Support Marriage Equality and Stop Colonial-Era LGBTQ+ Discrimination

Target: Edward David Burt, Premier of Bermuda

Goal: End ban on same-sex marriage and affirm marriage equality.

Marriage equality advocates in the Caribbean islands received an important boost when Bermuda’s Supreme Court granted the right of same-sex couples to marry. Unfortunately, this piece of progress was recently rescinded by an appeals court in the United Kingdom (which holds jurisdiction in many Caribbean regions). Although acknowledging the damage the prohibition could cause to citizens, the court ruled that the legislative assemblies of Bermuda and the Cayman Islands (where the right is also in dispute) had final say. Bermuda’s newest assembly had been quick to challenge the initial ruling, so for now marriage equality remains an aspiration rather than a reality.

Ironically, the anti-LGBTQ+ legal statutes in these regions and throughout much of the Caribbean derive from the islands’ former status as British colonies. The countries adopted colonial anti-sodomy laws that still remain in place for many regions. These laws threatened men (and in some cases women) with imprisonment for same-sex relations. The affirmation of marriage rights was seen as an important milestone in a part of the world where oppression and marginalization of sexual minorities is rampant.

Sign the petition below to urge a restoration of marriage equality for all.

PETITION LETTER:

Dear Premier Burt,

“Stigmatisation, denigration and victimisation …a sense of exclusion and stigma”: the Privy Council, in its decision to uphold the legislative assembly’s challenge to marriage equality, warned that the ruling would enable these conditions to thrive for many of your citizens. You claimed that society was not ready to accept same-sex marriage, yet you have created an environment that makes acceptance impossible.

You may not care about the harm you are doing to an ostracized segment of your population. Perhaps you will care about the economic damage you are tallying…to the tune of billions of dollars in lost revenue from tourism and from productive workers leaving their homeland to find acceptance. Pretending a people do not exist will never change the truth of their existence.

Stop handcuffing your people and your economy. End the war on marriage equality now.

Sincerely,

[Your Name Here]

Photo Credit: Benson Kua