As they celebrated tying the knot at an outdoor party, many of the first same-sex couples to marry in Taiwan on Friday (May 24) urged Asian governments to follow their island’s lead. Taiwan’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage was not without controversy and came after three decades of campaigning by activists against staunch conservative opposition. It places the island at the forefront of the gay rights movement in Asia, a continent home to 60 percent of the world’s population but where the battle for marriage equality has struggled. “I think this will have a ripple effect and influence other Asian countries, they will see that this is feasible, that it can be done in Taiwan,” Chen Xue, a writer who married her long-term partner on Friday, told AFP in a Taipei park where newlyweds and their supporters had gathered to celebrate.