This is one of the last steps to full fledged rights for the LGBT community. What the article doesn't say is that for now you can adopt. just not the two of them as a whole. But every LGBT couple can have/raise adopted children if one of the partners adopts. Sure, the whole existing thing is laughable, so I really hope the lower house will give in, because it's a necessity.

Personally, I am very much surprised that the Council of States brought this in of its own - that's a huge step.

And of course, the article has to quote a conservative to add spice. But even them would be doomed to speak out against same-sex marriage as of now. So they have to dance around it and look like fools, as they almost always do.

We had a couple of elections the last few month, and while I wouldn't say that Switzerland has the most progressive (far from it) government (but an overall pretty decent one - we'll discuss the ups and downs of direct democracy later ...,) these elections got rid of many right-wing idiots. (Not as right-wing as you know some, but pretty conservative, bigoted, homophobic racists.)