But what’s going on in the Eich and Portland cases isn’t about law. It’s about social mores and the insistence on the part of a loud, influential faction of so-called liberals that every single American not only tolerate gay marriages, but also recognize and positively affirm the legitimacy and goodness of gay marriages. The punishment for refusing to give in to this non-negotiable demand won’t be jail time or other legal punishment — so again, the issue isn’t the law. Rather, the punishment will be a social media–fueled witch hunt, ritual humiliation, excommunication from civilized life, and exclusion from prominent positions of power in leading industries.
The most common — and laziest — response by those leading the charge (or cheering it on from the sidelines) is to say: But these opponents of gay marriage are just like opponents of interracial marriage! No one throws a pity party for these and other racists when they’re marginalized, so why should it be different with those who reject gay marriage for religious or other conservative reasons?
For the umpteenth time: Our response should be different because the issues are different. Yes, it’s possible to find justification for racism in the Bible — as it’s possible to find justification for nearly anything in its many hundreds of pages. But racism — along with opposition to interracial marriage — received its primary historical validation from ideas, prejudices, and economic circumstances that have nothing directly to do with the message of Judeo-Christian scripture.
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