Company Says ‘I Do’ to Its First Gay and Lesbian Wedding Expo in Texas
Although same-sex marriage is illegal in Texas, a North Carolina company is presenting its first-ever gay and lesbian wedding expo in the Lone Star State.
The Same Love, Same Rights Austin Gay & Lesbian Wedding Expo will be 1-4 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 12, at the Hyatt Regency Austin. Admission is free for registered attendees.
The Austin Chronicle describes the event this way:
“You think we’re gonna sit around until a bunch of Mormons or straight judges decide whom we should love, with whom we should couple, and how we make family? Hell no. We’re getting’ hitched. En masse. And the hitches of getting hitched are similar across orientation lines: flowers, DJs, bands, preachers or JPs, gowns, tuxes—this expo will expo it all!”
Although this is the first Same Love, Same Rights expo in Texas, other LGBT wedding expos have been held in the state.
More than 35 LGBT-friendly wedding professionals will be exhibitors at the Austin show.
Organizers said that “couples, advocates and straight allies are all invited to join us for this wonderful day of grassroots activism, joy and celebration.”
In 2003, the North Carolina company behind the Austin event began producing many of the country’s LGBT wedding expos. The Same Love, Same Rights branding was launched a year later, in response to the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment Act, which would have defined marriage as being only between a man and a woman.
Marianne Puechl and Cindy Sproul, a married lesbian couple, own Asheville, N.C.-based RainbowWeddingNetwork.com, which puts on Same Love, Same Rights expos across the country. The company’s first LGBT wedding expo was held in 2003 in Minneapolis.
In all, Puechl and Sproul have staged about three dozen LGBT wedding expos. They’re part of an LGBT wedding industry that would create an annual economic impact of $9.5 billion if just half the same-sex couples in the United States exchanged vows, according to a 2009 estimate from Forbes magazine.
“This is an important time for the LGBT minority in America,” Sproul said. “Bringing legitimacy, and showing a public face to the issues, is key to transforming the rights of our minority.”
Follow Technorati