Arguments against gay marriage flimsy

By Josh Geist & Jose Garza

We don’t hate too much. It’s not in our nature. But sometimes we can’t help it. Hatred and oppression we admit to hating.

We abhor the prospect of voters—the majority of whom are straight, and a significant percentage of whom are homophobic—getting to decide whether or not gay folks get their civil liberties.

And yet, here we are with a constitutional amendment on the table to make sure they don’t. Some of the arguments against gay marriage are misguided, some don’t apply and some are downright wrong. And all of them are built on trying to take away the right of American citizens to choose how to live.

First off, the current system is the pinnacle of unconstitutionality. Even if marriage is a privilege, instead of a right—which it isn’t—the 14th Amendment specifically states, “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens.” There is absolutely no way to say that straight folks can marry and gay folks can't without seriously abridging privileges.

The U.S. Special Counsel’s removing job protections from gay federal employees, though, is just downright infringement on rights.

Then there’s the religious argument. A purely religious ideal can’t be used to justify an amendment banning something that has no effect on anyone else, and really is no one else’s business. Perhaps the most important thing that people opposed to gay marriage need to realize is the profound difference between faith—which is personal—and fact—which is absolute. Policy and law can only be based on facts that can be verified by evidence.

Faith, by St. Paul’s definition, is “believing in things unseen,” without tangible evidence. Since there can be no factual or evidentiary judgment as to whether homosexuality is wrong, we can't make a law against it, because faith can't be a basis for law. Leaps of faith can be a wonderful thing. But they are leaps—leaps we cannot ask others to involuntarily take.

Here's an example—there are many Christians who believe that other religions, or the atheists’ lack of religion are “wrong.” For some reason, though, even the most extreme among the Christian right never tries to eliminate freedom of religion. Just because one sector of our population believes a thing to be wrong—especially for religious reasons—isn't sufficient reason to make it illegal, no matter how large that sector is. That's why we have things like the 14th Amendment—to defend against the tyranny of the majority. We can use what we believe to govern ourselves—not to govern others.

And then there's the biological argument of it being unnatural. “The Homosexual Matrix” by Dr. Carl A. Tripp outlines documented occurrences of homosexuality in primates, rats and dogs as well as humans.

The notion that gays are spreading disease is nowhere near being the leading cause of AIDS and other diseases. Unprotected sex in general and lack of education is the largest culprit. Unless someone wants to make the argument that half of Uganda's population has AIDS because Uganda is a great flaming gay nation, this argument is pretty well out of commission.

It’s really quite simple—there is nothing factual to justify a law banning gay marriage. To support a banning of gay marriage and to claim to believe in the constitution is the height of hypocrisy, and an affront to the American ideal.

— These columnists may be reached at collegian@csufresno.edu\