First all, Malta, congratulations: what you have achieved in just five years for LGBT rights is incredible. You are now a leading light to the rest of the world in terms of LGBT equality. The passing of legislation to achieve marriage equality is another step towards ensuring that all people who live here enjoy equal opportunity, rights, and freedoms. 

But with progress comes a backlash. Many people are happy about gay marriage becoming legal, but others are not. Many believe for whatever reason - religious, cultural, personal - that marriage should be between a man and a woman. Many wonder what will happen to their marriage when gay people are allowed to get married. Will marriage become a farce? Will we allow people to marry anything - a car, the sea, their dog? I have seen comments like these at the bottom of news articles and on Facebook, and if one of you has written these comments, or you agree with those that have, I am addressing this article to you. I strongly believe in marriage equality, but I also believe that it is equally important to engage with people who think differently from me. I hope that with this article, I can give you some food for thought.

When it comes to arguing in favour of gay marriage, I have three points to make: 1) gay marriage is important for furthering equality, 2) gay marriage does not affect you or straight people and, most importantly 3) gay marriage does not hurt anybody.

Of course, all three points are important. Firstly, I believe in equality, and think it is only fair that rights that are extended to some should be extended to all. Regardless of your religious, cultural, or personal beliefs about marriage, it is still a legally binding contract that exists outside religion or Maltese culture. It is a contract that is recognised by the state and not just your religious leader. As a contract between two people, it should be available to all. As such, gay marriage is important for furthering equality.

Secondly, marriage equality just does not affect straight people, as they can continue to get married or not in the same way that they could before. The marriage between husband and wife has not been altered, nor has their personal relationship to each other. They can still call each other husband and wife; they can still go about their everyday life as they did before. The only thing it may have been affected is their understanding of marriage, an understanding that has only been widened and become more inclusive.

However, I know that this in itself is not enough; you might say just because something does not affect us, that does not necessarily mean we should not intervene. I agree in principle; you should intervene if you think an injustice has occurred. Indeed, that is a rallying cry for solidarity on the left; just because I am white, does not mean I should not fight against racism. Because I am not struggling to pay my rent does not mean I shouldn't fight against income inequality. Because I have not personally been raped, it doesn't mean I shouldn't care that others are. I should care, and I do, because even though I am not suffering personally, others are. I do care about the effects of racism, about income inequality, and about rape, because it hurts people. Therefore, I think that me telling you that you shouldn't care about gay marriage solely because it doesn't affect you is both wrong and hypocritical of me.

This is why, even though the first and second arguments are important, the third argument in favour of gay marriage is more so. I struggle to see the injustice that gay marriage has brought about. I do not oppose gay marriage because gay marriage does not hurt anyone. When anti-gay marriage proponents claim that allowing gay marriage will lead to people marrying their dogs or a child, this is the clear distinction. Two adults can consent to enter into a binding partnership based on love and commitment. A child or a dog cannot. A lack of consent is a violation. Therefore, I cannot support child marriage or a person marrying an animal because if that happens, someone (child or animal) gets hurt.

Gay marriage is a very different prospect; two adults, fully in control of their faculties, deciding to dedicate their lives to each other. It is a prospect that 1) ensures equal rights, 2) does not affect straight people, and 3) does not hurt anybody - all the while allowing two people in love to declare their undying devotion and commitment to one another. What's not to like about that?