Prepare for Battle - Gay Marriage

Prepare for Battle

Are we prepared for another Civil War? Another time where a few states decide to secede from the union? Another Civil Rights Movement? The answer is no, but that is exactly what we are asking for. Gay marriage has been the “hot topic” for discussion within the past five years, and the only “objections to gay marriage are based on religious prejudice” (Pollitt “Adam and Steve”). Homosexuals should not have to suffer because of a few outlandish ideas of select religions. Homosexuals should be awarded the same rights as heterosexuals because the Constitution guarantees its rights to all Americans – not just heterosexuals. Although people are worried about the effect on heterosexual marriage and the values of marriage decreasing altogether, legal issues of marriage, what the churches’ views are, reasons behind homosexual marriage, and their own narrow-minded views on procreation, homosexuals should not be reprimanded by not being awarded their due rights, their individual worries should not effect the ability of homosexuals to marry.

First, one of the biggest fears that people have about allowing gay marriage is that it will decrease the value of straight marriage”. Although people against gay marriage do have a good point that “women domesticate men” (Pollitt “Adam and Steve”), in the sense that married men are less likely to kill people, crash the car, take drugs, and commit suicide, they do omit the facts that married couples’ amount domestic violence, child abuse, infidelity, and abandonment is elevated (Pollitt “Adam and Steve”). The logic used here is almost like sayingconcluding that a person with no reason to live is more likely to commit suicide than a person that has a reason to live; not a valid point, merely common sense. Marriage altogether is reaching all time lows.

Second, in society, the value of marriage is rapidly decreasing. The assessment of family tradition will start being assessed due to a lack of marital morale; not the legalization of homosexual marriage. Divorce, out-of-wedlock births, and abortion are much more acceptable than they were 50 years ago, and those elevated levels were undoubtedly not due to gay marriage (Pollitt “Gay Marriage”). Most people believe that sex was to serve for procreation and to promote spousal unity, but everyone knows that is not true, and people don’t want to believe that marriage’s main purpose is solely sex (Colson “Love That Won’t Keep Quiet”). Sex. This shouldn’t be the first time that it’s said, but not allowing homosexuals to get married is not going to stop them from having sex. Today sex is what marriage is all about while keeping two people faithful to each other while they are in a sexual relationship. By not allowing homosexuals to marry we are not encouraging them to experience intimate relationships with just one other person we have become an advocate for homosexuals to have multiple partners.

Third, a marriage isn’t just about a relationship anymore - it is about legal issues. “Why should access to health care be a byproduct of a legalized sexual connection, gay or straight” (Colson “Love That Won’t Keep Quiet”), better yet a byproduct of anything at all? Having a spouse should not have anything to do with weather or not you should receive “health insurance, survivors’ rights, mutual custody of children, or job protection” (Pollitt “Gay Marriage”). People that never get married do not get heath insurance from another person, and neither should someone who is married. There is too much value put on marriage, most of it being negative. Marriage opens up “… whole new vistas of guilt, frustration, claustrophobia, bewilderment, declining self-esteem, unfairness and sorrow, it will offer …the opportunity to prolong this misery by tormenting each other in court” (Pollitt “Gay Marriage”). If homosexuals want in on this great fun that heterosexual marriage has been an example of, then they should be able to have the same rights at a heterosexual has.

Fourth, the church has much prejudice against homosexuals and bears the weight of the prohibition of gay marriage is. The church used to be able to “love the sinner and hate the sin” (Goodman A23). Now it is the difference between whether the church believes “…that homosexuality is a choice [or] … innate” that sets the standard for deciding whether or not they accept homosexuality. “..[A] weight of research suggests that sexual orientation is indeed something we are born with” (Goodman A23). However, the church strongly opposes homosexuality because they believe that it is a lifestyle, not a one time sin.

The church shouldn’t be one of the