Essay On Culture Wars

How prominent are the culture wars, and how do they affect our society? Abraham Lincoln said in 1857, “A house divided against itself can not stand.” When he said this, he was talking about the dispute of slavery in the United States. The north was on the side of no slaves and the south was on the side of pro slaves. Lincoln said, “Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and put it in course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become alike lawfull in all the states, old, as well as new.” Basically what Lincoln was saying is that the people of the US have to pick one side and act on it (“House Divided”). This was one of the most important culture wars back in the 1800s. Neither side could compromise and there ended up being an actual war, the Civil War. Long story short, the north won and owning slaves became illegal when the 13th amendment was passed in 1865 (“13th”). The culture war on slavery tore the nation apart. In total, there were about 620,000 American casualties, which are about 200,000 more American casualties than World War II and taking the lead as the most casualties in an American war. That is over 600,000 American deaths over a dispute that got out of hand (“Civil War”). That happened over a century ago, but we still have culture wars going on. They may no longer be about slavery, but they are very prominent in today’s world. For instance: gay marriage. …show more content…
There are many disputes over wither gay and lesbian couples should have the right to get married. The individuals that are pro-gay marriage say that people should be in love with whomever they want, but anti-gay marriage people argue that it is agents what the Bible says. They use the freedom of religion as their excuse to bash on gay marriage. Another reason people might hate on gay marriage is that they could not have any children and in their mind, marriage is for producing offspring, which could be argued agents; same sex couples can get married and do not want any children, or they cannot have children and senior citizen couples cannot have children either. On the other side of the argument, people who support gay marriage say that marriage is for people who are in love and that people should be in love with whomever they want. The opposite side may argue that if the supporters are saying that anyone can be in love with anyone, it should be okay if a 12-year-old gets married to a 30-year-old or a man could get married to his dog. They love them, so why should they not? The argument in on going and does not seem to stop. It may seem like a harmless dispute, but in reality it is not. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 4,400 teenagers commit suicide each year (“Bullying”). While, according to a study done of 32,000 high school students in 2011, teenagers who are gay are 40 percent more likely to commit suicide in conservative areas then teenagers who are not, even if they were not bullied or depressed (“How”). So, that would be 1,760 teenagers dying each year because their sexual orientation is not being accepted. Even with the acceptance of gay couples rising and gay marriage becoming legal in the US in 2015, a lot of people are still agents it. Just recently, a county clerk from Kentucky got arrested for not providing marriage license to gay couples. This instant within itself has spread controversy on wither she could be let go or stay in prison. Since she says that she is expressing religious freedom, she got let go (Blinder). Another topic that people are constantly debating about is abortion and wither it should be legal or not. People argue that abortion is also murder; in their eyes, when the mother gets an abortion, they are killing a baby - a human being. The people that are all for abortion say that it is the mother’s body and she can do as she wishes. Why would someone wish to get an abortion? Well, according