Nepal to legalize gay marriage, offer weddings on Mt. Everest
Want to get married on top of the world? Not a problem, says a travel agency promoting gay marriage in Nepal.
In May, the country is set to ratify a new constitution that legalizes same-sex marriages, according to a report in The Telegraph.
Sunil Babu Pant, a Communist legislator and leader of the country’s gay rights movement, launched Pink Mountain, a travel agency offering wedding ceremonies on Mount Everest, the world’s tallest peak.
Pant’s company will offer regal, elephant-back processions and wedding ceremonies at the mountain’s base camp.
“Most Asian countries don’t welcome gay visitors, so we can have the maximum benefit for the Nepal economy which is fragile after years of war,” Pant told the Telegraph. “The government is hoping to increase the number of tourists from 400,000 to one million next year and has taken a positive attitude to welcoming gay and lesbian visitors to help meet their ambitious target.”
Now that is completely out of left field and cool at the same time.
As more countries legalize same-sex marriage, the U.S. becomes more of a laughing stock and less relevant on the world stage.
How wonderful of Nepal to welcome Gay visitors to the “Top of the World” with open arms in a spirit of equality which Americans, sadly, can only dream of.
I may one day write to Mr. Sunil Babu Pant’s company Pink Mountain and find out what his agency is offering by way of tours in Nepal. I have never been to Asia and may want to experience that countinent at least a few times in my life. I am not sure I have the nerve to climb such an arduous mountain at my age in my soft and flabby state. But maybe a hike around the bottom of that mountain might one of his company’s offerings for the older and more out of shape like me.
Form of government is of no concern in any country to me so long as I can be reasonable sure of my personal safety unrelated to naturally risky outdoor adventures (like no riots, uprisings, wars, revolutions, bombings of popular venues and events, or of vehicles, etc)and also of my welcome.
I don’t and won’t call my country the USA a laughing stock as I still have some hope and some national pride, but I do believe that it’s becoming irrelevant on the world power and political scene. And that it is underperforming in health, environment, education, gay rights, rights for its minority citizens, (especially its peoples who were here before the arrival of the Europeans) public transportation, curbing pollution, economy, energy efficiency etc.
This comes a surprise, but a welcomed one none the less.
Morgan, sadly, I agree with you. When I see you list the things we are behind the world in, it comes across as quite striking. While not news to me, it really jumped out as just sad that we can’t be leaders in the area you cite.
I think I know why. This country was founded at a time of more personal integrity, by people who were truly interested in the ideals of freedom and self government.
Now it is run, under the same rules, by people with no personal integrity and no interest in the ideals we were founded on. Their ideals, on both sides, boil down to power and money. Yes, the left has better ideology towards the people and our rights, but I believe they use that to gain support only to get power. Of course we know how the right uses ideology to do same.
The rules were written for a time when people seemed to have more humanistic respect…more of an understanding of their role in society and the implications of behaving poorly in that society.
Sure, I’m not saying the rosy glasses view of a bunch of nice people figuring out how to live better. They were rough times and there was plenty of fend for yourself to go around, but I simply come to believe more and more each day that we do not have the moral integrity to live up to our ideals in a system that assumes integrity to even function properly.
Of course, the reason we have lost that integrity is the rise of christianity. Our founders were not all christians, many of them rejected it but now that it is the assumption rather than part of our diversity, it has been used to approve horrible behavior in the name of a higher good. What a bunch of crap that is…men have always done evil, but never as fervently when doing it under the guise of religious cultism!
Although a recent Nepali Supreme Court decision stated that in theory there is no reason to deny equal rights, including marriage, to gay people, it did not order that equal marriage rights be implemented, but rather punted the decision to a committee to study the issue further. I wish Pant all success in spinning this to create a wave of gay tourism and maybe even real rights; however, Nepalis, while extremely friendly, are very conservative on sexual issues. The gay Nepalis I met are very closeted and there are, as of now, no gay venues. There are many reasons to go to Nepal, but don’t go expecting a gay utopia – or any gay scene at all. It is a desperately poor country struggling hard to redefine itself and to seek solutions to seemingly intractable social and political problems.
robertocucina,
That may change very soon. I hope
Again, a primary example of a govermenment asserting a pragmatice approach to marriage of two people over and beyond the emotional rhetoric (hysterical fanaticism) used by anti-same sex opposition to define marriage as being only a relegious sacrament, for procreation, and/or protection of children. I will repeat my assertion that a government’s only interest in sancioning marriage by licence is to control wealth and the distribution there of. In essence, marriage, e.g., the incorporation of two individuals into a single family unit by license and a legally signed contratual agreement, is all about economics for the benefit of the society in which the union takes place. Nothing more and nothing less. Napal, in its governmental wisdom, evidently sees the economic benefits of allowing sanctified marriages for same sex couples to promote tourism. Its a pragmatic approach to attact foreign dollars for that nation’s economy. I wish them well.
Absolutely amazing! Imagine elephants at your marriage ceremony in the Himalayas…ROCK ON! That would be a memory for a lifetime. Mad respect for Nepal!