This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2004, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

I am about to get married and I'm concerned that my marriage will be devalued, given the morals of our current culture.

One might think it'd be the “threat” from same-sex marriage, but I can't think of a single way that any loving couple could negatively impact our relationship. The threat to my marriage is the need to ask for sanctioning from the government, or ask someone else if my honey suits me OK.

What business is it of anyone's whom I choose to love? How can I fully savor my own marital rights and responsibilities when someone else that I care for very deeply is being denied these same rights? I do not wish to receive the resentment that comes from having something that has been specifically denied to another.

To those who support a constitutional ban on “gay marriage,” what's next? That only, say, people with the same ethnic heritage can be legally joined? Oh, that's right. That one failed already.

Are you going to tell me we have to produce children for our love to be valid? Or maybe one can only marry those in the same financial situation, educational experience, or who worship exactly as, hmm, the “majority”? Isn't that the exact tyranny that our forefathers tried to prevent when they wrote the Constitution?

Don't attempt to “save” marriage for me, and please don't destroy the world's finest document in this reckless attempt at legitimizing bigotry.

Mike Coronella

Moab