I support gay marriage.

There are a number of reasons why I support gay marriage:

I cannot live in the world, enjoying all of the rights that have been fought for throughout the years, and then have the audacity to deny those very same rights to people that I share this country with. To me, this is the fundamental problem with denying the right to get married to gays. As Americans, we take our rights for granted and if anyone tried to take them away, we would fight until the death to ensure that we retained those rights. But just as quickly, we're willing to deny the rights we can't live without to our fellow human beings. How does this make any sense?

Perhaps traditional marriage advocates want to preserve the sanctity of marriage. In reality, we live in a world where people are getting married for money, for citizenship and for a large list of other reasons that have nothing to do with the ‘sanctity’ of marriage. Marriage is about love. It’s about spending your life with someone, having a family (if you wish) and sharing your love with the world. It’s simply telling the world, “Hey. I love this person and I want the world to know it. I want them all to myself for the rest of my life.” It can also be because you are going to be deported otherwise. Marriage is whatever you want it to be. There’s no reason that gays and straight people alike can’t share this.

Some objections to gay marriage don’t make any sense to me. For instance, some may want to deny this right to gays because they believe that it will lead to the end of humans due to the lack of procreation. Can this be taken seriously? Can we really let ourselves believe that just because we let gays have a ring and a piece of paper celebrating their loyalty to each other then that will lead to the end of humankind? Will heterosexuals cease to have sex with each other? This doesn’t make any sense. For one, gays are a minority in the United States. Just because marriage is legalized doesn’t mean that everyone will turn into a homosexual. Two, there are ways of procreating without having a heterosexual partner, or even a ‘partner’ at all. C’mon. You’re going to have to give me a better reason than that.
Also, probably my least favorite rebuttal is that once we legalize gay marriage, then we’ll have to legalize marriage to animals/minors/etc. Really? Is there not a small difference between a consenting adult and an animal or a child? This argument is a textbook case of what is called the Slippery Slope Fallacy because it is absurd to think that just legalizing gay marriage will lead to someone marrying their pet.
Another argument against gay marriage states that allowing gays to get married and have children (by whatever means) will cause their children to be gay and possibly corrupt in some way. It would ruin our society. If anything, I believe that children brought up under those circumstances would look at the world with more understanding and love in their hearts. They would be more willing and more apt to accept someone for who they are. I believe the corrupt youth of the world are those growing up in homes that teach them that being different is something that should be condemned and are taught to hate these individuals.

And we can’t forget the ultimate deal breaker, “God says it’s wrong, so it has to be wrong.” Personally, it saddens me to see one religion dictate the way that the rest of us live our lives, regardless of our beliefs. Your religion and your beliefs about that religion should have NO effect whatsoever on how other people live their lives, especially if those people don’t even believe in that same religion.

As you could probably see, this is a subject that I feel very intensely about and I could honestly go on and on for hours. Perhaps in the future, I will type more, but I prefer debate and seeing other opinions. I can’t honestly say that I am sorry if I offended anyone because it’s just my opinion, it’s my blog/note, and that’s just the way it is. Discuss.

Nadya Suleman and Her Octuplets

Welcome to my first blog. Often enough, I find myself aggravated with random things that have happened in the world and I feel like I need an outlet to express my feelings on certain issues. I've posted a few on MySpace, but I feel that I just want a place that can be solely about blogs dealing with controversial issues in the world. I encourage debate and I would love to hear your opinions on these matters.

So, for my first blog on this platform, I would like to discuss Nadya Suleman, the mother who recently gave birth to octuplets. An amazing feat? Yes. An unfit mother? No doubt in my mind. This woman gave birth to octuplets after recieving "in vitro fertilization." In normal circumstances, taking this step wouldn't bother me in the least, but this woman already had six children! In a recent article, it was revealed that she was already experiencing financial problems with the six children that she has previously, and then she decided to have more?! This is absolutely ludacris to me! These poor children are going to grow up in a household where the money is always going to be tight. Another problem that I foresee is the fact that this family now consists of 14 children! That's too many for them all to recieve the love, care and attention that they need to grow up has happy little children. The last thing they need is all the stress that is going to come from the mistakes that there mother has made.

Now, don't get me wrong. I don't think that this is the children's fault and my only hope is that they all grow up to be healthy and happy individuals, but this mother is out of control! My guess is that she probably won't stop here. The saddest part of all is that because of her "obsession" with children, the usual sponsers that would have jumped all over helping her out and ensuring that these children grow up happy, aren't helping! So now, due to this woman's carelessness, the taxpayers are now paying for her children! In this article that I was reading it states the following: "For a single mother, the cost of raising 14 children through age 17 ranges from $1.3 million to $2.7 million, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture." And it's our job to help her pay for this. That is absolutely ridiculous!

Unfortuneatly, due to the fact that many Americans make there money and want to see it go towards things that are going to help them out directly (rightfully so, in my opinon), this woman has recieved an uncanny amount of death threats. This is uncalled for. Granted, she is a moron and a terrible mother, but that doesn't warrant these people to threaten her life.

In the end, while I think that she made all the wrong choices, I welcome this kids into the world and I only hope that they can survive the life that has been set before them.

Here is the most recent article that I have read on this subject. It's also where I found that statistic. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090212/ap_on_re_us/octuplets

Thank you for reading and please leave your thoughts!