IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 7 ENGLISH | Page 87

ing their right to inherit, property, pension, adoption and sex change. These
rights have been protected principally at
judicial levels, which have supported the
evolution and effective guarantee of the
LGBTQ community’s rights, in the spirit
of the 1991, liberal Constitution. This is
what the Constitutional Court did, too.
Congress has turned its back on the discussion of these issues and never approved laws that would guarantee their
rights in a broad way, with solid grounding in law. Curiously, equal adoption
was approved before marriage between
same-sexed couples, although what is
foreseen is that the high constitutional
court it will approve it very soon by.
This body already allows this sort of
union via a solemn contractual tie,
through which the couple acquires rights
without being institutionally married.
With this imminent approval by the
Constitutional Court, Colombia is approximating the world’s most egalitarian
nations, and enters into a small club of
countries that acknowledge all rights to
the LGBTQ community. Of course,
there are many detractors of all these
decisions, both in Colombia and the international community. Religious institutions and the conservative sectors represent them. Their argument is that equal
marriage harms the traditional concept
of a family being comprised of a man
and a woman. The voices of the opposition to equal marriage and homosexual
adoption have been notorious in Colombia.

Yet, they are not only isolated in social
reality, but also visibly contrast with
different scientific studies that take the
position that the minor’s interests are
most important and confirm that no one
has been able to prove that the children
of same-sexed couples have their psychological wellbeing affected their parents’ sexual orientation. Similarly, those
conservative positions strictly ignore or
reject the importance of adoption in Colombian society, where, unfortunately,
there are so many boys and girls under
State protection, have no home or family, because they were abandoned, or due
to poverty and violence. The homoparental family that can now exist can offer
these children the love and motivation
they require to effectively advance their
integral development. The debate continues to wage on quite seriously at all
the country’s levels. Yet, the taboo is
being mitigated and one sees the prevalence of a Western idea—one’s individual freedom ends where another’s begins. Thus, what is being shown is that
the union of two, same-sexed people,
and their desire to have a family, harms
no one. Religious and conservative convictions are one thing, but the evolution
of laws that look out for the people’s
general interests in quite another. Guaranteeing the rights of minority rights is
key to ensuring social stability, pluralism, tolerance, and respect towards the
rest. That is the base for consolidating
democratic values like diversity, freedom, and equality.

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