Social
Issues in America
There are many social issues that lie within the Unites
States of America, but some stand out more than others. These issues effect the
way that American society works and can be a determining factor in things such
as elections, media, and government laws. Two main social issues that exist in
America are gay marriage and immigration. Though they are not prevalent issues
in all of the states, they are still commonly talked about by many people
throughout the country.
Since 2001, when September 11th happened, many people in
the United States have had a fear of allowing immigrants into the United
States. It went to levels of border control and more. Therefore some judge that
immigration is a threat to the United States. FAIR estimates that “ in 2010 the
illegal alien population is about 12 million persons. Government and academic
estimates estimate that population at about 11 million.” This makes people have
concerns because they think that many illegal aliens are taking jobs from other
American citizens. Also, some people contribute the high levels of crimes and
drugs in certain areas to be the cause of illegal immigrants who work for other
countries. According to the Heritage website “When three out of every 100
people in America are undocumented (or, rather, documented with forged and
faked papers), there is a profound security problem.” Many people see this is a large issue because
of what happened on September 11th.
Gay marriage has also slowly become a significant social
issue in today’s American society. According to Wikipedia, “Since 2000, eleven
countries (Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway,
Portugal, Spain, South Africa, and Sweden) and several sub-national
jurisdictions (parts of Mexico and the United States) have begun to allow
same-sex couples to marry.” In the 2012
election, there were four states that had some sort of gay-marriage amendment
added to their ballots. In Minnesota, the ballot discussed whether or not gay
marriage should be defined in our constitution.
This was a social issue here in Minnesota because many people felt that
marriage should not have anything to do with state laws. Across the nation, people are split in the
middle because of other outside factors such as religion.
Overall, these social issues have been spoken about a lot
over the past months due to the election season. Gay marriage and immigration
issues are here to stay and I personally think that they will continue to be
issue for a long time because Americans have many different feelings about
them. These social issues will continue
to define American society and the standards that they live by. Hopefully, there will come a day when
American society does not let social issue define who they are, but I know this
will not be soon.
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