Leo van Doesburg

40 Members of the European Parliament sent a letter to Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, to the President of the Chamber of Deputies Liviu Dragnea, and to the President of the Senate Calin Popescu Tariceanu. They asked them to respect the sovereignty of their own people and to organize without delay the referendum on the definition of marriage that was requested by 3 million Romanian citizens. The referendum is currently being postponed by more and more procedural delays.

On Friday, the 22 nd of May, the Irish citizens will vote in a referendum aimed at amending the Irish Constitution so as to redefine marriage as being between any of two persons, regardless of their sex. The promoters for the redefinition of marriage, are introducing the referendum as a grass root movement. The media mentions that no less than 80% of the Irish citizens will vote in the referendum for such an amendment in the constitution. It is proudly announced that the big majority for a YES vote would mark the first time that same-sex marriage legalization would be legalized by popular vote.  This would also “mark yet another defeat for the Catholic church and the political power it used to wield in Ireland ” (trying to unjustly frame marriage as a catholic and not a societal issue) However, increasing concerns have been raised by the question whether this is a “home-grown phenomenon” or rather a more carefully-orchestrated and massively well-funded assault on the nat...

”Do you think that the Constitution should define marriage as a union between a woman and a man?” was the question that within 15 days gained about 20% of voting population′s support, or exactly: 749.316 signatures. Although this should be more than enough to legally call for a national referendum, this action faced a lot of pressure from different sides. Please read here an article written by Slavko Vukmanov, member of the Croatian political party HRAST and his personal impressions about the actions and pressure they faced:

In spite of pressure, mass demonstrations to preserve marriage are continuing. A new massive demonstration took place on Sunday in Paris, France, against the legislative proposal to legalize marriage and adoption for same-sex couples. While official police statements spoke of an estimated 300,000 protesters, the organizers said that some 1.4 million people took part in the demonstration. Even though the media try to frame the demonstrations in negative ways and the police (under the French Ministry of Internal Affairs) tries to forge the real number of protestors, the French people are determined that the institute of marriage and the children’s rights need to remain protected. (Article by Leo van Doesburg and Jonathan van Tongeren) Please find an analysis about the pressures here :

A law proposal on “marriage for all” (mariage pour tous) is due to go before Parliament for debate by the end of this month. The legalization of gay marriage was a campaign promise by socialist President François Hollande .   However this proposal seems not to have the approval of the majority of the French population. Only in the last three months, 100,000s of people from all across France have participated in several unprecedented manifestations to oppose this bill with determin ation, bec ause t h is proposed law would mean a profound change of the nature of Marriage, Ad option and Filiation and has been promoted as "creating access to parenthood for same sex couples through the "mechanism" of adoption. On the 13th of January the first national massive demo nstration will take place in Paris, where (a ccording to the French media) several hundred thousands people are expected to be gather ed .   (article writ ten by Eunice Vatran , adapted by Leo va...