IRELAND YES VOTES
Awarded to the 1,201,607 people who voted Yes to same-sex marriage
WORDS: BEN KELLY
Attitude Award Winner
GREATEST MOMENT OF THE YEAR AWARD
Ireland Votes YES To Same Sex Marriage
There was never any question that the stand out LGBT moment of 2015 was Ireland’s historic decision to pass same-sex marriage by referendum, becoming the first country in the world to do so.
Fran Veale / REX Shutterstock
The national vote was necessary in order to change the republic’s constitution; altering the definition of marriage so that it ‘may be contracted in accordance with law by two persons without distinction as to their sex’. As anticipated, the campaign was fairly heated. With all of Ireland’s political parties supporting a Yes vote, and the No campaign led largely by the Church, it looked very much like modern liberalism taking on the status quo of religious establishment. Though a Yes voted seemed the likely outcome, a shock result in the British General Election weeks earlier gave many supporters cold feet.