Same-sex marriage (also known as gay marriage) is a controversial topic that is constantly appearing in headlines of the news. It seems that more and more states are pushing to legalize gay marriage every day. Wyoming, a typically more conservative area, was the 32nd state to legalize gay marriage back in October. Although there seems to be increasing support for gay rights, the right for same-sex couples to marry continues to spark debate. Gay marriage is a universal issue, and debates continue to arise over whether same-sex couples should be granted marriage equality, be granted civil unions as a replacement, or denied theses rights altogether. From both sides we can often witness poor reasoning and a misrepresentation of facts. The purpose of this paper is to analyze a few of the key philosophical assumptions made by both proponents and opponents of marriage equality and then evaluate the truth and effectiveness of these assumptions. One of the key arguments against same-sex marriage is that redefining what marriage really signifies (traditionally the legal union between a man and a woman), …show more content…
This is not always the case. A lot of Americans are just against redefining what marriage actually means, mainly for the reasons listed in the previous paragraph. Marriage is the legal union of traditionally a man and woman as spouses. Many opponents to changing this definition feel that changing what marriage actually signifies will dissolve marital norms and the actual significance of the legal union itself. Claiming that someone is prejudice towards LGBT people should not be used as a personal dart in order to guilt people into changing their ideas. People should be entitled to their beliefs without automatically being criticized for being prejudiced, biased, racist,