There are many ways to express love. Some would say red roses, others say a walk in the moonlight, but the ultimate expression of love is marriage. Marriage is a binding agreement and serves as a document that unite two people who promise to stay together for the rest of their lives, and now it’s extending to the LGBT community. As of Jan. 6 LGBT couples have the right to say, I do. The correct word is right, not privilege, it is marriage and not just a domestic partnership.
Florida is now the 36th state to allow love to overpower hate and protests. How anyone could protest one person loving another may seem unreal in today’s society but it is still an ongoing battle.
Some countries go as far as to stop conducting weddings altogether in order to avoid gay ceremonies. One woman though, not only opened the door for love but walked right in. Judge Sarah Zabel decided to begin granting marriage licenses the morning of January 5, a day prior to the original start date. It is a beautiful sight to see love spread so openly throughout the state. The first gay ceremony was in our very own city of Miami.
Catherina Pareto and Karla Arguello said their vows after being together for more than 14 years. One word to describe the entire event would be bliss.
Let’s go back in time, a time where love itself was banned solely based on the gender and the idea that love could only exist between a man and a woman. The original ban on marriage equality began in 1977 when the group Save Our Children decided to fight and eventually triumph in banning same-sex marriage as well as same-sex couples adopting children. The group went even further in 1997 with the Defense of Marriage Act which defined marriage as a union between one man and one woman, thus barring anyone else from the right to marry who they love.
Florida was still generally late, being the 36th state to remove the ban. The first state to dissolve the ban on love was Massachusetts in May of 2004 and now here we are a little more than ten years later with only 14 states to go. Let’s see what the future holds in store for America. Which state will be next?
