Nearly ten thousand people gathered around Taiwan’s legislature on Sunday in Taipei calling for marriage equality. The organizer of the “Rainbow Siege” event is the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights. That group is a collective of more than 120 civic groups.
Sunday’s rally called on legislators to cast aside their homophobia and end their discrimination against gays and lesbians, in order to pave the way for Taiwan to become the first country in Asia to offer marriage equality.
Organizers attached a total of 112 symbolic “homophobia locks” to the outer wall of the legislature. Those represent the 112 lawmakers. So far, 19 of those lawmakers have released statements in favor of marriage equality. Three of those legislators, all from the Democratic Progressive Party, were on hand at Sunday’s rally. They used symbolic “equality keys” to remove the “homophobia locks”.
One of those lawmakers, Yu Mei-nu, has pledged as a member of the legislature’s judicial committee, to hold a public hearing on marriage equality in mid-October. She said that at the hearing she will request a speedy response from the Ministry of Justice, and that a date be set for reviewing marriage equality legislation.