Should Same Sex Marriage Be Legal?

The debate over whether or not people in same sex relationships should be allowed to marry, or even enter into civil unions is no new fight. In fact, movements designed to legally protect civil unions began in the fun-lovin 70’s. Denmark legalized same sex marriage in 1993, Israel followed suit in 1994, and the following year Sweden did the same. Same sex couples can also marry in the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and Canada. In December 2006, South Africa plans to start performing it’s first legal same sex unions.

In the past two years, the United States has intensified it’s position on same sex marriages. The twenty-first century has prompted much intra-debate within world powers when it comes to whether gay couples should have the same legal right to marry as heterosexuals. Aruba, Australia, Austria, China, France and the United Kingdom are some of the other countries at odds over gay marriage.

The United States is a different case, same sex marriage is legal-or it’s illegal-or it’s illegal and civil unions are used in lieu of same sex marriage, it all depends on where you go. Massachusetts performs gay marriages across the state, but travel a little further south to New York and Dave and Doug’ll find it a bit more difficult to register for a bridal shower. Of course that didn’t stop New Paltz, New York mayor Jason Paltz from performing dozens of marriages in 2004.

California, Washington, DC, Maine, New Jersey and Vermont all offer same sex couples the option of civil unions. Civil unions were designed to offer life partners some of the same privileges of a “traditional” marriage-although it techinically isn’t a marriage.

So, what says the opponents of gay marriage? There’s the oh-so original “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” argument. Most opponents are more concerned with what they describe as the salvation of marriage. Changing the face of one of society’s oldest institutions diminshes the validity of a healthy hetero marriage.

There’s also pro-gay marriage advocates, or simply people who couldn’t care less. They claim that robbing gay couples of the right to join America’s fifty percent divorce rate is a miscarriage of civil liberities. Proponents also point out the disadvantage that no-gay marriage has on the couples involved. Unless there’s some type of civil union, partners may not be able to visit one another in the hospital during an illness, inheriting property from a deceased partner can prove a pickle to say the least. For some reason, families are reluctant to relinquish all monies to their daughter’s live-in girlfriend-and unlike wives, girlfriends tend to get a less sympathetic ear in probate court.

The American government decided to do away with this issue of should they, shouldn’t they once and for all. A constitutional amendment, they suggested. You know, like the 14th and 15th amendments? For all of those who skipped U.S History class that day back in tenth grade, constitutional amendments are those monumental additions added on to the Bill of Rights. The 19th amendment, for example, gave women the right to vote.

Ah ha, same sex marriage advocates shouted. The proposed amendment was just what they were looking for. Advocates against the amendment argued that constitutional amendments have always been used to expand, not limit civil liberties. Bickering about gay marriage was one thing, Constitutionally killing it was another, they argued.

And today a fight that started thirty years ago continues. Whether same sex marriage should be legal really hinges on one question; should gay people have the right to be as miserable as most married Americans?