Legal Issues Surrounding Gay Marriage

You know, I wasn’t going to write a piece on this topic, but after reading one particular article, I felt I had to. I’m appalled that the article in question has been rated as the most valuable of all that had been written on the topic – is this really the world we live in today? Now, I’m not a religious person, but I’m not an atheist. Rather than disbelieving in God’s existence, I maintain my right to reserve judgment and hence claim myself as an agnostic.

Legally, in the UK, homosexuals are allowed to wed if they so please, and as far as I’m concerned that’s a great step forward in terms of human rights. I’m a heterosexual man but have no problem with gay men or women and have had many friends that are gay. To claim that homosexual people are only homosexual because of the ways in which they think is ludicrous, and further more – to say that there is no need to judge them because they will be judged by God upon their death, well, I’m speechless actually. I’m sure the Bible does not condone homosexuality, in fact I know it doesn’t, but one thing I can tell you about the Bible is that it is full of contradictions. For a religion that prides itself on forgiveness, why preach an eye for an eye, and does that mean Christians are in favour of capital punishment? Treat every man as equal: Are homosexual men and women not of equal stature to heterosexuals?

I understand that cultures vary from nation to nation and they do need to be respected, but I just can’t ignore such blatant prejudice. Go back one hundred years and study the suffragettes: women, fighting to be recognised as equals. Many women died, and the social feeling at the time was that their plight was pointless and their claims unsubstantiated. Well, look at the status women have today, and does it seem wrong?….no, of course it doesn’t. Why, as a human race, do we feel so threatened by something new? Gay people do not choose to be gay, and many have to deal with being ridiculed and attacked, both verbally and physically, when they finally pluck up the courage to reveal their sexuality to their families and friends.

It is the choice of the church as to whether they allow homosexuals to marry before the eyes of God, and with that I have no quarrel as yes it does go against religious beliefs, but to claim that they should not be allowed to marry full stop, even in a registrars office for example is once again, ludicrous. And what if a Christian boy grows up to be homosexual? Does his family cast him out on the streets, is he not allowed to marry before the eyes of his very own God? The questions are endless, but I know what I believe. Wake up people, homosexuality is not a state of mind, its something we have no control over, so why persecute people who have done nothing wrong?