Gay marriage should be legally allowed

Dann argues that the divisiveness of gay marriage is a negative effect and therefor gay marriage should not be allowed. A few questions: 1. At one time (and still to some) the idea of desegregation and desegregated marriage was divisive. Incredibly so. To this day evolution is divisive (in the US). Would you apply the same logic to these issues? 2. Do you believe that if an issue is divisive we should let the issue alone? Especially when doing nothing about it is has a consequence in-and-of-itself (e.g. segregation)? 3. How is leaving gay marriage banned less divisive? Discrimination is divisive. Wouldn't the majority of people in this country who support it [1][2] be unhappy with this and feel divided against the people who are getting their way de facto? "There is no good reason to incorporate homosexuals into an already established institution. Doing so just cheapens the institution for others. Nobody likes to share. Nobody likes to see their own life cheapened by others and, rightly or wrongly, a lot of people do see it that way." How do homosexuals cheapen marriage? How do people's opinions about how gays affect the institution of marriage have any bearing on real societal harm? "The fact that there are those who oppose it is proof in itself that it has a negative effect on society for it has merely caused a further,a different rift in the confused ideology of our times. And it the homosexuals who are the instigators of this public debate." Would this be the same way that people of color were the instigators of the debate for civil rights? Why is it the onus of the minority the bow to the status quo instead of the status quo chugging based on new information? Again, would you see it that racial minority rights should have stayed the same because of it's divisiveness? You continue to argue that the status quo should not change if the issues are divisive. Where would we be as a society if we took this stance with every divisive issue. We'd still have slavery in this country. This country may not exist in the first place as revolution is divisive. Why do the gay marriage supporters get blamed for causing the division? Didn't the people who made gay marriage impossible in the first place cause the division? If the laws weren't so strict in the first place wouldn't this have been a non-issue? It would seem the division comes from those who can't let others live their lives. Those who can't let things that offend them exist. Those who wish to treat others as second class citizens. You speculated that the only reason the idea was designed was "to cause ructions in society". Isn't it the discrimination that is causing the "ructions"? Couldn't the fact that people are so unwillingly to treat these people the same way they treat others a good reason to bring the issue up? Dann has brought up the divisiveness of gay marriage as the sole reason for it to stay illegal. I posit: 1. The divisiveness of an issue is on those who are factual and/or morally in the wrong should be the ones to concede (those in opposition). 2. Other divisive issues have been dealt with in US past that I don't believe my opponent would be opposed to/support (e.g. support slavery, oppose civil rights, oppose evolution etc.) 3. That banned gay marriage still leaves divisiveness and therefor does not help society. 4. That divisiveness isn't sufficient reason for the ban for the above reasons. [1] http://www.gallup.com... [2] http://features.pewforum.org...