Gay marriage is in the news again because Senator Rob Portman (R-Ohio) has come out in favor. He says that government shouldn't deny two people the right to marry. A couple weeks ago, John Stossel said pretty much the same thing at a Libertarian forum. Libertarians are for leaving people alone so why should they interfere in who marries whom? Interestingly, if we had a libertarian government, I would be in complete agreement. Let them marry. But we don't live in a libertarian state. We live in a state where the government decides whose beliefs are enshrined in law and whose are to be trod upon.
The libertarian opposes the use of force by government to inflict a set of beliefs in either direction. Thus, if two men or two women want to live together and call it marriage, I don't care. As Thomas Jefferson might say, it neither picks my pocket nor breaks my bones. But on the other side of that coin, if Achmed the Muslim landlord refuses to rent to homosexual couples, I am okay with that too. It is his property so he gets to decide. And there's the rub. Those in favor of gay marriage as civil right and freedom and liberty will gladly strip away Achmed's freedom of conscience. We have already seen Catholic adoption agencies shut because they refused to consider gay couples. We've seen eHarmony forced to match gays. Thus, so long as Achmed, the Catholic Church, eHarmony and others will be obligated to bow to government coercion, I am opposed to gay marriage.
If the religious people are to tolerate gay marriage, then the gay marriage folks should likewise tolerate the right of religious people to live by the tenets of their religion.
If the religious people are to tolerate gay marriage, then the gay marriage folks should likewise tolerate the right of religious people to live by the tenets of their religion.
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