Special rights. The gay agenda. Gay rights. These are all phrases spoken by people who don’t know or can’t remember what the basic ideals were when this country was founded by the framers of the Constitution. They are neither lofty, nor utopian, but rather what is ingrained into every human soul at the moment of cognizance. To strip away these fundamental abstracts is to strip away everything that is good about this country, everything about Democracy in and of itself.
There are people out there who wish to make amendments to our Constitution that integrate a form of bigotry or intolerance, such as the Federal Marriage Amendment, which prevents the marriage of a man and a man or a woman and a woman outright. “The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, the Fourteenth ensured all Americans equal protection under the laws, the Fifteenth provided voting rights regardless of race or previous condition of servitude, the Nineteenth guaranteed voting rights for women…the Twenty-Fourth eliminated discriminatory poll taxes in federal elections…” (1) Not one of these amendments prevented any one race, sex, or person of differing sexuality the same rights afforded to other citizens of this country. They only expanded on the ones already in place, but the people who have forgotten why America is such a free country will change that if given the chance.
The Fourteenth Amendment specifically states in the Equal Protection Clause that “no state shall…deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” (2) This means that no state has the right to take away the freedom of one group while completely stripping away the same freedom from another. We would then find ourselves completely unbalanced and un-American if we were to allow this, not to mention wholeheartedly ignoring our Constitution. The arguments in favor of regulating marriage to be between a man and a woman are numerous, but none hold up to the Constitution.
The first and most prevalent (at least with the religious conservatives) is that it goes against God’s law and the Bible. While respecting all religions without nationalizing one over all the others (another ideal of our founding fathers), this argument assumes that everyone is a Christian or that their specific religions are against homosexuality in any form. “Not all religions have a problem with homosexuality; many sects of Buddhism, for example, celebrate gay relationships freely and would like to have the authority to make them legal marriages. In that sense, their religious freedom is being infringed.” (3)
Many people feel that same-sex marriages would destroy or lessen the current institution of marriage, so it’s interesting to note that “nearly half of all marriages end in divorce” according the 2000 US Census Bureau of Household and Family Statistics. If half of straight couples can’t keep their marriages together without this amendment, what good is this argument in favor of the amendment? It would seem fairly obvious that homosexual marriages weren’t praised for the half that worked, so why should it be blamed for the half that didn’t work? The bottom line is that this argument is ridiculous at best.
Another good argument (and by good, I mean laughable) is in regards to the “opening of floodgates” into marriages involving humans and animals. “Gay marriage has been legal in Denmark since 1989. A survey conducted in 1995 indicated that 89 percent of the Dutch clergy now admit that the law is a good one and has had many beneficial effects, including a reduction in suicide, a reduction in the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and in promiscuity and infidelity among gays.” (3) So, the law in Denmark had worked for 6 years and still, 16 years later, there is absolutely no record whatsoever of any legal marriages occurring between a man and an animal or a woman and an animal.
Having numerous friends who are gay, I talked to a few who were in relationships. Two of my friends plan on having their own small ceremony for themselves and our group of friends. One of their main concerns deals with serious illnesses and their ability to be with the other should an emergency arise. If Partner A had to be admitted to the hospital, Partner B would not be allowed into his hospital room due to the wording of these amendments and bills being passed. Since Partner B is technically not a member of the family, according to the law, his presence is not a necessity in the hospital room. This goes for property rights as well. If the two of them had bought a house or have been making payments on it for ten years, in the event of one of their deaths, the deceased’s family gets all rights to the property. This leaves the deceased’s loved one with no home even though they had shared in the payments and general upkeep in the home. This has even been known to completely circumvent the most stringent and careful writing of wills, which leads us to the most important issues of the gay family. The family unit itself.
They say ‘Only heterosexuals can make good parents,’ or ‘A family isn’t a family with two members of the same sex as heads of the household.’ Actually, “studies have shown that children are more influenced by their interactions with their parents, than by their sexual orientation. With this in mind, the American Association of Pediatrics supports gay and lesbian couples adopting children.” (5)
As of 2002, a study done by the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption found that “nearly 40% of American adults, or 81.5 million people, have considered adopting a child. If just one in 500 of these adults adopt, all of the 134,000 children in foster care waiting for adoption would have permanent loving families.” (6) One out of every five hundred people adopting would be able to give a child a family. That’s vastly more important than keeping someone from adopting simply due to their sexuality especially considering who some of these hopeful parents are: knowledgeable leaders in the child development industry.
“To categorically deny gay people the chance to be foster parents accomplishes nothing beyond making it harder to place the nearly 2,000 foster children in need of permanent homes in Missouri. Every mainstream child advocacy and mental health organization is opposed to foster care policies that ban lesbians and gay men, because such bans serve only to hurt children who need homes.” (7) This was stated by Julie Brueggemann, who is the Executive Director of PROMO, Missouri’s statewide lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights organization.
She spoke in defense of Lisa Johnston, who applied to become a foster parent with her partner Dawn Roginski and was denied only because of her lesbianism. Not only is this asinine because it’s wrong, but Johnston holds a degree in Human Development and Family with an emphasis on child development. She’s been to a higher level of education dealing directly with children and their development, so she knows what she’s talking about, yet is unfit to be a parent due to her sexuality. On this particular matter, it’s not the possible adoptive parents who lose, it’s the children in need of good homes. Just think, 1 in 500 would give every child a home and a family to be a part of, but we’d rather sacrifice the welfare of thousands upon thousands of foster children just to write intolerance into our Constitution.
As you can see, many of these arguments absolutely cannot stand up on their own. Together, they smack of personal bias, revulsion, and outright intolerance with disregard for facts, figures and the truth, but there is still the matter of constitutionality. Federally amending our Constitution to prevent a person from enjoying the same rights as everyone else is not progress, in fact it’s exactly the opposite. When we let ourselves be blinded by our own prejudices, we forget exactly what is right and wrong. Our forefathers knew the difference and that’s exactly why they founded this country with an umbrella of freedoms for everyone to enjoy, not just the few. They named us the United States of America, not the United Straights of America.
1.) http://www.aclu.org/LesbianGayRights…ID=15175&c=101
2.) http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Protection_Clause
3.) http://www.bidstrup.com/marriage.htm
4.) http://www.womedia.org/taf_statistics.htm
5.) http://www.lesbianlife.about.com/cs/…adoption_2.htm
6.) http://www.statistics.adoption.com/i…tatistics.html
7.) http://www.aclu.org/LesbianGayRights…ID=18799&c=104
Written by Bucho
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