in brief: the internet goes rainbow in support of same sex marriage

The United States Supreme Court legalised gay marriage in all 50 states on 26 June 2015, which sparked Facebook’s ‘celebrate pride’ tool, allowing users to add a rainbow filter over their profile pictures and publicly display their support for marriage equality.

Users can add the rainbow filter by simply visiting the ‘celebrate pride’ tool, where they will see a preview of their profile image with the rainbow effect. They can then simply click the ‘use as profile picture’ option and, just like that, they will be proudly showing their support for same-sex marriage.

‘Our country was founded on the promise that all people are created equal, and today we took another step towards achieving that promise,’ said Zuckerberg, in response to the Supreme Court’s Decision. ‘I’m so happy for all of my friends and everyone in our community who can finally celebrate their love and be recognized as equal couples under the law’.

Facebook isn’t the only tech giant to show its support for marriage equality, with Google adding bright characters of the top of their home page when terms such ‘gay pride’, ‘same sex marriage’ or ‘LGBT’ are entered into Google search.

Twitter has also joined the charge, automatically adding rainbow emojis to tweets using the hashtags #Lovewins or #Pride.

Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple who publicly announced his homosexuality last year, celebrated the Supreme Court’s ruling on Twitter, saying, ‘today marks a victory for equality, perseverance and love.’

It is clear by now that social media platforms spark change, with the internet transforming into a rainbow paradise over the weekend. With the addition of America, 22 nations now have national laws allowing same-sex marriage. However, as Zuckerberg says, ‘we still have much more to do to achieve full equality for everyone in our community, but we are moving in the right direction.’

(Image credit: 1.)