(Source)
In a few hours I’ll be on Busan e-FM’s Let’s Talk Busan again, this time talking about gay marriage. You can listen on the radio at 90.5, online here (please note that you’ll have to download Windows Media Player 10 first), or via an archived version here later in the week.
For any readers who didn’t already know, I’m all for it, although I’m not very confident about seeing the issue on the political radar in Korea for at least another 15 years, and actual law changes not for another 15 after that. But I’ve often noted the extraordinary pace of change in Korean society too, so here’s hoping I’m proven wrong!
The Grand Narrative 
I do hope Korea legalizes gay marriage, and I think it will but like you said, it probably won’t happy for another 15-20 years. Gays in Korea are very underground and you don’t see much activism. There is a smaller population of gay Koreans and due to its small size, they mostly go unnoticed. I know there are a few gay K-pop stars and hopefully as LGBT citizens become more openly accepted in Korea, you’ll see more people stand up for GLBT rights.
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Yes, I am not holding my breath for gay marriage in Korea anytime soon. I don’t know that social conditions will ever be ripe for gay marriage as we know it in the US, and I tend to be skeptical of any “developmental” models predicting otherwise.
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30 years is quite a bit of time though. Do you think gay marriage may become obsolete by then with the rapid advances in biotechnology, genetic screening, etc.?
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It is quite a bit of time. But from what I’ve read about LGBT issues in Korea, my own impression is that Korean attitudes are indeed very similar to what they were like in the US in the mid-1980s, with some celebrity gays here and there certainly, but very people knowing — and even fewer being able to genuinely accept — openly gay colleagues, teachers, neighbors, and so on, let alone allowing them to marry.
As for genetic screening and on, yes, that’s definitely set to become a big issue in that timeframe, But I think the question of screening for the “gay gene” — to the extent there is one — would be framed more in terms of bioethics than civil rights (i.e., is more similar to questions of screening for things like intelligence and height than anything homosexuality or marriage-related), and not be allowed. Either way, there’ll be a lot of gays marrying well before that’s possible, and it’s hard to envisage a world where their rights are withdrawn or never granted simply because gay people will supposedly no longer be born.
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Why do you suppose it would not be allowed? I don’t think parents would accept such restrictions, especially with other parents and other countries utilizing biotech and genetic screening.
You’re right that there would be gay marriage until widespread adoption of genetic technology, but presumably it would be obsolete shortly thereafter.
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