French high urt grants new rights to gay parents

MEET FRANCE’S FIRST MARRIED GAY COUPLE

In June, France was wrapped ntroversy after two regnal adoptn agency officials ma disparagg remarks about same-sex upl: one sayg that agenci would always favor heterosexual upl over homosexual on, and another that same-sex upl were “atypil” and should be prepared to adopt “atypil” children – those who are olr or wh disabili. Jt, who was adopted himself, knew how long the procs uld last – for all upl, gay or straight – and didn’t want to durg one of the terviews halfway through the lengthy, paperwork-tensive procs, Jt says, “A psychologist told , ‘In any se, you’ll never adopt France. The uncil [that ultimately cis on adoptn s] is Catholic and they’ll never give a child to a gay uple.

One year later, they had adopted two boys om Brazil – and acquired a bter taste about France and gay rights. But social norms and a relig history rooted nservative Catholicism have prevented LGBT upl om exercisg the rights to which they are legally June, France was wrapped ntroversy after two regnal adoptn agency officials ma disparagg remarks about same-sex upl – one sayg that agenci would always favor heterosexual upl over homosexual on, and another that same-sex upl were “atypil” and should be prepared to adopt “atypil” children – those who were olr or wh ments have dredged up latent discrimatn a untry that thought had progrsed further than that, and have forced French society to look ward for solutns.

“In terms of homosexualy general, France is still que nservative even when to acceptg same-sex marriage, ” says Sébastien Chv, a French soclogist who studi genr and sexualy at the Universy of Lsanne. The fluential “Manif pour To” (Prott for All) aln that has led anti-gay-marriage and -adoptn protts sce 2012 is chiefly Catholic. While parts of the Catholic Church have embraced homosexuals and their partnerships, the official le remas agast such is often a problem for same-sex upl adoptn proceedgs.