Marriage should be an individual choice, not a political argument. As a teenage girl from Australia who is currently in her last year of high school, I am surrounded by the controversy around same-sex marriage. It’s currently a huge debate which divides the community as it requires us to question the laws of equality. Why should marriage only be between a man and a woman? In America this is one of the most popular questions asked.
One of the easiest ways to decide if you are for or against same-sex marriage is to put yourself in their position. Say that same-sex marriage was legal but heterosexual marriage wasn’t. You fall in love with someone and want to marry them and build a life with them, but you can’t because it’s illegal. You are denied the opportunity to publicise your love in a ceremonial ritual that’s been around for centuries just because people don’t want you to be happy and you’re considered ‘weird’ and ‘abnormal’. Why should the government have to decide who marries who? Why is it anybody else’s business but yours?
America has always fought for the rights of equality. First it was fighting to treat each race equally and then it was fighting for women’s rights. Why should the way gay people are treated be any different? People say there are more gay people out there than there used to be, but that’s not true. There is the same amount of gays now than there was 100 years ago; the only difference is nowadays, we accept them more in society. But we still don’t accept them completely. We need to change this. Macklemore, a modern day rapper known by many, wrote a song called ‘Same Love’. He mentions this is ‘A world so hateful some would rather die than be who they are’. Oregon, this is what you are enforcing. People are killing themselves, just because you won’t accept them. People are killing themselves because their sexuality is hated by many. This isn’t right. Nobody should need to hide their true selves; they should be proud of who they are and be accepted by the people around them.
Whether we are straight, gay or lesbian we all have the same feelings and act the same way. I found an Australian advertisement which conveys this message perfectly: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wj09lWcz0yk (ITS TIME GET UP - start at 0:53 till finish). Until the end of this video you don’t realise the person behind the camera is actually gay. The people in this advertisement do everything the same as those who are straight; they celebrate, they argue, they build a life together and, most importantly, they love. So why should same-sex couples be restricted from what heterosexual couples are allowed to do?: Marry. This video conveys the same message Macklemore conveys through his song: ‘underneath it’s all the same love’
We should be allowed to marry whoever we want no matter which sexuality we are. The government shouldn’t be the ones to decide, it should be a personal choice. It should be simple: if you love someone and want to spend the rest of your life with them then you should be allowed to marry them, no matter what gender they are. Same-sex marriage should be a constitutional right, not a political debate. Thank you for your time.
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