This will be brief, because there are already way too many people giving their long-winded opinions on this topic, but the debate about gay marriage annoys the crap out of me. I'm sick of people arguing this down to the letter of the law, hinging it on a technicality, and ignoring the compassionate human element.
Equal rights for all human beings. Is that so hard to understand?
“But the purpose of marriage is for a man and a woman to produce children!”
No, it isn’t. That’s just what happens in the majority of cases. Marriage is the act of one adult human being binding him/herself to another adult human being. Not all marriages result in children, either by choice or by circumstance, and certainly not all children are born into wedlock. What about hermaphodites? Transgendered individuals? Who's considered a man or a woman in those cases?
“But if we change the law to include same sex couples, what’s to stop people from marrying their dogs, or multiple people, or the Berlin Wall?”
People do that now. There are always going to be a small number of couplings that fall outside the bell curve. This isn’t about deviants. This is about the pairing of a human and another human. Gay men and women who just want to go down to City Hall and obtain a marriage license the way straight men and women do all the time. Not inanimate objects, not members of another species. This really needs to be clarified?
“But kids raised by gay couples are being robbed of their right to have both a mom and a dad!”
That isn't a right. That’s like saying kids have a right to grow up with a sibling. Or both a brother and a sister. What kids do have, however, is the right to grow up in a loving and supportive home, regardless of the family makeup.
“But God hates gay people! The Bible forbids homosexuality!”
The Bible was written and intrepreted by humans. As was the Constitution and all of our laws. This isn't about God. We don't know that God even exists, and if God does exist, we can't presume to know God's intentions.
Equal rights for all human beings. Is that so hard to understand?
“But the purpose of marriage is for a man and a woman to produce children!”
No, it isn’t. That’s just what happens in the majority of cases. Marriage is the act of one adult human being binding him/herself to another adult human being. Not all marriages result in children, either by choice or by circumstance, and certainly not all children are born into wedlock. What about hermaphodites? Transgendered individuals? Who's considered a man or a woman in those cases?
“But if we change the law to include same sex couples, what’s to stop people from marrying their dogs, or multiple people, or the Berlin Wall?”
People do that now. There are always going to be a small number of couplings that fall outside the bell curve. This isn’t about deviants. This is about the pairing of a human and another human. Gay men and women who just want to go down to City Hall and obtain a marriage license the way straight men and women do all the time. Not inanimate objects, not members of another species. This really needs to be clarified?
“But kids raised by gay couples are being robbed of their right to have both a mom and a dad!”
That isn't a right. That’s like saying kids have a right to grow up with a sibling. Or both a brother and a sister. What kids do have, however, is the right to grow up in a loving and supportive home, regardless of the family makeup.
“But God hates gay people! The Bible forbids homosexuality!”
The Bible was written and intrepreted by humans. As was the Constitution and all of our laws. This isn't about God. We don't know that God even exists, and if God does exist, we can't presume to know God's intentions.
1 Comments:
Well said.
Post a Comment
<< Home