施文儀 (Shi Wen Yi), Assistant Chief of the Taiwanese Health Bureau, said last week that he did not think public officials should be elected if they discriminated against gays & lesbians.  He argued that the government must step up and legalize same-sex marriage.

This marks an attempt to break the government’s silence about same-sex rights.  Though explicit antagonism has not been part of any major political party’s platform, few politicians have explicitly supported same-sex rights either.  To break the status quo of invisibility is the goal of many LGBT rights advocates today.

Here is a link to the China Times report.  

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September 6, 2012 Update:

According to Cheng Chiwei of Hotline, Mr. Shi has nonetheless continued to promulgate certain incorrect assumptions.  Mr. Shi has said that passing same-sex marriage would decrease the spread of HIV in Taiwan.  Mr. Cheng argues that it is not a question of getting married or not, but a question of condom use and proper education of safe sex practices.  ”Why conflate marriage & HIV?”