Facebook Adds Civil Unions, Partners to Relationship Status Options

Setting aside "it’s complicated," the choices of "married," "engaged," "divorced," "separated," "widowed," and "single" don’t cover all the bases, especially for LGBTs. In response to the hodgepodge of relationship legal statuses that exists in America and around the world, Facebook has added two options to describe users’ relationships. Now uses can also choose from “in a civil union" and "in a domestic partnership” to add to their profiles in the U.S., Canada, France, the U.K., and Australia, starting today.

Facebook made the changes with input from LGBT organizations including the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, and the Human Rights Campaign.

"As LGBT people face a pathwork of relationship recognition laws, this gives people more tools to adequately describe their relationship," said Michael Cole, spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign. "Facebook has been a company that has tried to be inclusive of the LGBT community and this just one sign of it."

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