All Love's Legal: Thailand set to make history as country moves one step closer to legalizing same-sex marriage
The kingdom is on its way to becoming the first country in Southeast Asia to legalize same-sex marriage.
A decade-long journey
On Wednesday, March 27, Thailand’s lower house passed the Marriage Equality Bill with a landslide 399 votes in support, only 10 against. This move marks the culmination of years of advocacy work from Thailand’s LGBTQ+ rights groups to gain legal recognition for same-sex couples in a country that boasts one of the most vibrant & diverse queer communities in Asia, particularly as the country’s capital of Bangkok is set to host World Pride festivities in 2028.
The bill still requires approval from the Senate as well as from King Vajiralongkorn, upon which it would become law 120 days later. In this case, Thailand would become the 3rd country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage — after Taiwan in May 2019, and Nepal in June 2023.
The new legislation removes the gendered definition of marriage as the union between a man and a woman, now presented as the union of two people regardless of gender. Same-sex couples thereby become entitled to the full array of rights granted to heterosexual couples, including inheritance as well as adoption rights.
However, activists have warned that the continued gendered terminology, namely ‘father’ and ‘mother’ instead of ‘parent’, in family law could complicate adoption processes for same-sex couples.
Support for the Marriage Equality Bill brought together various fringes of Thailand’s civil society, and raises hopes that this would help expedite a draft bill to allow transgender people to change their legal gender on their official documents after undergoing sex reassignment surgery.
Additionally, many sex workers who had supported efforts to pass the bill also hope the momentum can fuel legal recognition for sex work in the country. Although prostitution is illegal in Thailand, it has become a notorious destination for sexual tourism, largely in the red-light districts of Bangkok, Phuket, and Pattaya, among others.
Activists have pointed to the trade-off between the economic weight carried by sexual tourism and the lack of legal protection for sex workers, especially at the hands of unknowing tourists and predatory clients, becoming an important intersectional issue for queer rights groups, particularly as LGBTQ+ tourism represents an important sector of the country’s tourist sector.
Advancing LGBTQ+ rights in Southeast Asia
Beyond domestic implications, the Marriage Equality Bill represents a beacon of hope for the advancement of LGBTQ+ rights in a region where queerness remains heavily policed.
In October 2022, a Halloween-themed drag event in the capital of Kuala Lumpur in neighbouring Malaysia ended abruptly after the police raided the venue and arrested dozens of men, many of whom were Malay/Muslim, for cross-dressing. Similar crackdown occurred a few months later in March 2023 in the aftermath of the Women’s March, when several organizers & protesters were questioned by the police for waving rainbow flags. The issue made it all the way to the country’s Parliament, where some even accused the rally of being a pro-LGBTQ event.
Similarly, and despite its relative openness towards the LGBTQ+ community, the Philippines has at times cracked down on queer expression, as illustrated by the arrest of drag performer Pura Luka Vega last October after a video of them performing as Jesus Christ surfaced online.
Beyond conservative social attitudes, many countries in Southeast Asia still retain anti-queer legislation. Despite repealing colonial-era Section 377A in November 2022, Singapore simultaneously moved to amend its constitution to enshrine a heterosexual definition of marriage, effectively undermining hopes for substantive equality.
Homosexuality is still a crime in Myanmar, as well as Muslim-majority Malaysia, Indonesia, and Brunei, many of which inherited colonial Britain’s Section 377 of the Penal Code, with penalties ranging from fines to jail time, to death by stoning in the case of Brunei.
While the ostensible passing of marriage equality in Thailand has stoked outrage among Southeast Asia’s conservatives, the legal move provides a shining beacon of hope to the region’s many queer individuals that change can happen at home, without the need to turn to Western countries for marriage rights.
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