Template talk:Same-sex unions

Sort by continent?

As the list is getting longer, I'm wondering if it would make sense to sort the marriage section of the template by continent (or some other measure). Could link the continents' wikis e.g. Asia and Europe ~Malvoliox (talk | contribs) 16:52, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure that would improve the template, just make it busier and more convoluted. Jdcooper (talk) 00:47, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be very imbalanced? Like Europe, Americas, and a small bit of others. Quartr (talk) 22:14, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Where's Nepal?

Where's Nepal? The Supreme Court of Nepal had recently legalized same-sex marriage in the country. 36.76.91.208 (talk) 10:00, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Citation? Last I heard they had yet to issue a ruling, and don't know if the ruling itself would mean legalization. — kwami (talk) 15:40, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Slovakia

I've reviewed this article and I see no evidence of unregistered cohabitation for same-sex couples in Slovakia. The only source it cites is the civil code of the Czechoslovakia era. That civil code doesn't even mention same-sex couples. Here's the most recent report from ILGA-Europe: https://rainbowmap.ilga-europe.org/countries/slovakia/ . You can clearly see that Slovakia has 0.00% points in the category of 'family'. ILGA World database also doesn't mention unregistered cohabitation for same-sex couples in Slovakia. It is also clearly a more reliable and up-to-date source than a sixty-year-old Czechoslovakia civil code. If our WP:RS are inconclusive, it is better to err on the side of caution and not include Slovakia as recognising unregistered cohabitations? In general, Wikipedia leans towards not including information that is not fully supported, rather than including dubious information until it's proven wrong. Cyanmax (talk) 11:29, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

“Recognized” sub section

Is there any need for this special sub-section with a single entry, when that entry (Israel, in this case) is listed in its own section with a footnote anyway? I dislike the idea that any country should be listed twice, and I don’t think in general this sidebar needs to give readers the entire complete and complex legal status at every jurisdiction, when readers can and should be encouraged to go to the article to get the full picture. Maybe you can give me a better idea of your thinking here, @Kwamikagami? — HTGS (talk) 22:11, 20 September 2024 (UTC)

They have marriage but don't perform it. Would we just list it under 'marriage' with a footnote? — kwami (talk) 00:24, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Is “having marriage” not equal to “performing marriage” anymore? I don’t want to be argumentative, but I just can’t see that “recognition of marriage” is really what we’re getting at when we say a place has (“has”) same-sex marriage.

In saying that, I’m not here on a campaign about the politics of the legal question, I actually just want to organize the template in a sensible way; if others agree that recognition without performance is our standard, then yes, I’m happier if Israel is only listed in that one place, even if it is the marriage list. — HTGS (talk) 00:48, 21 September 2024 (UTC) Also I’m always happy when a discussion about Israel doesn’t turn out to be a “discussion about Israel” haha — HTGS (talk) 00:51, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I removed the 2nd entry for Israel.

Recognizing marriage was never equal to performing marriage. You can be married in Israel, you just have to get married somewhere else, even if by video conference. The only other polities currently like this that I'm aware of are American Indian nations in the US. — kwami (talk) 00:55, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I don’t generally appreciate edits made while discussion is underway, but I’m surprised to see—on reading Recognition of same-sex unions in Israel properly—that it doesn’t appear that civil unions are any different:

the Knesset passed the Civil Union Law for Citizens with No Religious Affiliation, 2010. The law allows opposite-sex couples, but not same-sex couples, to form a civil union in Israel if they are both registered as officially not belonging to any religion.

So ultimately, the question is: Should Israel be listed under marriage, or under limited recognition? — HTGS (talk) 01:25, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Marriage. The higher tier applies. In countries with both marriage and CU's, we list them under 'marriage'. — kwami (talk) 01:37, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Well sure, I mean, I already knew what your answer was. My point was that it should never have been listed under CU. I would like more input to consider this resolved though. Would you mind if I notified WikiProject:LGBT, Talk:Recognition of same-sex unions in Israel and Talk:Marriage in Israel? — HTGS (talk) 01:59, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Sure.

We set up CUs before the situation with marriage was clarified. I thought there were CU's for SS couples, but no matter now that marriage is so easily accessible (at least if you speak English!) — kwami (talk) 02:58, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, why is English a necessity for Israeli same-sex couples to be married? — HTGS (talk) 03:01, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

You need to call a county clerk in Utah. Good chance they won't have a Hebrew (or Arabic or Russian) speaker there. Unless you want to fly to Greece, but that's no longer easy accessibility.

I don't know if there are other places that will marry non-residents via video call. — kwami (talk) 03:13, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I think the “recognized” section is necessary, and an important distinction, even if Israel is the only country that qualifies under that category. Prcc27 (talk) 06:07, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Agree with @Prcc27:. Personally I don't see the problem in leaving the template as it is. We agree that Israel is the only state with this particular situation, and I feel it would be misleading to clump it in with all the others as if there were no distinction. Jdcooper (talk) 21:12, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I just have a hard time imagining that same-sex couples in Israel feel like they have legal access to marriage when they need to leave the country or use an American Zoom court. — HTGS (talk) 22:10, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

in mexico too, not all states grant equal access to marriage, but once you're married you're married. SSM is not the same as marriage equality, even in the US. in israel if one of the recognized religions started conducting SSM, you'd be able to get it in-country, since the state already recognizes it. — kwami (talk) 23:02, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Two states: also American Samoa, which we'd had further down based on its previous lack of recognition. — kwami (talk) 22:56, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Kwami, what is your understanding that the “Marriage” section actually means? — HTGS (talk) 03:17, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

That you can be legally married in that polity. If you can, there is marriage. We generally expect you to be able to get married there as well, as that makes a huge difference for accessibility, but in some ways that's secondary: once you're married, that's no longer legally relevant (to you, at least). — kwami (talk) 04:30, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

I think “That you can be legally married in that polity” doesn’t resolve our ambiguity. Honestly, it would read like you want to say places where you can exist while married, but I think you must mean places where the government will recognise your marriage? I would be fine with this, but 1) I suspect this just isn’t quite the mainstream understanding of “Legal status of same-sex unions : Marriage”, and 2) I would want to make the section clear to readers in what it is actually saying. That was the intent behind the previous “Marriage legal” list title, but I appreciate that that barely clarifies anything from where we stand. — HTGS (talk) 04:45, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

BTW, we might simply delete the American Samoa entry. They're covered by the fn in the US entry. Personally, I like having it spelled out, but could see it either way. — kwami (talk) 04:37, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

I’m fine with this :)

I would prefer not to have American Samoa have to be listed as a sub-item to United States if it is kept though. That just seems unnecessarily wordy. (And yes, I would ideally do the same to the Dutch and British territories.) — HTGS (talk) 04:47, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Nepal

A couple people have put Nepal back on the marriage list, saying that's because marriage is legal even if it affords no rights. A register sounds more like the situation in Aruba before legalization, or some EU countries that register couples married abroad for the purpose of immigration, but we don't include those countries. I think an explicit rational needs to be made, and consensus on whether that counts as 'legal marriage'. BTW, we also count Mexico as a country even though marriage is not legal in 4 states. Perhaps the solution is to remove the addition of the word 'legal' from the section title. (SSM is also legal in Vietnam. They just don't recognize it.) — kwami (talk) 22:49, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Well same sex marriage is legal throughout all of Mexico, Just because the state congresses of Aguascalientes, Chihuahua, Guanajuato and Chiapas have not modify their civil codes that does not means couples have not been getting married, Aguas and Chiapas had their bans overturn by the supreme court those are no longer valid, congress might decide to never modify their civil codes and ss couples will still be getting married. For Chihuahua and Guanajuato are a little more complex but couples are still getting married, the federal and state governments recognized those marriages as legal. Its true that many states for example have bans against same sex couples adopting but those are totally different issues, in Latin America marriage and adoption laws are not usually interrelated, what I means is that if you legalized ssm you will need to change other laws to legalized adoption, its not by default that by having marriage you will have adoption.

On regards of Nepal its more complicate because marriages are being performed, we already had at least one lesbian and one gay couple being able to marry not just transgender as when it first starts. Sunil Babu Pant activist from Nepal from what I have gather every time he gives an interview he assures that the couples that married have the same rights even if they are registered in a temporary register. For me Nepal should only be added or any other country if we can confirm or verify that same sex couples are getting most of their right and benefits and the countries laws consider them married. On vietname Case for examples the country does not consider them married nor they get any rights from what I gather --Allancalderini12 (talk) 08:27, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

I think you've got it right. If you can provide RS's that SSM couples in Nepal are afforded the rights of marriage, and not just put on a waiting list for when those rights might some day be granted, then I would agree with you that Nepal should be listed under 'marriage' and should also be dark blue on the map. It took us years to find a RS that Israel affords SSM couples the rights of marriage, and Israel occupies a lot more print space than Nepal. It might be only after the SC rules that we discover that we should have been counting Nepal all along.

For Vietnam, SSM used to be illegal. As in you could be arrested for having a wedding. It's now been legalized in the sense that it's been decriminalized. I.e. the police aren't going to harass you at your wedding. But your wedding will carry no more legal weight than it would in India or Peru. It seems that there isn't the threat of violence that you face in some countries, and so people have been having public weddings for years, but I don't know if that even make it easier for them to rent an apartment together. (If it does, then IMO we could list Viet under 'minimal rights', because all residency needs to be registered with the police, but we haven't been able to find a RS.) — kwami (talk) 09:21, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

I can provide more than enough sources to support my position:

1 [1]

2 [2]

3 [3]

4 [4]

5 [5]

6 [6]

7 [7]

8 [8]

9 [9]

No reason to jump ahead of the game. Stop parroting pointless claims, provide sources. Cyanmax (talk) 14:34, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

For clarity, Cyanmax's position [correct me if I'm wrong] is that Nepal does not have SSM. E.g. their first source says, 'No, Nepal didn’t allow queer folks to marry each other' and 'So why did the media spread misinformation?' I.e., that it is 'misinformation' that Nepal has SSM. — kwami (talk) 23:37, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

That source is from December 2023, at the time only 1 marriage had occur in the country, since then the Home Affairs' National ID and Civil Registration Department circular to all local registration authorities on April 24 to allow same sex marriages and put them on a separte register. Honestly for now we should just put Nepal on the same sex marriage category imo. --Allancalderini12 (talk) 03:50, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

i agree completely. This template should reflect the reality, not make a judgment call on what constitutes marriage. Andrew1444 (talk) 04:18, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. Find the sources that counter Cyanmax's, and we'll do just that.

You're arguing over WP:TRUTH, that reality is what you know to be true. Find something that satisfies WP:RS instead. — kwami (talk) 06:12, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

Better be patient and wait for a final verdict of full bench of the Supreme Court. Same-sex marriage has been legal in Colombia since 28 April 2016, but notaries across the country started registering same-sex marriages since June 2013. It's been 15 months, but only around five couples have registered their "marriages". Isn't that suspicious? I could understand if it was Liechtenstein with a population of just under 40,000 people. But Nepal is a crowded country with a population of over 30 million. Most of those couples are transgender couples, and the remaining few were listed as "bride and groom". They had to to seek help from lawyers and wait a very long time just to get useless "marriage" certificates with that "bride and groom" note. But many other couples can't afford a lawyer. Don't tell me it's not a big deal. Cyanmax (talk) 13:23, 19 October 2024 (UTC)