Today is a huge and potentially historical day in Ireland. A referendum is being voted on that would change the constitution to make marriage legal for everyone, whether gay or straight. If it passes, Ireland would be the first country to legalize same sex marriage by a vote. And particularly considering how socially conservative Ireland has always been
(homosexuality was illegal until 1993, divorce was illegal until 1995 and abortion is still illegal in all cases), it would be an even more dramatic step forward for this country. Ireland is becoming more and more modern in many ways, and a lot of people were turned off by the church scandals over the past decades and so they don’t allow church doctrine to determine their beliefs as much anymore. I get the sense that equality is a very important value in this country and there’s a “live and let live” attitude, so hopefully that will translate to marriage equality too!

The referendum has been discussed for months now, but debate and media coverage has heated up particularly in the last few weeks. Interestingly, for votes and elections here, signs are only allowed to be put up a month in advance and must be taken down by a week after the vote. Also, starting the day before the vote, there is a moratorium on media debate about it, so it kind of puts boundaries around when and for how long people can debate the issue.

Here are some of the campaign signs that have been posted around:

Polls over the last few weeks have shown a win for the yes campaign, but there’s worries that “no” voters have been reluctant to say they’ll vote no but will come out to vote today. Still there’s been a huge surge in registration of new (and mostly young!) voters so hopefully that bodes well for yes! Most of the government parties support the referendum and so many people I’ve heard discussing it seem to be in support.

The church hall building where Isaac’s preschool is is a polling station, so I got to see voters coming in and out this morning when I dropped him off. There were camera crews interviewing people, as well, and I saw this man talking about why he voted yes, for a more inclusive Ireland!

Finally, I’ll post these pictures of two amazing murals that have gone up in the past few months, painted by an artist named Joe Caslin. One is on a busy Dublin street, but the other is on a rural castle in Galway, which I think is just a beautiful juxtaposition of a classic Irish countryside scene with a message of progress and change.