Gay Rights Argumentative Essay

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“By in large in this country the issue of gay rights and equality should be past the point of debate. Really, there should be no debate anymore.” ­Scott Fujita
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender rights are a big issue in this country at the moment, and we need to address them. Religions usually only accept the idea of a man and a woman being together, and it causes them to be ignorant about other people’s necessities. Religion is preventing them from receiving the equality that they deserve, and it cannot continue. LGBT children are being victimized and being subjected to bullying in schools despite protections, and many people are halting the movement of same­sex marriage.
One of the greatest contributing factors to the bullying and harassment …show more content…

This argument is based on the idea of the First Amendment, which prohibits the making of any law that impedes the free exercise of religion. In the opinion of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, “The First Amendment ensures that religions, those who adhere to religious doctrines and others have protection as they seek to teach the principles that are so fulfilling and so central to their lives and faiths” (Daniel Burke). While the right to freely exercise one’s religion should be protected, this protection should not violate the civil rights of another. In addition to the First Amendment arguments, many people have used conspicuously similar arguments to the ones that once supported efforts to outlaw interracial marriage. According to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, pastors and churches will be confronted with demands to support and participate in same­sex marriages. He even went as far as to say that there was a historical precedent of those demands when there were laws that imposed penalties on pastors who refused to participate in the marriage of mixed­race couples (Daniel Burke). By saying this, he is suggesting that he still views interracial marriage to be unorthodox, which doesn’t make a very compelling argument for the same thing to be true about gay marriage. Whether it’s the free exercise of religion argument or a different one, the battle is far from over in regard to same­sex marriage, and there will still be protesters and many people who look down on