Friday, May 22 2015 was the day the Irish nation decided to tell the world that their LGBT+ sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, family and friends belonged. The Yes vote, by 62 percent of the electorate told us loud and clear that we should put away residual doubts about our value and inclusion. It said we could allow ourselves to be embraced by the love, fairness, inclusion, generosity and equality that were evidenced that day. These were the values of the campaign, values to which Ireland not only aspired, but actually managed to exhibit, on that day, in that vote. And many claim they still feel the reverberations, some years on.
The day of the announcement of the result Saturday, May 23 has three outstanding memories for me. The first is being in RTÉ studios to do an interview on how the day might shape up at 9am when, just 15 minutes after the first ballot boxes had opened, the No campaign conceded defeat. After more than a decade of campaigning for marriage equality, it seemed that suddenly we had won, that the long campaign journey was over.
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