The marriage equality topic has been a hot button issue as
of late in this country, particularly on social media sites like Facebook and
Twitter, where many have taken to social media activism as a means of either
showing their support for marriage equality or sharing their opinions against
marriage equality. Some have simply taken to the medium not as a means of
showing support or not showing support for the topic, but to basically exclaim
that changing a social media avatar or posting a status for or against marriage
equality is essentially not going to do a thing to help or hurt the cause.
(This is the only thing that I actually have a problem with, because I don’t
believe it’s ever wrong to stand up for what you believe in and everybody has the
right to do so in whatever manner they please. If it annoys you, simply ignore
it.) While many disagree on marriage equality, I think we can all agree that it’s
nice to see social media sites actually used for [mostly] intelligent
conversation and debate this week.
I’ll now note that this is not really a piece about marriage
equality, so you don’t have to worry about being offended or bombarded with my
reasoning for why I believe what I do (if you want it - message me), but it is
probably necessary to note that I am in favor of marriage equality.
In the last two days I’ve had in person discussions (well,
one of them probably doesn’t count as a discussion) with two different people about
the subject of marriage equality. They are both against marriage equality.
The first conversation took place on Thursday where a friend
and I happened upon the topic after previously discussing a religious studies
course and the new Pope. I can’t remember word for word what this friend’s
reasons were for being against marriage equality, but at least most of the
reasoning seemed to be based on his religious beliefs, a common reason. He
discussed his reasons. I discussed mine. Neither of us got offended. Neither of
us tried to change the other person’s mind (though I don’t have a problem in
people doing so). It proved to be one of the most interesting and best
conversations I’ve had recently.
This is essentially how conversations or debates should
work.
On Friday, the other person brought up the marriage equality
on Facebook thing with disgust in his voice. I could tell he more than likely
just wanted either an argument or to irritate me, but I asked him what his
reasoning was for being against marriage equality. His reaction was vastly
different than the person from the previous day (which knowing the two isn’t
surprising in the least, but still disappointing). He stumbled verbally before
basically giving an answer the equivalent of “just because.” I could tell that
he either really didn’t have an answer or at least couldn’t formulate his
answer into words (which anybody with sound/good reasoning shouldn’t have a
problem doing). “Just because” is never an acceptable answer to a question,
especially a serious one (and the phrase is a major pet peeve of mine). I
pressed him on this and finally got him to give me a somewhat, but still
unsatisfying answer of “I guess I was just raised that way.” This isn’t atypical.
Many beliefs are hierarchical, but adults should make up their own minds and
beliefs or at least be able to explain/comprehend those beliefs.
This is a common issue I run across on almost a daily basis
(either in person or online), but feel like it’s one that’s maybe more frequent
among my generation. People have opinions or beliefs, but cannot defend them.
Or maybe they just intentionally won’t. Either way if you can’t adequately
defend or state why you’re for or against something than you shouldn’t voice
your opinion on it. If you can’t defend or state why you think a certain way than
you should probably be questioning “why do I think this way?” You might change
your mind or at the very least avoid the ignorant “just because” answer.
