Andrew Sullivan's Against Gay Marriage

In Andrew Sullivan 's "For Gay Marriage" (29-33) and William J. Bennett 's "Against Gay Marriage" (33-36), both authors address the issue of legalizing gay marriage, and more specifically the implications it would have on various aspects of society. Sullivan 's article focuses on how the legalization of gay marriage would not drastically change society as it is now, only provide validation and equality in all aspects of life. Bennett 's article focuses on the same specifics of society, such as fidelity and the definition of marriage, as his is written as a rebuttal to Sullivan 's, explaining how legalizing gay marriage would greatly impact society for the worse. Each author 's argument is influenced by either the inclusion or omission of the

When Sullivan includes the arguments of the opposition, he generally keeps the reference to the opposition objective and generalized; he never attacks their arguments, but gives answers to the problems they highlight. Without using this technique, then Sullivan 's argument would be much more lacking in conviction. By pointing out how his argument nulls the counterargument, Sullivan is more effectively able to convince the reader that his argument is the logical and sound one. Sullivan 's use of the counterargument was the key point in some of his examples and so analyzing how much this technique impacted the work as a whole tells the reader how strong the argument would be on its own. Bennett takes the arguments of the other side and mostly just dismisses them without analyzing them. If Bennett had not addressed the opposition in the way he did, and more so tried to show how his argument makes the counter one void, then Bennett 's overall argument would have been enhanced. It is important to look at how Bennett frames his argument around the counter one because most arguments are negligible if they can be easily refuted. The way Bennett addressed the opposition did not refute them with evidence, only claims, so there must be some validity to those counterarguments, which hurts the validity of Bennett 's own argument. Both authors address the oppositions, in different manners, and both arguments are impacted by their choice in