Ashford University COM325: Persuasion and Argumentation Final
Changing Times: Pro Same Sex Marriage
How dare I? Right, Ma? How dare I?... Listen, Ma, you had it easy. You have thirty-five years to remember, I have five. You had your children and friends to comfort you, I had me!… ‘Cause everybody knows that queers don’t feel nothin’. How dare I say I loved him? You had it easy, ma. You lost your husband in a nice clean hospital, I lost mine out there on the street. Twenty-tree years old, laying dead on the street. Killed by a bunch of kids with baseball bats. Children. Children taught by people like you. ‘Cause everybody knows queers don’t matter! Queers don’t love! And those that do deserve what they get!... (Harvey Fierstein’s Torch Song Trilogy, as quoted in Mohr, 1994, p. 56).
Put down, called names, perhaps raped or beaten by those who believe they are better or that they can “cure” them: that is what “queers” get. The gay and lesbian community has had to fight for what rights it has much the same way that African American and other “non-white” communities had to fight for theirs, despite the guarantees of “certain inalienable rights” by the Constitution. In 1967, the U.S. Supreme court abolished laws preventing interracial marriage in the United States United States
One of the most often-heard reasons for the ban on same-sex marriage is, “Homosexuality is immoral” (Kotulski, 2004, p. 95). According to Kotulski (2004), there is a list of immoral behaviors that do not prevent a person from marrying, including many crimes that lead to imprisonment (p. 94). Indeed, the law does not prohibit a person from marrying his or her first cousin or his or her ex-lover’s adopted child. It does not prohibit muggers, murderers, kidnappers, or child abusers from marrying. Some people believe that “divorce, contraception, fertility therapy, women in the workplace, and even left-handedness” are immoral, or were at one point in time (p. 95-96). None of those issues prevents a person from marrying another. Still, two persons cannot marry if they have the same genitalia.
Religious beliefs often create arguments against the marriage of two persons of the same gender. Since marriage legality is the responsibility of the government, there should be an institution of the “separation of church and state” laws that already govern problems such as these. Kotulski (2004) suggests that objectors are afraid that “if civil marriage was legal to same-sex partners, then religious institutions would be forced into performing ceremonies.” First, due to those laws mentioned above, laws forbid government from forcing religious institutions to do anything (p. 92). Second, not all religious institutions are against same-sex unions. According to Rev. Dr. Mel White (2010), himself a gay man, there is no reason for religious institutions to be anti-gay. The idea that the Bible “condemns homosexuality” as it exists today is a fallacy. This belief has merely “been passed down from generation to generation with very little personal study or research” (p. 4). The Bible says nothing at all about homosexuality as gays and lesbians practice it today.
The Bible does issue a number of commands that people no longer practice. For example, according to Deuteronomy 22:13-21, if someone were to discover a bride who has had intercourse prior to marriage, she should be stoned to death. Deuteronomy 22:22 states that adultery (on the part of either spouse) is a crime immediately punishable by death by stoning. Divorce, remarriage of a divorcee, and intercourse during menstrual flow are all condemned by the Bible (p. 8). Even if homosexuality were damned by the Bible, it makes little sense to uphold that one law and not the others listed here, as Tiger Woods and Jesse James have yet to be stoned. In fact, if Biblical law were practiced today, there would far fewer problems with homelessness and overpopulation in Western culture.
Religion and morality aside, legalizing the marriage of same-sex couples is just good business on the part of the United States Massachusetts Maine Maine
Even with a less than perfect economy, Americans today are fortunate to live in a country where people can fight for what they believe are rights they should be afforded. During past wars abroad, in Oriental countries such as Korea and Vietnam
Because of that law, if something were to happen to the life-partner of a gay or lesbian person, regardless of how long they have been together, there is no protection for the grieving widow/er. According to Eskridge & Spedale (2006), many widowed partners are left with only their memories in the event of a death. Families of the dead partner have every right to collect the belongings, possessions, and inheritances left behind, leaving the surviving partner with nothing but grief (p. 133). Legalization of same-sex marriages would provide protection against angry families who were unsupportive of their loved one’s lifestyle. In the United States
One final argument by those opposed to the legalization of equal marriage laws is the welfare of children, existing or would-be. The first rallying cry by opponents is, according to Kotulski (2004), “marriage is for procreation!” (p. 91). Noted nationally-syndicated columnist and president of the National Organization for Marriage, Maggie Gallagher (2003a), is one such opponent. She contends, “Marriage is the means by which societies do their best to secure fathers for children… when the law institutionalizes same-sex marriage, it affirms that children do not need mothers and fathers, and that marriage has nothing to do with babies” (p. 12). In fact, marriage has nothing to do with babies at all. It is legal, for example, for a sterile man or a sterile woman, or both, to marry in any state in the union. It is also legal for any adult man to marry a post-menopausal woman of any age. It is legal for women whose doctors have medically advised against having children at the risk of their own health to marry any man of their choosing. If marriage is only about having babies, then these examples should also be illegal. It is also important here to note that, though they often employ the use of fertility assistance, artificial insemination, or surrogacy (as do any couple who are unable to have a child “naturally”), gay and lesbian people do procreate!
Maggie Gallagher (2003b) also speaks out against the absence of one parent of each gender in a child’s life. While she has spoken out before against single parenthood, here she speaks of the child-related virtues of marriage that, in her opinion, same-sex marriage could not fulfill. She states:
Marriage as a public tie obligates not only fathers, but fathers’ kin to recognize the children of this union. Marriage is in every society the sexual union where childbearing and raising are not only tolerated but applauded and encouraged. Marriage is the way in which every society attempts to channel the erotic energies of men and women into a relatively narrow, but highly fruitful channel, to give every child the father his or her heart desires. … Successful societies do this not only because children need fathers, but also because societies need babies (p. 18).
Again, not every marriage is destined to produce children, whether society needs them or not. To base the rule of marriage on whether or not the couple can bear and raise children would be to make illegal a number of heterosexual marriages, and society would not stand for that. They have a hard enough time standing for the fact that it is legal for gay and lesbian couples to raise children, biological or adopted.
Solodnikov and Chkanikova (2009), in a proposal about whether to allow same-sex Russian couples to adopt children, cite pubic worry about these children: their sense of gender identity, if their mental health can withstand the social disapproval of their parents, and even the possibility that they will be confused about sexual orientation. They state, “psychologists are apprehensive that children will copy the sexual
orientation of their parents” (p. 16). This is a ridiculous and unfounded fear. There is no proof whatsoever that the child of gay or lesbian parents will grow up to be gay or lesbian, just as it is not a heterosexual parent’s fault if his or her child grows up to be homosexual. As for the mental health of the child and his or her gender identity, there are now anti-bully programs in the schools and community groups especially for the children of gay and lesbian parents in order to help deal with the special situation (C. Johns, Assistant Principal, personal communication, April 19, 2010).
Gay and lesbian children are just as well cared for and have the same joys and woes of the children of heterosexual couples. They may be unhappy, however, if their parents are not married, not because they do not love one another, but because of a law. This law does not prohibit marriage based on race, criminal or immoral behavior, or ability to produce children. Opponents tend to quote Bible verses that are supposed to condemn homosexuality, but it is clear that the Bible does not even mention homosexuality as we know it today. There are clear public health and welfare benefits as well as economic benefits that would promote same-sex marriages in the United States United States
References
Eskridge, W.N., & Spedale, D.R. (2006) Gay marriage: For better or for worse? What we’ve learned from the evidence. New York : Oxford
Gallagher, M. (2003a) A reality waiting to happen: A response to Evan Wolfson. In Wardle, L.D., Strasser, M., Duncan, W.C., & Coolidge, D.O. (Eds.), Marriage and same sex unions: A debate (pp. 10-12). Westport
Gallagher, M. (2003b) Normal marriage: Two views. In Wardle, L.D., Strasser, M., Duncan, W.C., & Coolidge, D.O. (Eds.), Marriage and same sex unions: A debate (pp. 13-24). Westport
Goldberg, N.G., Steinberger, M.D., & Badgett, M.V.L. (2009). The Business Boost from Marriage Equality in Massachusetts : Evidence from the Health and Marriage Equality in Massachusetts
Kotulski, D. (2004) Why you should give a damn about gay marriage. Los Angeles
Mohr, R.D. (1994) The long arc of justice. New York
Ramos, C., Badgett, M.V.L., & Sears, B. (2009). The Economic Impact of Extending Marriage to Same-Sex Couples in Maine
Solodnikov, V., & Chkanikova, A. (2009). Children in Same-Sex Marriages. Russian Education & Society, 51(7), 13-34. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database.
Sullivan, P. (2008, May 6) Quiet Va. Washington
White, M. (2010) What the Bible says and doesn’t say about homosexuality. Lynchburg