The Washington Times believes that Arizona’s veto of the religious freedom bill was a bad move, claiming that the LGBT community is waging a war on faith.
Arizona has been in the news quite a bit lately. When Governor Jan Brewer vetoed the “religious freedom” bill the other week, gay rights activists were thrilled. Arizona had been one of several states making headlines due to the fact that it was considering the passage of a bill that would allow business owners to turn away same-sex couples if the business owners didn’t agree with their “gay lifestyle” due to their own religion.
Huh.
Well, thankfully the bill in Arizona was vetoed, but The Washington Times published an article on March 5th, 2014, stating that the veto was an expression of “religious intolerance.”
First of all, the title of the article—”In Arizona, gays show Intolerance of expressions of faith; Brewer veto of bill a loss for religious freedom”—just screams bigotry. In no way was Brewer’s veto of the bill a blow to those with strong religious beliefs; as she stated to the press, she has more pressing matters and believed that passing the bill could have serious implications for Arizona:
“Our society is undergoing many dramatic changes. However, I sincerely believe that Senate Bill 1062 has the potential to create more problems than it purports to solve. It could divide Arizona in ways we cannot even imagine and no one would ever want. Religious liberty is a core American and Arizona value. So is non-discrimination.”
The Times argued that the veto was an act of intolerace from the LGBT community and its supporters, and went as far as to compare LGBT community to neo-Nazis:
The proposed law was not Christian-specific, as it was often portrayed in the media, and would have, for two examples, protected the right of a Muslim caterer to refuse to arrange a pig roast, or a Jewish photographer (or any other photographer of good will) to decline a commission to photograph a neo-Nazi ceremony.
They also claimed that a wedding cake adorned with same-sex cake toppers mocks authentic marriage, and go as far as to say that “hairy legs” (as in those of a man) would offend a baker:
A wedding cake announces its sexual proclivities only when the baker puts two men or two women on it, and this, to many, mocks authentic marriage. Or maybe putting four hairy legs on a wedding cake just offends a baker’s art.
They continue with a statement about “homosexuals” and the fact that they “despise” people of faith:
The lavender lobby has a winning streak in the courts, but what homosexuals covet most is not the tolerance of the larger society, but the approval of society, and particularly the approval of the people they despise most, men and women of faith.
Basically, the Times has endorsed the license to discriminate—and this is isn’t the first time. They previously reported on “militant homosexual activists” and defended a bakery that had closed its storefront due to being “hounded by gays.”
Emily Gable is the associate editor at Equally Wed, the world’s leading gay and lesbian wedding magazine. For more marriage equality news, follow Equally Wed on Twitter and Facebook.
Photo: Wikipedia
