Same-sex marriage is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender, entered into in a civil or religious ceremony. There are records of same-sex marriage dating back to the first century. In the modern era, same-sex marriage started being legalized at the beginning of the 21st century. Today, it is available in 28 countries. Same-sex marriage is performed and recognized in Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Iceland, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, South Africa, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States, Uruguay. Same-sex marriage is due to become legal in Costa Rica. Israel recognizes. Furthermore, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights has issued a ruling, expected to facilitate recognition in several countries in the Americas; the introduction of same-sex marriage has varied by jurisdiction, came about through legislative change to marriage law, court rulings based on constitutional guarantees of equality, recognition that it is allowed by existing marriage law, or by direct popular vote.

The recognition of same-sex marriage is considered to be a human right and a civil right as well as a political and religious issue. The most prominent supporters of same-sex marriage are human rights and civil rights organizations as well as the medical and scientific communities, while the most prominent opponents are religious fundamentalist groups. Polls show continually rising support for the recognition of same-sex marriage in all developed democracies and in some developing democracies. Scientific studies show that the financial and physical well-being of gay people are enhanced by marriage, that the children of same-sex parents benefit from being raised by married same-sex couples within a marital union, recognized by law and supported by societal institutions. Social science research indicates that the exclusion of homosexuals from marriage stigmatizes and invites public discrimination against them, with research repudiating the notion that either civilization or viable social orders depend upon restricting marriage to heterosexuals.

Same-sex marriage can provide those in committed same-sex relationships with relevant government services and make financial demands on them comparable to that required of those in opposite-sex marriages, gives them legal protections such as inheritance and hospital visitation rights. Opposition to same-sex marriage is based on claims such as that homosexuality is unnatural and abnormal, that the recognition of same-sex unions will promote homosexuality in society, that children are better off when raised by opposite-sex couples; these claims are refuted by scientific studies, which show that homosexuality is a natural and normal variation in human sexuality, that sexual orientation is not a choice. Many studies have shown that children of same-sex couples fare just as well as the children of opposite-sex couples. A study of nationwide data from across the United States from January 1999 to December 2015 revealed that the establishment of same-sex marriage is associated with a significant reduction in the rate of attempted suicide among children, with the effect being concentrated among children of a minority sexual orientation, resulting in about 134,000 fewer children attempting suicide each year in the United States.

Some proponents of legal recognition of same-sex marriage, such as Freedom to Marry and Canadians for Equal Marriage, use the terms marriage equality and equal marriage to indicate that they seek the recognition of same-sex marriage on equal ground with opposite-sex marriage as opposed to special rights. The AP Stylebook recommends the usage of the phrase marriage for gays and lesbians or the term gay marriage in space-limited headlines; the Associated Press warns that the construct gay marriage can imply that the marriages of same-sex couples are somehow different from the marriages of opposite-sex couples. Anthropologists have struggled to determine a definition of marriage that absorbs commonalities of the social construct across cultures around the world. Many proposed definitions have been criticized for failing to recognize the existence of same-sex marriage in some cultures, including in more than 30 African cultures, such as the Kikuyu and Nuer. With several countries revising their marriage laws to recognize same-sex couples in the 21st century, all major English dictionaries have revised their definition of the word marriage to either drop gender specifications or supplement them with secondary definitions to include gender-neutral language or explicit recognition of same-sex unions.

The Oxford English Dictionary has recognized same-sex marriage since 2000. Opponents of same-sex marriage who want marriage to be restricted to pairings of a man and a woman, such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, use the term traditional marriage to mean opposite-sex marriage; the American Anthropological Association stated on 26 February 2004:The results of more than a century of anthropological research on households, kinship relationships, families, across cultures and through time, provide no support whatsoever for the view that either civilization or viable social orders depend upon marriage as an heterosexual institution. Rather, anthropological research supports the conclusion that a vast array of family types, including families built upon same-sex partnership

The Russian Toy is a small breed of dog bred in Russia from the English Toy Terrier. There are two types of coats in the breed: long coat; the smooth-coated variety was known as the Russian Toy Terrier and long-coated as the Moscow Long Haired Toy Terrier. Both were brought together under the same Russian Toy Terrier name in 1988 and the "Terrier" was dropped from the name when the breed was added in 2006 to the official list of breeds registered with the Fédération Cynologique Internationale and has been registered in the Foundation Stock Service of the American Kennel Club since 2008, allowed to compete in AKC companion events since 2010; the first official breed standard of the two varieties was written in 1966 in Russia. The breed was nearly wiped out twice; the smooth coat type is the older of the two, with the long coat type first appearing in 1958. Until the 1990s, the breed was unknown outside of Russia, so few details on associated health issues are known; the Russian Toy was bred as a rat fighter and as a watchdog, can still exhibit the vocalization expected from the latter.

It is a friendly dog and can become attached to the family unit. Due to its size and similarities to the chihuahua, the two are compared; the Russian Toy is one of the smallest breeds in the world, measuring between 20 cm and 28 cm and weighing anywhere between 1 kg and 3 kg. It has a distinctive head with large eyes and triangular ears. In countries where docking is prohibited, the tail is curved in the shape of a sickle. There are two types in the breed, distinguished by their coats; the smooth-coated dog has a short, close-lying coat. The long-coated variety has a longer coat and profuse feathering in the ears and tail; the feathering or "fringe" on the ears is 3 to 5 cm long, can be straight or with a slight wave. It will be grown by the age of three and should cover the outer edges and tips of the ears; the smooth coat type of the breed resembles the Pražský Krysařík breed of the Czech Republic. The Pražský on average is a little heavier than the Russian Toy. Both of the Russian Toy varieties can be crossed and produce smooth- and long-coated puppies from the same litter.

In addition, when two smooth-coated dogs are bred together, they may bear a long-coated offspring if the long hair gene is present in their pedigrees. However, there have been no records of two long-coated Russian Toys breeding together and producing smooth-coated offspring; the breed has four main colors: black and tan and tan, brown and tan, solid red of various shades. Red includes red sable. A Russian Toy will require the help of a veterinarian to remove any retained deciduous teeth that fail to fall out and make way for the permanent teeth. Without this intervention done under anesthetic, the baby and permanent teeth will occupy the same socket in the jaw, which can cause tartar deposits, tooth decay and periodontitis, can lead to premature loss of teeth. Retained puppy teeth can cause misalignment of the teeth; as with most breeds of dog, the Russian Toy can suffer from patellar luxation, where the knee cap slips out of place when the knee bends as the groove that holds it in place is too shallow.

It is an inherited defect, which occurs during the development of the foetus and by trauma. Russian Toys can suffer from bone fractures due to their sometimes delicate nature. Active and cheerful, the Russian Toy was bred both as an anti-rat dog and a watch dog; the second quality is still active in the breed, they can be vocal. They can become quite attached to their family, regardless of the ages of the family members. Russian Toys are very reserved with strangers, but loyal to their owners, always ready to protect them from any perceived danger; the first evidence of English-style terriers in Russia can be seen in the Museum of Zoology in Saint Petersburg. On display is an English style terrier dated 1716–1726 with a sign that reads "This dog is a short hair terrier named Lizetta, it belonged to the Russian Emperor Peter the Great." Indeed, the breed was developed as a companion dog for Russian nobility. According to some accounts, records indicate that eight smooth-coated Russian Toys competed in a dog show in Saint Petersburg as far back as 1874.

The more accepted first reference to the breed appears in May 1907 when 11 Russian Toys were shown at an exhibition in Saint Petersburg. In 1923, two dogs appeared at a Moscow dog show and in 1924, three more were awarded medals at a show in Odessa, but as a result of the October Revolution, the Russian Toy diminished in popularity and in numbers as these types of dogs were linked to the aristocracy and therefore frowned upon. In 1947, only one dog was shown in Saint Petersburg; when breeding began to revitalize the stock of Russian Toys in Russia, only a few of the dogs left had pedigrees or were purebred. The lack of numbers and political isolation of the country at the time caused the creation of a new breed quite distinct from the former English style toy dog as breeders sought to stabilise the remaining toy sized terriers into a standard breed; the resulting contemporary Russian T

Slavic Native Faith is intrinsically related to the identity of the Slavs and the broader group of populations with Indo-European origins. Scholar Kaarina Aitamurto has studied Rodnovers' political philosophy as a form of "democratic criticism of liberal democracy", or grassroots democracy, they propose a political system in which power is entrusted to assemblies of consensually-acknowledged wise men, or to a single wise individual. Scott Simpson states that Slavic Native Faith is "fundamentally concerned with questions of community and ethnic identity". Shnirelman notes that the movement is "obsessed with the idea of origin". Rodnovery displays greater concern for collective rights than individual rights. Most Rodnover groups will permit only Slavs as members; the notion that modern Rodnovery is tied to the historical religion of the Slavs is a strong one among practitioners. There is no evidence that the early Slavs, a branch of the Indo-Europeans conceived of themselves as a unified ethno-cultural group.

There is an academic consensus that the Proto-Slavic language developed from about the second half of the first millennium BCE in an area of Central and Eastern Europe bordered by the Dnieper basin to the east, the Vistula basin to the west, the Carpathian Mountains to the south, the forests beyond the Pripet basin to the north. Over the course of several centuries, Slavic populations migrated in northern and south-western directions. In doing so, they branched out into three sub-linguistic families: the East Slavs, the West Slavs, the South Slavs; the belief systems of these Slavic communities had many affinities with those of neighbouring linguistic populations, such as the Balts and Indo-Iranians. Vyacheslav Ivanov and Vladimir Toporov studied the origin of ancient Slavic themes in the common substratum represented by Proto-Indo-European religion and what Georges Dumézil studied as the "trifunctional hypothesis". Marija Gimbutas, found Slavic religion to be a clear result of the overlap of Indo-European patriarchism and pre-Indo-European matrifocal beliefs.

Boris Rybakov emphasised the continuity and complexification of Slavic religion through the centuries. Many Russian Rodnover groups are critical of democracy, modern liberal democracy, which they see as a degenerate form of government that leads to "cosmopolitan chaos". According to Shnirelman they favour instead political models of a centralised state led by a strong leader. Aitamurto, characterises the political models proposed by Rodnovers as based on their interpretation of the ancient Slavic community model of the veche, similar to the ancient Germanic "thing". Nineteenth- and twentieth-century intellectuals interpreted the veche as an anti-hierarchic and democratic model, while Soviet Marxist tended to identify it as "pre-capitalist democracy"; the term had ethnic and national connotations, which were underlined by nineteenth-century Slavophiles, nationalist circles in the last decades of the Soviet Union and from the 1990s onwards. Many Rodnover groups call their organisation structure veche.

Aitamurto finds that it proves to be useful in what she terms as Rodnvery's "democratic criticism of democracy". According to her, the veche as interpreted by Rodnovers represents a vernacular form of governance similar to ancient Greek democracy. According to the view shared by many Rodnovers, while liberal democracy ends up in chaos because it is driven by the decisions of the masses, who are not wise. Ynglists call this model samoderzhavie, "people ruling themselves". Western liberal ideas of freedom and democracy are traditionally perceived by Russian eyes as "outer" freedom, contrasting with Slavic "inner" freedom of the mind. Aitamurto describes many Rodnovers' political philosophy as elitism, in which not everyone is reputed as having the same decision ability. In these ideas of grassroots democracy which comes to fruition in a wise governance, Aitamurto sees an incarnation of the traditional Russian challenge of religious structures and alienated governance—such as autocratic monarchy and totalitarian communism—for achieving a personal relationship with the sacred, at the same time a demand of social solidarity and responsibility.

She presents the interpretation of the myth of Perun who slashes the snake guilty of theft, provided by Russian volkhv Velimir, as symbolising the ideal relationship and collaboration between the ruler and the people, with the ruler serving the people who have chosen him by acting as an authority who provides them with order, in turn is respected by the people with loyalty for his service. Some Rodnovers interpret the veche in ethnic terms, thus as a form of "ethnic democracy", in the wake of similar concepts found in the French Nouvelle Droite of Alain de Benoist; the ethnic dimension emphasised by Rodnovers becomes a form of nationalism, has been characterised as ethnic nationalism. Aitamurto suggested that Russian Rodnovers' conceptions of nationalism encompass three main themes: that "the Russian or Slavic people are a distinct group", that th