Communities

Use the topics below to learn more about why the freedom to marry matters to communities across America and throughout the world.

Fair-minded Americans across the country are wrestling with the need to end discrimination in marriage to enable committed same-sex couples to get legally married. Marriage is a powerful and important affirmation of love, a source of social support and recognition, and the legal gateway to protections and responsibilities w bhich are invaluable to the safety and security of every family. The legal and economic consequences of marriage licenses affect virtually every area of life, from access to health care to parenting and immigration rights, from Social Security benefits to transferring property without adverse tax consequences. The inequities and the legal and cultural second-class status that exclusion from marriage reinforces affect all gay people, but fall hardest on the poor, the less educated, and the otherwise vulnerable. Denial of the freedom to marry undermines young gay people's sense of self and dreams of a life together with a partner.

Marriage discrimination exists across our country and in all types of communities. Contrary to the popular perception that same-sex couples and their families lack cultural diversity and live upper class lifestyles in big cities, the facts show the opposite is true. Same-sex couples live in nearly every county in the United States, are more culturally diverse than society as a whole, and have their highest increase in population in the Southern and Mountain states along with various distinct shifts from the cities to the suburbs.