Lang 1 Philip Lang T. Hobbs American History 220 30 May 2013 Civil Rights? Gay Rights?

How About Just Rights. If there is anything that gets me riled up and ready to debate, its the controversial topic of gay rights and those who appose them. In Charles Colson and Anne Morses essay opposing gay marriage, Societal Suicide, they express that marriage should be seen as a traditional building block of human society. It goes on to explain their tired and bias conclusion that marriage is a bond that should only be between a man and a woman. At the same time, they question the extinction of marriage because of same-sex couples oppressed desire to happily marry each other. How is making it legal for supporters of marriage and gay people in love to express their bond considered the end of marriage? Allowing gays to marry would not only promote marriage, but it would support the obvious right and humane decision to care for every citizen with liberty and justice for ALL! Societal Suicide explains that gay marriage is not only wrong, but goes against the natural order of the family system, as well as promotes broken families and crime amongst young people without mothers or fathers, all the while, weakening the meaning and status of heterosexual marriage. I do not believe in any reason for keeping people from being who they are if there is no harm being done to others. Gay marriage should absolutely be legalized because we all deserve equal rights regardless of skin color, religion, ethnicity, occupation, or sexuality.

Lang 2 In the beginning of their essay, Colson and Morse explained how the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts decided to begin letting same-sex couples into holy matrimony by issuing valid marriage licenses. They describe the thousands of gay couples rushing to embrace the joyful first-in-a-lifetime event as gleefully mocking their state constitutions and laws while news media egged them on. First of all, Id more consider that a life long awaited moment to break free of the bogus state constitutions that has held people back from being treated the same as heterosexuals, and not so much of a mockery. You hardly have to egg on people in love to get married. Equal rights for gays to marry have been a constant fight for the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered) community for decades. Thousands of gay couple have been planning and waiting for the day they could marry for the majority of their lives. Stopping gays from being able to marry is in direct violation of equal rights that exists for the soul purpose of cutting down gays. Why should the requirements for sexual orientation be any different than other diverse sides of an individual? If marriage is just the building block of economics, then gay marriage should be seen that way as well, and not just a homosexual romp in the bedroom. What really gets to me in Societal Suicide is the authors deliberate approach to dumb down the sacred bond of marriage by forcing it to become consumed by a world of procreation and child-rearing only beneficiary between a mother and a father. The law has demanded such a high and unrealistic standard on gays in every dimension of their lives, yet there are still no such laws prohibiting having children out of wedlock, dead beat daddies leaving their children in poverty, or any regulations and rules pertaining to heterosexuals procreating. In Anna Quindlens essay Desecration? Dedication! she

Lang 3 quotes Jonathan Rauch saying that 28% of all gay couples already have children. Its illegal to bring a gay family together through marriage, yet it is not illegal for gay couples out of wedlock to raise children. What does that have to say about marriage being the means of procreation? Allowing gays to marry would promote healthy and functioning families for those couples who have already adopted or been artificially inseminated. On the other side of it, what about all the straight couples who desire marriage, but have already established do not want children or are incapable of becoming pregnant? Should they be allowed to marry? Perhaps we should just ban marriage all together because, in reality, its the straight people lacking the criteria that we put on gays on a regular basis; thus far, its the straight people making all the mistakes of marriage. Colson and Morse explain that children from broken homes have more trouble in school and more behavioral issues, using the term broken homes to include gay coupled families who have either two fathers or two mothers. But these statistics were not done on same-sexed family units; they were done on families deprived of one or more parental units. This has absolutely nothing to do with same-sex couples raising children because at least in same sex couples, there are two loving parents dedicated to each child. The heterosexual divorce rate in the U.S. is 50%! What about those broken homes that involve half of all families created through marriage? With the loving, helpful hands of nurturing parents in the home, acts of crime involving young people do not fit into any broken family statistics. The statistics used in the essay are based on crimes being committed out of recklessness caused by the devastation of being let down or left behind by their own flesh and blood. Children arent going to commit more crime simply because their gay parents are the same gender. Just because a childs life isnt normal,

Lang 4 or even easy, does not mean they do not have the same chances to bloom into wonderful people. And just because a couple is gay, does not mean they cant seek out positive male or female roles for their childrens lives. Psychological studies show that children, though cling to the security of one main caretaker, thrive on the interactions with people outside the family circle, such as teachers, mentors, or people of inspiration. Who knows? Maybe well even start to see more tolerance in our future generations due to the promotion of acceptance in people different from us, which would in return reduce crime rates and strengthen our communities. Two daddies or two mommies will always equal two parents. Colson and Morses decision to consider marriage nothing more than a building block of society and means of procreation should be considered offensive, not only towards gays, but the entire human race, which prides itself on the capacity to feel and express emotions at levels most other species are incapable of doing. Correct me if Im wrong, but havent we all established that today, in most countries, marriage is meant for two people in love to express their devotion and dedication for one another in the eyes of the law and the world? Love is beauty; the way to make positive change after centuries of discrimination and destruction created through inhumane mistakes and violating the rights of whole genres of people out of pure ignorance and fear. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Though we have come a long way in correcting our wrong-doings of our violent history, we still have many milestones to cross before we could ever call ourselves the land of the free. Allowing gay marriage would be a positive step in the right direction by supporting our citizens rights and by helping them to pursue to lives of freedom we have all been promised, all the while

Lang 5 strengthening our economy and the togetherness of our country. Injustice towards gays is injustice towards human beings. We need to learn to come together through our similarities and stop exploiting each others differences.

Works Cited

Lang 6 Kaster, Carolyn. What Atheist can learn from the gay rights movement. 6th ed. Washington Post: 2013. Doran, Tom. Margaret Thatcher's Legacy on Gay Rights . The Daily Beast: Publisher, 2013.