Did You Know Gay People Have Their Own Country?

Some anti-gay activists would like to round up all the LGBT people and stick us on an island. We know the just the place: the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands.

Yes, there is actually an island founded specifically for us.

Dale Parker Anderson founded the Kingdom—technically a micronation east of the Great Barrier Reef—in 2004, after the Australian government refused to recognize same-sex marriages.

He and other activists arrived on the island and built a camp site—named Heaven after the gay nightclub in London—on Cato Island, the largest in a small chain of uninhabited sand bars.

They raised the rainbow flag and the rest is history.

What might you find if you moved there? Not much—probably just a plaque laid on the beach honoring Anderson, known now as Emperor Dale.

The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom was founded as a symbolic protest against the injustices committed against queer people around the world. And every LGBT person in the world is automatically a citizen.

It has its own stamps, and a constitution: “Homosexual people have honestly endeavoured everywhere to merge ourselves in the social life of surrounding communities and to be treated equally,” it reads. “We are not permitted to do so.”

In vain, we are loyal patriots, our loyalty in some places running to extremes; in vain do we make the same sacrifices of life and property as our fellow citizens;

in vain do we strive to increase the fame of our native land in science and art, or her wealth by trade and commerce. In countries where we have lived for centuries, we are still cried down as strangers.

In the world as it is now and for an indefinite period…. I think we shall not be left in peace.

The Kingdom even has its own national anthem: “I Am What I Am,” from La Cage aux Folles.

And even if no other country recognizes the sovereignty of the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands, it’s nice to know we have a homeland out there.

Plus, we bet it’d make a hell of a wedding destination.