The Lesbian News Stack 2011 - January 26

By maxime68 on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 - 17:40

Get ready for another fresh pile of political news with a focus on European LGBT content, and learn what our politicians have been up to so far.

World

The already existing split over gay bishops within the Anglican church deepens, as several archbishops refuse to attend respectively boycott the meeting of the world's Anglican leadership that's currently taking place in Dublin.

Around the Corner (India)

A lesbian couple committed suicide, allegedly because their fear of their future had deepened after watching a local show that explored the uncertainty of gay relationships.

Austria

Ulrike Lunacek, Austrian MEP and Co-President of the European Parliament Intergroup on LGBT Rights, invited Niki Lauda to the Rainbowball (Regenbogenball) in Vienna, after Lauda gave an interview in which he made some clearly homophobic comments.

Denmark

The Minister of Interior and Health undermined his own statement on gay marriage which means that it is now only a question of bringing the vote to the government.

France/Europe

When a gay couple, one of them French, applied for marriage in Portugal, they found their request refused mere weeks before the scheduled wedding. France had decided, without informing anyone else than consulates, that no French lesbian or gay person is allowed to enter a gay marriage or gender neutral marriage because the current French legislation doesn’t allow for a recognition of the couple’s status should they ask for this in France, neither is there a legal means to transform it into a PACS (French civil union which is gender neutral) as this would mean the couple had to divorce first. There are two sparks of hope on the horizon as the Constitutional Court will announce its verdict on the ban of gay marriage this Friday and Hélène Mandroux, Mayor of Montpellier and initiator of a campaign to open marriage, offered to marry the couple, who actually live in the region of Montpellier.

Germany

Minister of Family Affairs, Kristina Schröder, who was the topic of some malicious and – depending on your point of view – sexist news after the announcement that she was pregnant with her first child, managed to get quickly back to the headlines after she said in an interview that lesbian football (soccer) players are way more relaxed about their sexual orientation than their male counterparts and that she sees lesbian football players as lesbian role models.

A family living in Kehl (south-western city that shares a bridge with the French Strasbourg) has been charged with heavy assault directed at their daughter who was living in a lesbian relationship at the time of the attack. Sadly the daughter retells the events differently than unrelated witnesses.

The German Federal Government (coalition of Christian Democrats and Liberals) rejected a motion for full equality of same-sex couples once again.

A memorial service for homosexuals that were persecuted by the Nazis will be held on Thursday Jan 27th, in Berlin.