Well this petition is part of a new program that will force the parliament to vote on any cause/proposition that gets over 50'000 votes. Much like the white house petition USA has, but rather than just requiring a response this time they must actually vote whether or not to approve the subject. So even if someone gets 50k votes for something crazy or stupid they can just vote no and that will be the end of it. This petition has already had some interesting effects.
Anne Holmlund (coalition) from the committee that prevented the gender-neutral marriage suggestion from going further is apalled at this new development. She complains that the goverment is already busy and if getting signatures is this easy they might get flooded with new proposals. Also she is apalled that the voters can just suggest any ideas,
these voters are forcing the parliament to consider things that the voters want them to consider, even if they go against the plans the goverment has agreed upon!
And this is bad because... Having the goverment be influenced by the will of the people goes against what democracy stands for?
A friend of mine also pointed out two things about this:
a) The signatures on the net are coming from the people who are passionate about this. Most of Finland is ambivalent. They might not be active enough to go out of their way to sign this but he doubted that they mind if they mind if someone comes with the papers and asks for a signature.
b) One of the things with the biggest effects will be that gay couples can put on their resumee/job application that they are married. You know rather than saying that they are in a "registered relationship," in a perfect world this should not matter but if there is an employer who is discriminating people because of that it does make singling gay couples out much easier.
EDIT:
Just an update because I'm so amused that the rhetoric used by the people against this petition is so similar to that used by people against gay-marriage in any other country.
-All gays are pedophiles: "don't give kids to pedos!"
-A child needs a mother and father: "Why won't somebody think of the children." Any study that disproves this claim is declared to be false but they on the other hand seem to like this study:
http://www.spuc.org.uk/campaigns/ssmsub20130301 Which is incredibly biased as can be seen right from the introduction. (Well at least it is current. NO wait, that makes it worse "scientific" study with such a bias in 2013!) There are people hwo outright say that they would accept all the other changes except the right to adopt as a couple.
-Homosexuality is a disease: "The best decision Hitler made was to annihilate homosexuals from Germany, it is a pity that he lost." Or other variants on how homosexuality is a disease and back in the good days the cure was to beat them untill they "got better."
-Homosexuality is a disability: This claim is used as a starter for a demand that all GLBT (some only talk about gays/lesbians but some generalize to all GLBT) get stripped of their voting and legal rights to make decicions, then get taken to a asylum to be "cured form being gay."
-Bible/God is against gay marriage: Any claims against are simply ignored, such as saying that marriage wasn't a christian rite untill 1500's (or was it 1400's) or talking about the
other definitions of marriage in the bible.
-It is unnatural: Usually complaining that gay couples can't procreate. In these claims having children is the only acceptable reason for marriage. Pointing out to studies about homosexuality in other species will get you funny results.
-HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA IS DESTROYING SOCIETY: I've seen one american magazine which supposedly had this agenda being brought up a lot.
-Slippery slope: All the usuals polygamy, zoophilia and child brides. One person actually defended his claim by saying that he is not making an "sloping ground" argument but merely pointing out that if we "redefine" marriage then there is no argument against forbidding three or more consenting adults from getting married. Well duh.
-The signatures are fake: They don't seem to believe that the support is real since "gays and lesbians are only 1% of the population" If you point out that all of these signatures use a digital verification such as the ones you need to access your bank account through net they start claiming that this is not enough since anyone can hack those...
I could probably submit some but the only ones in english are from youtube.