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January twenty third was probably an unremarkable Thursday for you, But for Plus and Gay, a lesbian couple living in Bangkok, Thailand, it was a big day, the first day same sex marriage was officially made legal in the country.
We'd done sleep at night, We wig up at three am and go to Seamparocon at six am in the early morning, like a first couple in the corridor from Siam Parcon.
That's Gay, a thirty two year old pastry chef. They and their partner Plus were first in line to get married at Siam Paragon, a bustling shopping mall in Bangkok. After waiting for almost two hours, they sat down in front of an official and signed papers that made them a married couple in the eyes of the law. In the video so they sent us of the event, the couple are seated next to each other at a table, holding hands, watching the official sign off on documents in
front of them. Plus sniffling holding back tears of joy. Gay looks more composed, holding Plus's hands and reaching over to give them a reassuring pat on the leg, and as the official closes the file, they each bring their palms together and bow slightly to him in a gesture of things. They look at each other and hug through tears. For the signing ceremony, Gay and Plus were dressed in matching traditional wedding attire of red, white and gold.
Does she you were the the raidskirt like a tidy sigh?
Yeah? Tight close.
It's the first time she sees where the tycos doom and very shying and excited for her.
She looks like a princess from the picture.
Yes, I tell her she is my twinsip.
Every day.
After the registration, Plus and Gay joined a pride parade to se celebrate the historic milestone with hundreds of other same sex couples who got married in the same mall. The shopping center is no longer a registration site, but there are now more than nine hundred offices across Thailand that can officially license same sex marriages. That began January twenty third. Recognizing same sex marriage is a big change for Thailand.
Actually, Southeast Asian countries have a history of colonial era laws that prosecute homosexuality.
That's Bloomberg reporter putpitcha tanaka sempipat like most Thai people. She goes by a nickname Best and is based in Bangkok.
So in a lot of countries, sexual relations between people of the same sex are actually criminalized.
So Thailand is the.
First country in Southeast Asia to recognize same sex marriage and only the third place in Asia after Taiwan and Nepal to do so.
It's certainly a victory for the Thai LGBTQ community that's been fighting for marriage equality for more than a decade. But by passing this law, Thailand isn't just a pioneer for cultural change in Southeast Asia. It's also eyeing some big economic gains.
The industry that is going to benefit the most would be Thailand's tourism industry, which is a huge economic driver and calls for twelve percent of Thailand's GDP. The Tourism of Thailand estimated that LGBTQ tourists spend about forty percent more each trip on average than just a regular tourist, so there's a lot of incentives for Thailand to really try to attract more LGBTQ visitors.
Welcome to The Big Take Asia from Bloomberg News. I'm Wanha. Every week we take you inside some of the world's biggest and most powerful economies and the markets, tycoons, and businesses that drive this ever shifting region. Today on the show, a special episode for Valentine's Day, Thailand's same sex marriage law. How will it boost tourism, a crucial industry for the country's economy, and what does this mean for other LGBTQ rights.
A week after Plus and Gay got married, we sat down with a couple somebody Khau learn supadka a.
Zaia.
Hello, my name is Gay Kanet. I'm thirty two years old and the percy here.
Gay and Plus were high school sweethearts, and when Gay first met Plus at just fifteen years old, they said, it was love at first sight for me.
He like shiny and rainbow for me because I don't have girlfriend before. He like my first love in my life.
Plus and Gay are both from traditional families, and so in the beginning they hid their relationship at home, and Gay says at the time Thailand wasn't so receptive to gay couples. People would give them weird looks as they held hands walking on the street.
Yes, really uncomfortable because we go to the shopping mall right, if we take a hand, ladies or some something is weird in Thailand. You don't have You don't go each other like a koppo olifen go to get the now, I think it's okay, But ten years ago, no time.
Society did become more open minded over the next decade, so much so that Gay and Plus's families eventually accepted them as a couple, and in twenty twenty two, for the first time, a Pride parade took place in Thailand. Of course, Gay and Plus joined, but social acceptance is just one part of the equation for same sex couples. Plus and Gay had been living together for years, but they weren't able to make the kind of basic life decisions that other heterosexual couples make all the time, like
buying a house or adopting a child. They weren't able to register as each other's next of kin, either, which became an issue when Plus had to undergo a major bio duct surgery.
I need her mother to sigh when she needs to form the big surgery. And it's so sad because I met her every day. I leave with her, but I don't sigh when he was sick. But I don't sign for anything.
How do you guys think this new law is going to change your lives going forward?
I think from now we like a husband and wife. We have property and the bang from everything. I think open because we have the marriage license. Now, we have health insurance.
For now, game plus are planning to start a business together. And the honeymoon to a soccer She lies?
She lies to your band.
Killed usja Osaka.
You mean Universal Studios Japan.
I want to go too.
What did it take for Thailand to pass this law and the gains for the country's economy that's after the break. To better understand how Thailand became the first country in Southeast Asia to recognize same sex marriage, we brought.
In Patia Tanaka San Pipat. You can call me by my tight nickname, which is Best. I'm a bureau reporter at Bloomberg News in Bangkok.
Best.
What does the law change mean in practice?
Right? So, this so called marriage equality law is essentially an amendment to the Civil and Commercial Code, which is one of the seven primary codes of law in Thailand. Actually, and what it.
Does is it swaps out gender specific terms for gender neutral ones, for example, as it was before the Civil and Commercial Code recognizes marriages only between a man and a woman and now recognized as marriages between two individuals instead of between a husband and a wife, so essentially removed gender restrictions from the fundamental law that affects all
aspects of one person's life from birth to death. Basically because the Civil and Commercial Code has nearly two thousand sections relating to all aspects of your life, and changing and removing gender restrictions from the language of this law is really a fundamental change to ensure and guarantee equal rights, especially in terms of marriage.
And what specific impact would this change in the law have on gay couples lives.
It's basically nothing short of a life changer. It spends things like child adoption and inheritance and assets management, as well as signing medical content forms for each other, which really is important when you have a life or death emergency.
Best how long has this fight for marriage equality been going on in Thailand, I.
Would say at least the last thirteen years.
I remember seeing a headline in twenty thirteen of lesbian couple going to register their marriage at a district office. It was Valentine's Day. Lots of people were there. They were the only couple that was the same sex, and basically authorities turned them away because authorities didn't know what to do with the same sex couple. And the headlines ran pretty derogatory terms, pretty not nice terms, and had
a picture of like people looking at them nervously. But last month, on January twenty third, the day this law came into effect, it's really surprising for me to see the same couple show up at the mass registration event that I was at, and it was really heartwarming to see them finally able to get married after all these years.
It must have been momentous for these couples. Why did it takes so long, more than a decade, right for this law to come to fruition.
Yeah, in the big picture, Thailand was dominated by male military leaders for the better half of the century, and sad to say, these leaders were very much like Mashow men who had really rigid ideas about gender roles and social hierarchies on what one is supposed to do within such a structure, and it was not a discussion that
people could just have. But still, LGBTQ activists had been really trying in the past two decades at least to campaign for LGBTQ rights, so tragedies and bias was being slowly shipped away in Thailand.
It was a long and gradual progress.
And was there tipping point over this period.
I would say that tipping point was actually the twenty twenty three general election. Within the first few months of starting a new government, they submitted their versions of the amendment to the Civil and Commercial Code and the lawmakers consolidated that into one bill and they passed it in parliament in March twenty twenty four with an overwhelming amount of support, which was four hundred votes for.
The bill and only ten votes against.
This was really a low hanging fruit for them because so much work had been done by that point that all they really needed.
To do is just give it a serious push.
And it was also in their benefit to try to do this within the first few months of taking power, so that they could also politically decrease the resistance that might come from other controversial things that they were planning to push in parliament as well.
Thailand's new ruling party had a number of more contentious issues on its agenda, such as legalizing casinos and online gambling, which faced a lot more opposition there were also eyeing the economic benefits that this change could bring.
Lawmakers expected that this was going to create a huge windfall for the tourism industry, which is a huge economic driver for Thailand, contributing twelve percent to.
The country's GDP.
A recent study by AGODA found that recognizing same sex marriage would benefit Thailand with an additional four million foreign visitors per year and that is expected to create about two billion dollars in economic value within the next two years.
And even though the marriage equality law was passed with an overwhelming majority in parliament, are we seeing any resistance from other groups to these broader LGBTQ rights.
There are some resistance in the Muslim community in Thailand. So Thailand is a predominantly Buddhist country and we have a Muslim majority population in three southern provinces in Thailand. And since marriage equality was legalized in Thailand, we saw banners being put up in mosques around the capitol Bangkok at least that basically said same sex marriages are not
allowed here on these sites. So the law is effective across the country, but in some areas it might be culturally tricky, such as the Muslim majority provinces in the South.
Now does a marriage equality law pave the way for other rights for the LGBTQ community. What's next after this?
There are lots of other changes happening across the board that are not directly related to LGBTQ rights but have a lot to do with LGBTQ people. For example, the Health Ministry has proposed that it might push for commercial sorocracy to be legalized, which would allow LGBTQ couples to use circusy services and have children.
Also, there's a lot a lot of talks about.
Pushing for sex work to be protected under TAY law, and this is relevant because a lot of ALGBTQ people are in the sex work industry, and lawmakers are also talking about potentially proposing bills to legalize prostitution, which, believe it.
Or not, in Thailand has been illegal since the nineteen sixties.
But still this is a huge stepping stone for sure. LGBTQ activists have said that there are more agendas that need to be pushed through in order to really advance LGBTQ rights more.
This is the Big Take Asia from Bloomberg News. I'm wanh. This episode was produced by Young Young, Naomi and Jessica Beck. It was edited by Patti Hirsch and Thomas Cutty Abraham. It was sound designed by Young, mixed by Alex Suguiera, and fact checked by Eddie dun Our senior producer is Namely Shaven, and our senior editor is Elizabeth Ponso. Nicole Bloomster Bower is our executive producer, and Sagebauman is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. Please follow and review The Big Tick
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