13 Countries That Are More Gay Friendly Than America

Three years after it legalized gay marriage, Belgium gave gay couples the right to adopt, according to Pew. Belgium has also outlawed employment discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Before it legalized same-sex marriage, Spain already banned employment discrimination against gays, according to a Harvard Law publication on the subject. In 2007, Spain passed a law that let people officially change their gender before going through a sex-change surgery.

Canada amended its human rights law all the way back in 1996 to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation.

South Africa's ban on discrimination against gays in its 1994 post-apartheid constitution made it one of the first countries in the world to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation, according to the BBC.

Norway has put pressure on the U.N. to ensure that all countries decriminalize homosexuality.

But same-sex couples have been allowed to register for civil unions since 1995, according to Pew.

The New York Times' Frank Bruni has noted that Portugal's decision to legalize gay marriage is remarkable given that it's tiny and "overwhelmingly Roman Catholic."

Iceland is also the only country in the world to have an openly gay head of state, Reuters has pointed out. 

But the couple pictured here faced extreme opposition when they tried to marry. A judge tried to prevent them from marrying just days before their planned wedding in December 2009, according to Reuters.

Denmark requires the state church to perform gay weddings, according to Pew. It was the first country to allow civil unions in 1989.

The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) ranked the U.K. the best country in Europe to be gay.

A recent poll found that two-thirds of Germans support gay marriage, The New York Times reported in February.

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