Originally Posted by Frosstbyte

I am more than happy for him to feel any way he wants to about gays. I am more than happy for him to shout from the rooftops how he feels about gays. He can hate them to the core, and join a church that won't let them get married and I'm happy for both him and his church and every member to feel that way. I disapprove, but I'll defend their right to say it.

There are two problems, though.

The first is he's wrong, and while beliefs are something I'm happy to let people express and have no matter what they are, ignorance and beliefs based on ignorance are dangerous. I have never met a gay person who expressed his sexual orientation as a choice, just as I've never expressed mine as a choice. It supposes that every person at some point in his life has a moment where he says "Am I attracted to girls or guys?" and then decides on one, and that gay people pick improperly and ought to train themselves to pick the other, because that's the "right" choice.

Second, he wants to deprive people of something which our courts have described as a "fundamental right" because he believes it is wrong and because he thinks they have some sort of agency about who turns them on. I like speech. I like people to express themselves. I don't like it when expression infringes on the rights of others. For the life of me, I cannot conceive how two men or women getting married has any impact whatsoever on the lives of anyone other than them or their friends. This is not rape or theft or murder or harassment. There is no victim, just like there was no victim when a black man and a white woman got married. My how society has collapsed since we legalized that nonsense.

And, I guess if none of that matters and I have to be a bigot against a group, I'm ok with being a bigot against bigots.