Why should two adults be denied the right to marry because they are of the same sex? Because of society's ignorance, same-sex couples lose advantages given to heterosexual couples: health insurance, tax benefits, homeowner's insurance, auto insurance, and visitation in a hospital. All are given to heterosexual couples. A partner also has no right to funeral arrangements or to assume ownership of property (even when jointly owned). Same-sex marriage is not legal in any U.S. state.
Many people confuse same-sex marriage with same-gender and/or gay marriage. There are, however, differences. Gender is what sex someone is posing as, while sex is determined on internal anatomy. What I am trying to get at is that a man posing as a woman could marry a woman, or a woman posing as a man could marry a man. There are of the same gender, but not of the same sex.
Gay marriage is not correct terminology either. There is nothing in any amendment or law prohibiting gays/lesbians from getting married. The only catch with this is that a gay man can only marry a woman and a lesbian can only marry a man (Elton John could marry Ellen).
About sixty percent of the gay community (71 percent of all lesbians) is in a relationship. Assuming that there are twenty-five million homosexuals in the United States alone (one out of ten people), approximately fifteen million of them would be involved in a relationship. This accounts to seven hundred fifty thousand couples who are denied the right to marry if the time ever came and both people felt as if they were ready for the commitment.
Some people do not wish for same-sex couples to get married because they believe that it would degrade heterosexual marriage or the meaning of marriage. Some also believe that, if same-sex couples are permitted to marry, then people will be able to start marrying their pets and close relatives. That is absolutely insane! If a law was ever put into effect, it would say that two people of the same-sex can marry. It would not state that human beings can cross the lines into other species. Nor would the law state that we could marry close relatives.
If a man and women were to get married, their families and friends would be happy and celebrate their love. However, if two people of the same-sex were to even think about marriage, how many people would actually celebrate then? In the song, "How Nice" by Kristen Gems, she talks about the happiness that would be shared between a man, a women, their family, and their friends if a heterosexual couple were to get married. "But if both of them were women, or both of them were men, who would congratulate them then?"
Congress passed the "Defense of Marriage Act" (DOMA). This act defined marriage as "the legal union between a man and woman." When the bill got to Clinton, he gave in to all the pressure and signed DOMA immediately.
Same-sex couples also get ripped off financially. Over a ten-year period making forty thousand dollars per year, a same-sex couple could be denied up to 55 800 dollars in benefits that are given to heterosexual couples. Also, if one partner outlives the other by ten years, he/she could be denied up to eight thousand dollars in pension and four thousand nine hundred dollars in Social Security.
Many people believe that marriage is all about pro-creation. If that is the case, what about couples who plan not to have children or those who cannot due to some sort of medical reason? No one goes around saying that they should be denied the right to marry. Only twenty percent of American families are traditional. That is, where the mom stays home and takes care of the kids and the dad goes to work and makes a living. Many more women are working, and there are a significant amount of one-parent households due to divorce and people having children before marriage. Some people have even called the traditional family an endangered species.
Same-sex couples are also denied the right to adopt in many cases. Shouldn't a child have the chance to live in a nice, loving home, despite if he/she has two moms or two dads, rather than in a place where he/she will never feel wanted or at homes such as foster families, child care centers, etc? When it comes down to it, all a child needs is love. In a more recent survey, seventy-five percent of the people said that a family was a "group of people who love and care for each other."
Since many gays and lesbians marry the opposite sex to be "normal," there would be an increase in the divorce rate. If society would just accept homosexuality and allow them the right to get married, there would be a decrease in the divorce rate (which is now close to sixty percent).
On June 22, 1994, the government of Hawaii signed a law prohibiting same-sex marriage. They defined marriage as only being between two members of the opposite sex. On June 27, 1996, Governor John Engler of Michigan (my home state) signed a bill banning same-sex marriage. He said, "This new law ensures that in Michigan, marriage will continue to be what is always has been-a covenant between a man and a woman." Other states that passed anti-marriage laws include Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, and Virginia.
The controversy over same-sex marriage is quite similar to that of interracial marriage during the Civil War times. Back then, a white man could not marry a black woman, and a white woman could not marry a black man.
When it comes down to it, marriage is not the traditional, religious bond between a man and a woman to pro-create. People need to get real and face this. It is the 90's and marriage is not the same. Marriages are not arranged (in the U.S. anyway), and men don't go around looking for women with large dowries. Marriage is the bond between two people that love each other and is supposed to last forever.
I do not think that people should be denied the right to marry because they are of the same sex. It is absolutely ignorant and insane. Society needs to get real and start accepting reality. Just because they deny us the right to marry, does not mean that it will make us go away. We have always been here and we always will.
