, it was limited to the mainland and to overseas departments (think “states”) and wasn’t made available to overseas territories like New Caledonia, Wallis and Futuna until April 2009. For some weird reason, it’s still not available in French Polynesia (think Tahiti) or Mayotte (off the coast of Madagascar). Hopefully, France and Portugal will ring in marriage equality in 2010. It looks more likely in Portugal than here in France (my country) where a somewhat anti-gay right is currently in power, but the Left is pushing hard for marriage equality.
Yes, PhilAll very true, as is the horrendous anti-Jewish violence that broke out in Vienna after the Anschluss:
http://www.ushmm.org/research/…
And unlike Germany, you do not find in Austria the same dedication to keeping memory of the persecution alive, let alone admitting responsibility for it.
Stamp collecting helps teach geographyI knew those islands from my junior high school days of stamp collecting.
hope for the Catholic Catholic countries can surprise us. Look at Spain. Full marriage equality there, muchas gracias!