Non-Religious Reasons: Part 2 - Same Sex Marriage

Part 1 here

Give me one non-religious reason against same sex marriage.

There isn't one. ...but this isn't actually a problem for people who support traditional marriage.

See, marriage itself is a religious practice. It is a covenant between two people. For the Christian, it was established by God and therefore has a lot of stuff associated with it (things you're likely to hear about during a traditional marriage celebration).

"But Luke," you may say, "non-religious people get married too!"

Yes, in a sense. But these -- again, going no further than Wikipedia -- are civil unions defined as "marriage without religious content carried out by a government institution." And, I don't know if you remember back to when the whole gay marriage "thing" went viral here in the States, but that was one of the main arguments put forth by the supporters of "traditional (read: religious) marriage": Civil unions already exist; it is against the First Amendment for the government to force civil unions into the definition of marriage.

Now, does that mean I think we should strip gay couples of their rights? Not at all! Indeed, when I first heard how the government was mistreating some homosexual couples, I was angry and could not believe that some civil unions did not provide the partners opportunity to file their taxes jointly or to have visitation rights at hospitals. That was absurd.

But rather than fixing the government's problems, the government crashed through the separation of church and state and established a mandated religious expression for same sex unions.

You should be on the side of "traditional marriage" while also demanding better from our government concerning the civil unions it oversees.

"But Luke," you may say, "the government hands out marriage licenses. So marriage is a legal (not religious) thing."

And you are right, in part. The part of marriage that is connected to the government has everything to do with what the government does: collecting taxes, enforcing justice, and ensuring their citizenry is not abused. It doesn't actually define marriage itself (though, in seeking to protect, say, children, incest and under-aged pairings are often prohibited).

Please note: Marriage should not be defined by the government. The only time the government gets involved is when the elements of unions impact taxes and separations.

Click here to go on to the non-religious reason against stem cell research.

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Empty Nester