Gay Rights Movement Gaining Ground in Mexico Duncan Tucker - Al Jazeera
go to original January 28, 2014

Martha Sandoval and Zaira de la O's wedding was the first legal gay marriage in Jalisco. (EPA)

GUADALAJARA, Mexico - As the countdown to New Year's Day reached its climax in Guadalajara's trendy Barezzito nightclub, many of the well-dressed local couples shared a celebratory kiss. But the euphoria did not last long for two young men who partook in a modest display of affection.

"We kissed a couple of times and the security guards told us that it wasn't a gay bar and that we had to leave," Pedro Siordia Mora, a 23-year-old psychology graduate, told Al Jazeera.

"They called the police on us and the police showed up with machine guns," added his boyfriend, Michael Grendell, a 29-year-old English teacher from New York.

Intolerance of sexual diversity remains common across much of Mexico and Latin America, a strongly Catholic region where macho attitudes prevail. Yet the region has seen rapid change in recent years. Democratisation, an increased respect for human rights, the onset of globalisation and the growth of social media have all facilitated the expansion of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) rights across the region.

Read the rest at Al Jazeera

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