Gay Marriage should be Legalized

Thank you to thanavy for instigating this controversial debate. I assume that what he said in round one was just an introductory remark since it consisted of unargued assertions, and I expect him to make a more substantial case for the legalization of gay marriage in round two, where I will respond and then present my own case against gay marriage. But in the meantime, I will briefly respond to his opening statement. My argumentation style is very organized. Pro’s points are in font arial and mine are in times new roman. The bold term for Pro’s points and the underlined term for my text are tag words for what follows. [1] Living Together Gay marriage is just 2 same sex people who wish to spend their lives together.Definition of Marriage No it’s not. Gay marriage is marriage. It is more than just spending time together. By allowing gay marriage, we are not just letting gay people be together, we are defining marriage in a particular way. The public has an interest and a right to say what marriage is and is not since marriage itself is a public thing. [2] Old Beliefs Gay marriages have been prohibited for many centuries, but this is the 21st century so we must not live on old beliefs.Irrelevance My opponent is right that gay marriage should be opposed just because the opposition to it has grass roots, but that observation does not entail the opposite conclusion, that we should support gay marriage, either. The mere fact that a belief is old does not make it wrong. [3] Love It is only the mere act of love for another.Categories of Love Again, it is more than that. It is a specific use of love, but there are appropriate and inappropriate ways of using love. There are different categories of love. Saying that gay marriage involves love does not mean it is not immoral, for it may involve an inappropriate use of love. [4] Control It is wrong for people to try and control another's life. Ethics and Law So if someone commits a murder, it is wrong for society to control his life by putting him in prison? That doesn’t make sense. In a civilized, democratic country, we control other people’s lives all the time. We have a legal system which allows people to do certain things and disallows them from doing others, and if they break the law, they have to face the punishment. The bare fact that disallowing certain things, including gay marriage, is controlling people does not automatically make it wrong. My opponent has to explain why this instance of controlling people is wrong but that other instance of controlling people is right. [5] Discrimination It is discriminatory to humans and destroys equality in life.Misunderstanding Equality The idea that there is equality in life is unclear. Most people believe that we are created equally, which usually means that as human beings, we are equal in that no one is superhuman and no one is sub-human. One person’s life is not intrinsically more valuable than another person’s. That is the typical understanding of equality in people. But beyond that, there is tremendous inequality in life. Some people are better looking than others. Some are smarter than other, some are more athletic, more talented, more whatever. Beyond our basic humanhood, we certainly are not equal. We don’t treat two criminals equally if one of them stole and the other murdered. We treat people proportionally. Pro must explain why homosexual relationships deserve equal rights as heterosexual relationships. With that out of the way, I accept this debate and I look forward to a good one. On to Pro.