#lgbtq korean american

Pictured below: The White House is lit up in rainbow colors in commemoration of the Supreme Court’s ruling to legalize same-sex marriage on Friday, June 26, 2015, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

In a historic 5-4 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court held Friday that same-sex couples nationwide have an equal right to marry, sending waves of jubilation around the country among gay marriage supporters, including within the Korean American community.

“I’m just so joyous,” said Jeff Kim, a program director at the L.A.-based California Wellness Foundation who wed partner Curtis Chin in 2008 in California. “It’s the end of a long journey and battle for equal rights for LGBT people. It’s long overdue because when you boil it all down, there was no argument against gay marriage except bigotry—there was no justification for it.”

“It’s now the law of the land and I’m really happy that the Court caught up with what is justice,” added Kim.

Fellow Los Angeleno Paul Park, who also wed spouse Dean Larkin in 2008, wrote to KoreAmthat he had been checking SCOTUS blog all week long in anticipation of the ruling. “The moment Justice [Anthony] Kenndy’s opening remarks were shared, I was elated,” Park said via email. “Twenty years ago, [the idea of same-sex marriage] wasn’t in my vocabulary. In 20 years, the idea of families with delimiters will hopefully be an artifact of the past. The qualifier of ‘gay marriage’ will become a figment of the past. Maybe someday we won’t be ‘Asian American’ but just ‘Americans.’”

The Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges,in which the majority held that due process and equal protection under the law forbid the states from banning same-sex marriage, makes gay marriage legal throughout the country. Before Friday, same-sex marriage was legal in 36 states and the District of Columbia, but forbidden elsewhere in the country.

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