Bruin Alliance of Skeptics and Secularists

Apparently it is…and a rather pointless one at that.

To be clear, I do see why same-sex couples do want equality under marriage, but have a hard time understanding and believing people taking issue with gay couples wanting to get married. It seems like such a non-issue. There are more important things in life, no? If two human beings, two entities, want to wed and enter a social contract then let them do so. Does it adversely affect you? No more so than a wedding by a heterosexual couple. So let them do it and leave them alone. The current overal trend in America, at least in more open-minded areas, is that of greater acceptance of the homosexual community. This is a good thing and I hope it continues until the great majority of people see homosexuality as a non-issue and move to more important issues.

This post is prompted by an article I saw printed today in the Daily Bruin. The article titled They do, even if the law says they can’t . The article reports of a exchange of vows between a same-sex couple, Tom Keegan and Davidson Lloyd, in Bruin Plaza on Friday, April 18. The event was coordinated by the SCME - Student Coalition for Marriage Equality.

I did take issue with one part of the article though. It’s a rather technical criticism, but the article said:

… heterosexual married couples hold more than 1,000 federal rights that are not provided to same-sex couples, according to Marriage Equality USA, an organization with chapters across the country.

Now, unless I’m mistaking the term “federal rights” I don’t think rights would be the right word to use here. They are more like privileges that married people enjoy. The legal benefits of marriage are a societal construct and not an inherent right like, say, freedom of speech is.

Anyway, that’s not important. The point is, we should all try to adhere to the following maxim:

For as long as someone’s actions do not affect you (whether adversely or positively), you have no right to prevent them from engaging in such actions.

Now, if only more people tried to follow that we’d have a better world. This maxim not only applies to the issue to marriage between homosexuals, but to the issues of drug use, freedom of speech, ownership of certain things, etc. But no, the religious right and other people have to use some ancient texts as a guide and force their belief system down people’s throats. That’s not right. That’s evil.

The opinions expressed in this post are those of its author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BASS or the University of California, Los Angeles.