There are not valid reasons to deny same-sex couples marriage

Like my adversary, I would like to clear something up from the top. My opponent has been referring to Con as if that is his opponent. Unfortunately, this is simply not the case. Whether or not he likes to admit it, he is, in fact, Con. I am Pro. So any time he says Con did this or Con said that, I think he really means to say Pro. By all means, Con, do correct me if you are referring to yourself. Let's jump right in, shall we?"However, the claim that gay marriage was a civil right was never stipulated or accepted in the first round. This is why I challenged CON's [Pro's] argument that this was a civil rights issue, which was in the second round."This is simply not the case. My argument on civil rights was dropped. See the rules. Drops are concessions. Gay marriage was conceded as a civil right. Simple as that.Allowing gay marriage interferes with this important purposeWhat is this important purpose? To promote having children? "If the state were to call same sex unions a marriage in conjunction with opposite sex couples, the law would publicly declare that, from now on, Marriage can be understood apart from responsible procreation and natural parenthood."I must be missing something. Why is it so important that we have natural parenthood, that the child be biologically related to both parents? My opponent dropped the questions I asked within my argument within R3, so we are left to assume that there is no reason that a child cannot only be related to one parent having been born through the use of a sperm donor or surrogate mother. My opponent has not proved that there is an advantage to being related to both parents. So although marriage can be understood to be separate from natural parenthood if same-sex marriage is legalized, it already is. So if marriage is not about natural children, why should the state care?Here's why:Marriage does create more stable families. Even if the children are adopted, a family with married parents is much more likely to be stable than one with unmarried parents.The claim that gay marriage is a civil rightI believe this claim was already conceded, both through a drop, and through my opponent actually conceding it in his argument. What is Pro's point? He already conceded this. Twice. His logic makes no sense:"Not only would the state no longer be able to encourage incoming generations of heterosexuals to create stable environments, as I previously explained, but it would end up discouraging them as well."What? If someone is heterosexual and then gay marriage is legalized, this is not going to make them suddenly not want to get married to someone of the opposite sex. No. They would still live their life just as they had before. In no way does legalizing gay marriage decrease the stability of heterosexual marriages."If the traditional notion of marriage, which is defined as banning gay marriage by gay marriage advocates and essentially CON, continues to be compared or labeled as a form of slavery/bigotry akin to racism/homophobia and the state enforces this, then the likely hood of the next generation holding and practicing this idea of marriage in the future would be virtually impossible."It simply doesn't work like that. Let's take two examples from history: Women's suffrage and interracial marriage.In both cases people argued that allowing these events to occur would destroy the traditional family and traditional marriage [1] [2]. Of course neither of these events produced that outcome. It is the same with same sex marriage: Allowing it will not degrade heterosexual marriages."Remember, the studies I mentioned last round very clearly show that people, who cohabit, compared to those who don't, have less traditional ideals or views of marriage. Then, according to other studies, they would not only be more likely to cohabit but more likely to divorce from prior cohabitation. CON's view of marriage is considered and would be non-traditional as I explained above."All that allowing gay marriage will do is that it will allow gay families to gain more stability. It will mean that gay people can move beyond just cohabiting and assume marriage. It is correct that people who cohabit are more likely to divorce from this cohabitiaion, which is exactly why same sex marriage will provide stability. Long term effects of accepting Con's [Pro's] view of marriageSocial ramifications:I have refuted his arguments above, therefore Con still must prove that there are negative social ramifications.Legal ramifications:There are not other big legal changes that must occur if same sex marriage is legalized. The only thing that will happen is that gay people can get married and have more stable families.Immediate effects"This new law impinges on people's freedoms and their capacity to live their life with freedom of conscience and to transmit their values to their own children."This is pretty much the same argument used by Scalia in his dissent in Lawrence v. Texas: Letting gay marriage (or gay relations in the case of Lawrence) infringes on the rights of people not to have to deal with gay people. This argument is virtually same as the following argument that could have been used during the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s:"Segregation needs to continue because my right to keep my children away from Black children must be upheld."It's the same thing.Schools:What is to be said? The Court was correct. Media:So?Business:That's like denying rights for interracial dating or interracial marriage receptions. "Therefore, since same sex couples are fundamentally different, an important governmental distinction between the two relationships would be reasonable in order to advance this interest and prevent the inevitable consequences."Same sex couple are not fundamentally different. Homosexual couples and families function exactly like heterosexual couples and families. Also, my opponent has not proved that these consequences are, in fact, negative. Therefore, there is no reason to distinguish between the two.Questions:Although Pro attempted to answer question 2, I have refuted his entire argument on that front. Questions 1 and 3 remain unanswered from my perspective.Bottom line:My opponent has accepted same sex marriage to be a civil right. He argues that we cannot stop infertile couples from marrying because that is a civil rights violation. Denying same sex couples marriage is also a civil rights violation. Beyond that, my opponent still does not have one, valid, unrefuted reason to violate this civil right.Sources:[1]- http://en.wikipedia.org...'s_suffrage_in_the_United_StatesThe link refuses to paste correctly. Hopefully it can be accessed. If not, it is the wikipedia article on "Women's suffrage in the United States."[2]- http://civilliberty.about.com...