Why I'm Voting YES on May 22

Ultimately Ireland's Marriage Equality Referendum will boil down to whether or not a voter believes they have a say in somebody else's relationship.

It is not, as the No campaign, and particularly the Iona Institute have tried to tell us, about children and their inexorable right to a mother and a father. Because, to be blunt, that is not a right. There are many families out there who do not have a mother and a father at their core. 25% of Irish families with children are now single parent families. Where exactly do these families fit into the bigger picture of the Iona Institute?

It is not about surrogacy, which is presently unregulated in the country (a situation this referendum won't change) and it is not about adoption (which same sex couples have access to already). It is not an attack on religious beliefs or teachings. Religious schools will still be able to teach their beliefs in their religious classes.

Although, while we're on the subject. When it comes to adoption, surely it is a good thing for a child to be in a loving home, guided by two parents rather than the alternative of being bounced around state institutions and temporary foster homes?

I've been asked to Not Redefine Marriage. I've not been told why. I've not been told why a man and a woman's relationship is any more special than a man and a man's or a woman and a woman's. I've not been told why one relationship is entitled to "inalienable and imprescriptible rights, antecedent and superior to all positive law" and one isn't. I can't think of a good reason.

What the referendum actually IS about is enshrining in our Constitution the right of two adults to marry, regardless of gender or sexual preference. It's about the right of people to choose their relationship in the eyes of the law and not be treated differently because of it.

I've long been of the belief that what goes on between two consenting adults behind closed doors is nobody's business but theirs. Tomorrow I'll be voting Yes to allow people to carry on with their daily lives regardless of how they choose to live them, all of them being afforded the same inalienable and imprescriptible rights as the next.

Irish Citizens should be treated equally. It really is as simple as that.

Vote Yes.

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