In this and future posts, I will be sharing my views on various topics that are (still) being regurgitated by the mainstream media or argued over (again) in courts of law. I firmly believe there is a solution to every problem, and finding the solution usually begins with reducing the matter to it's simplest terms.
I'd like to start with the question of whether same-sex marriage ought to be legal. This is a matter that has been in and out of courtrooms at various levels, from one end of the nation to the other, for years. This is one proverbial horse that should have been declared dead a long time ago, and yet we are still beating the poor brute.
To fix the issue once and for all, we need to first realize that all this time, we've been having the wrong argument. What we should have been debating all along, is whether marriage is a legal institution, or a religious institution. Decide that, and everything else will sort itself out.
You see, if marriage is declared a legal institution, then the law which determines who may or may not marry must not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, age, gender, etc. So if marriage is a legal institution, then people of the same sex should be allowed the privilege.
If, however, marriage is declared a religious institution, then no government funded or state sanctioned benefits should be tied to it (we'll discuss separation of church and state further in a later post). That means that benefits like social security, pensions, insurance coverage, etc. cannot be based on marriage. Also, it means that the religious authority presiding over the religion practiced by those who wish to marry would be the only body with authority to decide whether they can or cannot marry. So if two men practiced a religion that permitted same-sex marriage, they would be allowed to marry.
That's all there is to it. Decide whether marriage is a legal or religious contract. If we are to have a true separation of church and state, it cannot be both. And either way, you can't stop people of the same sex getting married, if that's what they want to do.
Whether I (or you, or anyone) personally agree with or condone homosexuality or same-sex marriage does not enter into the debate. And I think that's the part people really have a problem with.
