Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) yesterday expressed “respect” and “support” for multi-dimensional gender identity, but said he has reservations about a proposed bill to legalize same-sex marriage.
The premier made the remarks during the question-and-answer session at the legislature in Taipei when he was asked by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) to comment on the bill up for review at the committee stage.
Jiang said he very much respects a person’s sexual orientation and supports multi-dimensional gender identity because it is what it is in diverse human society.
Photo: CNA
However, when it comes to making changes to the systems applied to traditional marriage, the family and spousal rights and responsibilities, the issue requires more careful consideration of everything involved because of the “immense complexity” of those changes, Jiang said.
“In a free society, the issue can be discussed. As for whether the bill would pass the legislature, it’s a decision for the people and their lawmakers,” Jiang said.
Jiang said he did not see a chance that same-sex marriage would be accepted by society at the present time.
The issue deserves more discussion, a higher degree of consensus among society is required and there should be complementary measures put in place before the decision is made to legalize same-sex marriage, Jiang said.
Ting said he has received complaints about the bill and that he agrees with Fo Guang Shan Foundation for Buddhist Culture and Education, which opposes the bill.
While people have the right to love a same-sex partner, to live together and to be granted certain legal rights, it should not affect traditional marital ethics and family values, Ting said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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