You and the World Blog 2 - Gay Marriage

Posted by Anna Sugrue in English 1 - Dunn on

​ Welcome to blog number two of my You and the World Project on gay rights. My first blog post addressed the statistics of gay marriage supporters in the U.S, and arguments that are held against gay rights, along with evidence supporting and opposing the the correlation of civil rights and gay rights. In this post, I will give an update on some new gay rights happenings since my blog one, share some of my own opinions, and give some new statistics. 

The last few months have been great months for the LGBTQ community. Same-sex marriage was legalized in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington state in November. Gay marriage and adoption is on its way to be legalized in France. The Hobbit, a wonderful success, came out in December, starring openly gay Ian McKellen as Gandalf the Grey. It seems both in America and in the world at large, people are slowly coming to terms with gay marriage.

On the other side, there are still people in the world fighting to protect the young generations from making the “life choice” to be a homosexual as an adult. Do you agree with men like Scott Lively, supporter of the Uganda “Kill the Gays” bill? Or Stacey Campfield and his “Don’t Say Gay” bill? Do you think that the good outcomes these men hope to gain from their campaigns out weigh the good outcomes of the lives of married gay couples?

For my piece of individual research, I created a short simple survey about who the survey taker was and if they supported gay rights. The questions were as follows; 1. Male or Female? 2. How old are you? 3. What is your sexual orientation? 4. Do you support gay marriage? 5. If no, why not? 

Here are a few helpful graphs depicting my results.

Gender
Gender
Age
Age
Sexual Orienation
Sexual Orienation
Do you support gay marriage
Do you support gay marriage
If no, why
If no, why
The results show, on a whole, that 90% of the participants, majority of them in the 14-16 age range, support gay marriage. The 10% of participants that said they did not support gay marriage answered that religion was the reason they opposed gay rights. When I asked one of the participants why religion gave him a reason to appose gay rights, he replied, “because homosexuality is a sin.” 

Interestingly enough, as a new poll shows, the amount Americans that believe homosexuality is a sin has decreased by 7% in the last year, from 44% to 37%. Even more interesting are the statistics shown from further polling. The amount of people that answer that they do not believe homosexuality is a sin has only increased by 2%. This leaves a surprising amount of people in the “I don’t know” category. Is this good news for the the LGBT community? How will we make “I don’t know” into “yes”?

This change in heart from religious americans can be rooted in many different recent cultural changes, including the support for gay marriage from Barack Obama and the rising popularity of openly gay celebrities like Ellen DeGeneres. I read another article on Huffington Post's Gay Voice's section about evangelical minister Steven Chalke. Chalke has begun "calling on Christians to support the gay community, as well as lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights, instead of promoting a policy of 'condemn and exclude'". This new christian way of thinking gives hope for a brighter future for gay marriage and gay rights. Christians like Chalke would not be changing their religion, but rather letting their beliefs evolve with the quickly changing times. 

I hope that this slow increasing trend of accepting gay rights will continue in America, and eventually throughout the rest of the world. Accepting the rights and differences of members of the LGBT community is the next step in the evolution of the human race. But once gay people have rights, will the world already have found a new group of people to discriminate against? Found a new step to overcome? 

For the third and final step of this project, I must become an agent of change and go into the world to make a difference that correlates with my issue. I plan to do a slideshow/video of the definitions of love. People arguing against gay rights have long, rolling arguments, but in the end, it's about whether you are letting people be with the people they love. With a series of pictures, I want to show that no matter who you are or who you are attracted to, you thrive off the same happiness and the same love. I hope it will make people think, reevaluate, and accept every single person's rights as a human being. Live and let live. Love and let love.

Here is a link to my bibliography. Stay tuned for my third and final blog!

If you'd like to see another youtube video giving strong arguments for gay marriage rights - click on this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PD-INsIbVcw

Comments (3)

Lauren Thomas (Student 2016)
Lauren Thomas

I found your blog to be very interesting. Your survey results are very intriguing and show things that most people would not realize or notice just by looking at one person. As a supporter of gay marriage, some results surprise me such that the people who has taken the survey are questioning or LGBT and they're open to it or they're not. I really like your topic too.

Morgan Caswell (Student 2016)
Morgan Caswell

Anna, I like how you included the statistics about who supported gay rights. I found it interesting that the main reason to not support gay rights was religion. Also, I like how you intertwined the recent events, such as the release of the Hobbit with an openly gay actor and how gay marriage has been legalized in all those states recently.