by Rex Wockner
[story filed April 1, 2001]
AMSTERDAM -- It was probably the most
important moment
in the history of the worldwide struggle
for gay
equality.
Four gay couples were legally married
here April 1
under the exact same laws heterosexuals
use.
It was a world first.
Several nations have registered-partnership
laws under
which gay couples can obtain up to
99 percent of the
rights and obligations of marriage.
But only The
Netherlands now lets gays simply marry.
"All the other countries have marriages
specially made
for gay people," said Henk Krol, publisher
of De Gay
Krant magazine and the driving force
behind the
16-year process that led to legalized
marriage for
same-sex couples. "What we have in
The Netherlands is
civil marriage open to everyone. That's
the big
difference. That is the news."
Amid an international media frenzy,
the weddings took
place at City Hall as the law became
effective at the
stroke of midnight. Mayor Job Cohen
officiated.
As Cohen finished his opening remarks
at 11:58 p.m.,
the audience in the City Council chambers
began
syncopated clapping as they waited
for the room's
clock to click over to 12:00. When
it clicked, cheers
erupted.
The ceremonies themselves took about
half an hour.
Cohen stood where individuals stand
to address the
City Council. The four couples sat
in the front row of
the seats where the councilors sit.
Cohen read the marriage vows once for
each couple and
they individually responded, "Yes."
Each couple shook
hands, kissed and signed documents
which were then
signed by the mayor.
A reception followed in the City Council
foyer and the
couples departed in four brightly
colored Volkswagen
Beetles for a party at a gay club.
"The most important thing is that we
love each other
like everyone loves each other and
gets married.
There's no difference," groom Peter
Wittebrood-Lemke
told this reporter. "The whole world
has to learn that
love is between people and not only
between a man and
a woman."
Asked how marriage fits together with
gay men's
reputation for non-monogamy, Wittebrood-Lemke
said:
"Real fidelity has nothing to do with
monogamy. Real
fidelity is something else, something
in your soul,
something that attaches you to each
other. Monogamy
can be a sort of contract if you choose
it. But if you
marry you don't have to choose monogamy.
You have to
choose for fidelity."
His partner, Frank Wittebrood, added:
"Maybe you've
been told that homosexuals are not
monogamous. I think
we are more honest. A lot of heterosexuals
are like
homosexuals, but they do it in hiding.
Homosexuals are
more honest."
Groom Ton Jansen, 63, married his partner
of 36 years,
Louis Rogmans, 72.
"Marriage gives you all the rights
that other married
people have," he said. "Marriage is
the most intimate
bond two people can enter into."
Former Labour Member of Parliament
Mieke van der Burg,
who fought hard for the marriage legislation,
said the
political process was arduous.
"In the beginning, I did not believe
it would pass,"
she said. "It was very difficult in
my own political
party and in the other parties. I
had so many
discussions with members of my own
party and other
parties. It was very difficult to
give the arguments
in favor of this."
Krol echoed: "In the beginning I never
thought it
would be possible to open up marriage.
I thought it
would be possible to have an excellent
registered
partnership in The Netherlands --
the best in the
world -- and that's what we've had
since 1998. But to
open up that institution that for
a lot of people is
so special, well, we always thought
it was reasonable,
but to convince everybody that this
was indeed
necessary was a hard job. Especially
because in the
beginning it was hard to convince
the gay community.
They said, 'That's something for heterosexuals.'"
Asked to advise activists working for
gay marriage in
other nations, Krol said: "You have
to discuss it over
and over again with the politicians
and let them
think. Discuss it over and over again
until they
understand there's no reason not to
allow it. People
are against it not because they think
negative about
it but because they feel negative
in their lower body.
That's the only reason they are against
it. Once they
start to think, they find no reason
to be against it.
"The thing that finally got us over
the hump was when
we did a survey of the Dutch population
proving that a
large majority was in favor of gay
marriage," Krol
said. "Everyone in Parliament wants
to do what the
majority of the people want. That
made the
difference."
University of Utrecht Prof. Rob Tielman
said it also
helped that "Dutch society is the
most secular one in
the Western world. This explains Dutch
attitudes
towards voluntary euthanasia, recreational
drugs,
sexual self-determination, the legal
right to be nude
in certain public places, mandatory
sex education in
all schools, the lowest percentage
worldwide of
abortions and unwanted pregnancies,
the constitutional
equal treatment of gays and lesbians,
the recognition
of gay and lesbian parenthood, etc.,"
he said. "The
fact that same-sex couples can marry
now in The
Netherlands is not a miracle but the
consequence of a
long history of respect for human
rights based upon
the principle of the right of every
human being to
give meaning and shape to his or her
own life as long
as the rights of others to human self-determination
are respected."
One law change remains -- which is
expected to pass
shortly -- before same-sex marriages
are identical to
opposite-sex couplings. It will grant
lesbian couples
who give birth to babies automatic
joint parental
authority. At present, they will have
to petition a
court for that authority.
It may take some time before gay spouses
will be able
to adopt children from other nations.
Not because The
Netherlands has a problem with it,
but because the
Third World nations from which Dutch
couples adopt
children are presumably hostile to
the idea.
FOREIGNERS CAN MARRY IN THE NETHERLANDS
Gay couples from other countries can
get married in
The Netherlands provided they have
lived in The
Netherlands for four months. The City
of Amsterdam has
said it believes that gay couples
from the other 14
nations that are members of the European
Union can
come to Amsterdam and marry without
establishing
residency.
Readers of De Gay Krant magazine are
offering to
assist gay couples from non-European
Union nations in
establishing a legal address in The
Netherlands so
they can get married here.
"If an American couple has a permanent
address in
Amsterdam, they can get married,"
Krol said. "De Gay
Krant, in cooperation with some of
our readers, is
willing to provide American couples
with addresses in
Amsterdam.
"These foreigners have to prove that
they are using
the Amsterdam address for at least
four months," Krol
said. "During these months it is possible
that the
City Hall will ask them to come by.
If this is asked,
they have to show up within three
weeks. American
citizens need a permit to stay that
long in The
Netherlands, but it is rather easy
for Americans to
get that permit."
Anyone interested in this should e-mail
h.krol@gaykrant.nl.
Evan Wolfson, director of the U.S.
Lambda Legal
Defense and Education Fund's Marriage
Project, says
that what The Netherlands has done
will reverberate
across the planet.
"Non-gay people throughout the world,
including in the
U.S., will see that the sky does not
fall when
same-sex couples are included in the
protections --
and the public celebration -- of civil
marriage," he
said.
The nations that have special partnership
laws that
give registered gay couples many or
nearly all rights
of matrimony are Denmark (and Greenland),
France,
Iceland, Norway, Sweden and, in the
U.S., the state of
Vermont. A few other nations, including
Canada and
Hungary, grant gays many rights of
marriage under
common-law marriage statutes. Portugal's
gay
partnership law is expected to take
effect later this
year.