I lived in France for a number of years, go back as often as I can, and while I love the country (as much as my own), I’ve long felt that the French reputation for social progressiveness is overstated. Tolerant in many respects, but “tolerance” is not the same as the willingness to grant civic equality. There’s a deeply conservative, even reactionary streak in the culture, especially vis-a-vis anything having to do with family issues — daftpunkydavid is absolutely correct to highlight the issue of adoption rights.

And, of course, there is also flat-out homophobia, Anyone here who reads French might want to check out the message boards at Le Monde, which have been overrun with bigot eruptions, most of which seem to be coming from arch-conservative Catholics. The arguments are, unsurprisingly, identical to what we see here in the States (end of civilization, polygamy and bestiality, what about the children, etc.).

The good news is that the polls I’ve seen show a majority of French people now in favor of marriage equality (with even stronger support among the young), and this may well be an issue in the next presidential election.

So Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité isn’t a reality for everyone, not yet. But they’ll get there. As will we.

i will add that, as much as i love france, it has sadly not been at the forefront of human rights when it comes to us queer folks, at least not since 1995, when they passed the pacs.

and although french people are overall very much for equal marriage rights, they are still reluctant to grant adoption rights to gay couples. i therefore partly fault the lgbt associations in france for this massive fail!

finally, due process and equal protection in the us and in france are not the same; if u read the decision, and try to draw parallels to what happens in the us, it sounds as if the constitutional council decided (by what vote margin?) that some rational basis test was applicable; and that there may be indeed reasons to limit marriage to 2 pple of opposite sex, pretty much like the ny state’s highest court had ruled (although the french court did not even give an example of what those reasons may be).
i am not sure this would happen in the united states. at least i hope it won’t.

No government is beyond critique and France is no exception. If there’s misinformation being spread, the first thing you should be doing is correcting the record; inexplicably telling everyone that they are forbidden to comment is hardly constructive.

If the French people want to resolve this they will do so and do so in a way consistent with their laws and culture. Stay out of it.

So what now? How are the chances of the legislature changing the law?

Liberté! Egalité! Fraternité! Maybe one day.

TRiG.

The law is complicated enough that in many cases one can come up with some sort legal argument to support the desired outcome however weak that argument may be.