Hong Kong lawyer says marriage will ‘no longer be special’ if same-sex marriages are legalised
The Asian city is facing pressure after Taiwan legalised same-sex marriages earlier this month
By Steve Brown
Words: Steve Brown
A government lawyer in Hong Kong says marriage will ‘no longer be special’ if same-sex marriages are legalised.
Just last week, Taiwan became the first place in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage and couples celebrated with more than 400 weddings taking place on Friday (May 24) – the day the law was brought into effect.
However, the pressure for Hong Kong to follow suit has been met with multiple objections including a former member of the Equal Opportunities Commission who said there would be ‘huge consequences’ if marriage equality happened.
And now, lawyer Stewart Wong reportedly said that marriage would be ‘diluted and diminished’ and ‘no longer special’ if same-sex couples could get married.
He also argued that Hong Kong’s definition of marriage was already defined by law and therefore ‘cannot be trumped’.
When questioned about same-sex civil unions, he said that they ‘undermine’ the traditional institution of marriage.
Wong said: “To recognise an alternative form of same-sex relationships which we say in tantamount to a [marriage] is to undermine the traditional institution of marriage and the family constituted by such a marriage.”