Gay France

Everyone uses different outlets as for where they get their world news. I personally have been a fan of BBC since my IB teacher in high school  I was on my BBC app on my smart phone and today a article was published titled "France's parliament begins long debate on gay marriage." If anyone has been reading about France, their latest president campaigned on gay rights, therefore this was to be expected. a problem that i see with this is the fact that Obama actually campaigned for this too, yet he hasn't done anything about it. Yes, Obama has been dealing with the whole fiscal cliff episode, but still, you would think some reference would have been made. This article talks more about the reaction by the French people's reaction to the debates happening in the French Parliament. The article says,

opinion polls suggest that around 55-60% of French people support gay marriage, though only about 50% approve of gay adoption.

 I have a personal problem with the math involved, but the article makes the point the this is a fairly serious change for France. The bill is supposed to allow for gay marriage and adoption, that's a big step in any society and the fact that hundreds of thousands of people are going to either a gay or anti gay marriage rallies shows how big of a step that is. As to why a Roman Catholic Archbishop would somehow connect gay marriage to incest and polygamy is beyond understanding, but the typical christian response would be that homosexuality is a sin and etc. The debate over the gay bill is going to last 2 weeks according to BBC, this article was published today so, hopefully, the bill gets passed by Feb. 13, 2013.

Gay couples and persecution.

Gay Marriage is a matter of respect and human rights because of the way it is received among the general public. Marianne Mollmann takes a different angle of gay rights and marriage: the kids.  Homosexual couples want to have a family that consists of children as well, they go to adopt or find surrogates to have children for them since they can’t go the traditional route. When gays are treated differently and not allowed a right to marry, there’s actually a bit more than that they lose as a side effect. When a normal heterosexual couple has kids they get benefits from their jobs, maternity/paternity leave for example, actually make a difference. A gay couple would have to use their vacation days or some other substitute to be able to get that free time with their children also, the fact that a lot of their children is adopted puts added difficulty to the couple compared to the normal heterosexual couple. While something like this seems rather small and trivial, the maternity leave along with other benefits that a normal couple would have just add up and will become a big disadvantage in one way or another.

Mollmann also talks about the human rights of gays, at the end of the day they are the same as any other human being. Gays have been the target for hate crimes for several several years, that’s not new. In my mind, that’s the equivalent of shooting a African American just because of skin color. People forget that gays are just humans and deserve the same respect and rights as anyone else. Why is it so easy for them to do that?

For too many people it is only a short leap from seeing homosexuality as offensive to justifying physical harm.

Works Cited

Mollmann, Marianne. "Gay Marriage Is a Human Rights Issue." Gay Marriage. Ed. Debra A. Miller. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2012. At Issue. Rpt. from "Gay Marriage: The Issue Is Respect." Huffington Post. 2011. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 23 Jan. 2013.