Swiss voters overwhelmingly said “yes” to same-sex marriage in a Sunday vote, beating a conservative effort to defeat LGBTQ+ equality.
Switzerland originally voted to legalize same-sex marriage in December alongside a bill streamlining the process of legal name and gender changes for individuals over 16 years of age. The now-defunct Christian Democratic People’s Party, a center-right parliamentary faction that merged with the Conservative Democratic Party of Switzerland in January, successfully petitioned to put the same-sex marriage bill up to a nationwide referendum, hoping that voters would reject the freedom to marry at the polls.
The attempt ultimately failed. Nearly two-thirds of Swiss voters (64.1%) elected to ratify the legislation in this weekend’s plebiscite, according to the German news outlet Deutsche Welle.
While Swiss same-sex couples have been able to enter domestic partnerships since 2007, these unions only offered some of the benefits of marriage. The bill will not only grant same-sex couples the same rights as married opposite-sex partners, but will also allow them to adopt children.
The legislation will also allow lesbian couples to have access to sperm banks for the first time in the country’s history and permit same-sex couples in which one partner lives abroad to apply for citizenship benefits.
Switzerland’s marriage equality vote has been a long time coming. The legislation was initially introduced in 2013 but stalled in its parliament, even as many of the country’s neighbors passed same-sex marriage. German Parliament passed its freedom to marry bill in 2017, and the Austrian Supreme Court extended full marriage rights to same-sex couples later the same year.
Swiss LGBTQ+ couples will have to wait just a bit longer before the law is implemented: They will finally be able to get married starting in July 2022. The estimated 11,500 couples engaged in civil partnerships will have the option of converting to a marriage or keeping their current status.
Even as same-sex couples wait to have their love recognize by the government, Swiss LGBTQ+ groups celebrated the groundbreaking step forward. Pink Cross, an umbrella organization representing gay and bisexual men, referred to the marriage equality vote as “a huge success and a big milestone” but acknowledged there is much more progress to be made.
“We have to fight for even more acceptance in society,” Pink Cross said in a statement on Twitter, “because insults and attacks are unfortunately still part of our everyday life.”
That sentiment was echoed by the Umbrella Association of Rainbow Families, a Swiss advocacy organization lobbying on behalf of LGBTQ+ parents. The organization wrote in a press release that the campaign against marriage equality mounted by opposition groups “left its mark” on members.
“Our families have come into the focus of the sometimes very derogatory political debate,” said its co-president, Eva Kaderli.
Opponents of same-sex marriage argued that sperm donation “deprived” children of the right to a father, according to the local news site Swiss Info. The publication further reports that anti-LGBTQ+ groups distributed posters depicting “zombie fathers” and “exploited surrogate mothers,” warning of the slippery slope that could result if surrogacy and egg donations were legalized in the future.
Europe as a whole has seen a sharp rise in anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment in recent years. In June, Hungary passed a Russia-style “propaganda” law banning minors from viewing materials that promote “homosexuality” and “gender change.” In nearby Poland, over 100 municipalities have declared themselves “LGBT-free” since 2019.
LGBTQ+ equality is particularly tenuous in the United Kingdom, where an appeals court recently overturned a ban on puberty blockers for trans youth under 16. In June, the U.K. government threatened to defund trans-inclusive LGBTQ+ groups.
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