Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) yesterday said he would be willing to participate in Taipei’s annual gay pride march.
Ko said he would participate in the event, if his schedule permitted, when asked by Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City Councilor Wang Min-sheng (王閔生) at the Taipei City Council.
Ko’s answer represented a shift from his stance in an interview in December last year, when he said he had “little desire” to participate in the event — one of Asia’s largest gay pride parades.
Ko said at the time that there is a difference between “respecting” and “promoting” homosexuality.
Wang called on Ko to participate in the march because it would represent an affirmation of gay rights, rather than the promotion of gay behavior.
The city government is “relatively open” to the possibility of subsidizing the march directly, Ko said, but added that city funds allocated to events for the gay community would depend on the needs of the entire community.
Wang said that the administration of former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) had reversed former Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) policy of providing direct subsidies and participating in the event, instead funding only “passive” events for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.
Taipei Department of Cultural Affairs Commissioner Ni Chung-hwa (倪重華) promised to use department funds to support an October LGBT film festival.
Last month, the Taipei City Government announced that its United Marriage Ceremony would be open to LGBT couples for the first time in October.
Ko said in the December interview that his stance on gay marriage was “unopposed,” rather than “supportive.”
Ko had said he was “glad to see” efforts by Seoul’s mayor to have the city recognize gay marriage, but that such efforts had “no relation” to his own mayorship.
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