Same-sex marriage has been a controversial issue for many years and continues to be a hotly debated topic in government and religious debates. Marriage equality is a human right and should not be run by religion or government; everyone deserves to experience the joys of marriage. In the past, religion was heavily involved in marriage, but in modern times religion and marriage have become more separate. So far, seventeen states and seventeen countries have legalized same-sex marriage. Many people, all over the world, are in support of marriage equality and the many states fighting for equality show a growing acceptance of this. It is becoming a permanent part of American culture. Same-sex marriage should be legalized in the United States because marriage is a right that everyone deserves, marriage should not be limited by religion, and marital diversity is becoming common. Same-sex marriage is a controversial issue that raises debates that stem from court cases, mentions of the Bible, and the use of an outdated meaning of marriage. Court cases that focus on whether or not same-sex marriages are legal are common in the modern era, but these cases began in the second half of the twentieth century. The beginnings of these cases began in 1971 with Jack Baker and Mike McConell attempting to obtain legal marriage status but were met with refusal (Crehan and Rickenbacker, n.pag.); however, many cases have followed in the fight for marriage equality. They were the first same-sex couple to attempt to marry and believed it would be granted as there was no legal justification that their request to marry was against the law. In December 1990, three couples fought to obtain legal marital status by submitting a request...... middle of document ......ic Search completed. Network. March 31, 2014.*Eskridge, William N. Jr. “A History of Same-Sex Marriage.” Lillian Goldman Yale Library. Digital municipalities. 2003. Web. April 26, 2014. Rowatt, Wade C., et. al. “Associations Between Religious Personality Dimensions and Implicit Homosexual Prejudice.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religon 45.3 (2006): 397-406. Academic research completed. Network. May 28, 2014. Whitehead, Andrew and Joseph Baker. “Homosexuality, Religion, and Science: Moral Authority and the Persistence of Negative Attitudes.” Sociological Inquiry 82.4 (2012): 487-509. Academic research completed. Network. March 31, 2014. Woodford, Michael R., et al. “Social work faculty support for same-sex marriage: A cross-national study of US and English-speaking Canadian MSW teaching faculty.” Social Work Research 36.4 (2012): 301-312. Academic research completed. Network. April 15, 2014.