Two attorneys led a discussion panel last night regarding hot legal issues facing the gay and lesbian community, including the right to marry and raise children. Richard Storrow, professor at the Dickinson School of Law, and Cynthia Schneider, legal director of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights in Philadelphia, said gays and lesbians should be given legal equality under the law.

Storrow said many state legislatures are denying gays and lesbians the right to marry and adopt children because of discrimination. "It's about putting gay and lesbian people down," he said.

Schneider said that gay and lesbian couples should be granted marriage rights so they can experience the same recognition and privileges as heterosexual married couples. "Civil marriage is a social and cultural institution recognized worldwide as an expression of a couple's love for each other," she said. "But it's not just symbolic -- there's a huge number of federal and state benefits married people get."

Schneider cited Social Security and the right to sue for wrongful death as examples of privileges married people are granted under the law, which unmarried gay and lesbian partners are denied. "All these privileges are so easy to obtain once you get married," Storrow said. "Gay and lesbian couples have to fight by tooth and nail for these privileges."

Storrow added that, in some situations, a child is better off being raised by a gay or lesbian couple than a heterosexual couple, but gay or lesbian couples are still often denied parental rights due to a bias against them. "I think it's important for us to question 'heterosexuals-only' marriage bias. It sometimes harms children," he said.

Schneider said the crusade for gay and lesbian rights is an ongoing and uncertain struggle.

"We've had a lot of progress, with steps forward and steps back," she said. "There's still a lot ahead."

Allies President Christy Merchant said the panel discussion was a way to introduce students to important issues facing the gay and lesbian community.

"I was particularly interested in the adoption research," she said.

Shay Bailey (junior-health policy administration) said she found the discussion informative. "It taught me some things that I didn't know," she said. "I was very unaware of some [legal] cases ... and certain acts and laws."

One student said the discussion brought light to what he said is the nation's wave of conservatism.

"We're still in the midst of a very conservative era," David Lease (freshman-marketing and sociology) said. "I don't think anyone can change that until the next president."