Could someone please help and critique my Persuasive Essay please?

Gay Marriage

Marriage has withstood separation from church and state long enough, the segregation of homosexuals from this highly valued institution not only cripples the American creed of equality but remains a wall of separation in our United States. The dream of being married and having a family of their own has been a dream that has followed many children since the moment they realized marriage meant happiness. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, once in your life you think about settling down with the one you love. But marriage isn’t as simple as buying a candy ring and throwing rice. It involves the church, the government and the family. For many people these days marriage is out of the question, not because of personal choice but because of the rules. Homosexual marriage is not yet legal in the U.S. although there are a few state exceptions. And for many gay couples, the reasons holding them back from true happiness are just ridiculous. In essence, the reasons that still segregate the homosexual couples from straight couples bring a contention between Americans like segregation between races did years ago. Why should my love be deemed any different than the love of a straight woman? The government should stop segregating people at every opportunity they have and allow every person to have the same rights as everyone else. All men, and women, are created equal, right?

So many times people get wrapped up in the words gay marriage or same-sex marriage. Jason Frye argues that it is just marriage and that people should stop calling it same-sex. He says “The only essential difference between these unions is the gender combination of the dolls on the cake.”(Frye) The love is still there and the respect is still there. He also defines marriage as a “long-held, established civil institution based upon cultural expectations of long-term committed monogamy and mutual respect between two non-related adults.”(Frye) Throughout Frye’s whole article he basically states that gay and lesbian couples should have the right to marry just like any other couple. There should be no separation between the two just because of gender. It is like separation between races. We had different schools, different laws and different lives than each other but we were deemed to be equal in all ways and today we all have the same rights. If we didn’t, there would be some major issues. So why can’t homosexuals have that same courtesy? America should put down the walls that are built to separate this nation. “The religious case against equal rights can—and probably will—be argued till the end of time. But the effort to deny equality to members of society on shifting religious grounds and nonexistent practical ones is a war on decency as well as on conservative sense.” (Murry)

Some people are asking for a Federal Marriage Amendment banning Homosexual marriage all together. The church says it is the only ways to keep this nation pure. Charles Krauthammer argues differently. He says, “marriage equality should not be forced on religious institutions… there is no more justification in the religious being forced to accept things they claim to be against their beliefs than there is in the religious forcing their beliefs on everyone else.”(Krauthammer) What he is saying is that everyone loves freedom and for the church to force their beliefs on the American public while rejecting other’s beliefs goes against our first amendment rights. “Gay marriage is a legitimate social issue to be decided democratically.”(Krauthammer) It, gay marriage, should be an issue decided by the people for the people, not by religious standards.

Doug Williams, an information technology business analysis, states the one of the reason’s the Catholic Church does not accept homosexuality is because, “Every act of sexual relations must [open] to procreation.”(Williams) Since homosexual couples cannot procreate naturally and artificial insemination is a sin, the Catholic Church does not acknowledge homosexuality as a real issue. They believe it is a temporary temptation and should not be acted upon. “Temptation doesn’t excuse behavior.” (Williams) This argument to hold any standing would have to be set for straight couples as well but as Douglas Murray states, “many straight couples… do not marry to have children.”(Murray) With our economy the way it is, many couples, straight or gay, choose to not have children but to invest in themselves and their surroundings. The argument that homosexuality is derived from the book of Leviticus where it states that no man should sleep with another man. In the following versus it states that women should not wear pants and men should not shave their beards. Jason Fry states that these reasoning are out dated. He says that no longer does America need a God for “paying bills… for health and welfare, social order, or the maintenance or the laws of physics.”(Frye) So if we don’t need a God until disaster hits, why should America base their opinion on today’s issues on the out dated facts of the Church?

To go along with the issue of procreation and children comes statistics and issues of children already involved in homosexual families. Would it be better to have a child with one parent or two? Throughout America people reason that a child should have two parents, two people to rely on and two people to love them. And who is to say that gay couples cannot care for their children because they are gay? Jonathan Rauch states in his book Gay Marriage that “many gay households contain children, whether by adoption, insemination, or a previous marriage.” (Rauch, 74) Children are already part of the situation and to tell them that their parents are legally married because of rules would make that child’s life a little more difficult. “Everything we know about children suggests they do best in stable homes, and everything we know about homes suggests that marriage makes them more stable.” (Rauch, 75) In 2000, the Census Bureau did a survey and our of the 594,000 same-sex couples, 28 percent had children. (Rauch, 74) So many people believe that since there is not a father figure or a mother figure in some gay couples household, children do not grow up correctly. Who’s to say that in single parent households or households that the father is constantly gone or the mother continuously working is better for a child than a household where there are two parents who try their hardest to give their child the best life they can have.

Love is a verb. It’s a constant thing that surrounds everyone every day. Who is to say that being homosexual is wrong? Who is to break up a family? Why is America, after so many years of fighting racial segregation, still in the fight over sexual orientation? Marriage is a relationship between two people who love each other and are willing to do anything for that other person. America’s society would benefit from having same-sex marriage not just because it would make people happy but because it would break down one more wall that is separating this United States. It would give us the real freedom we desire.