Rarely has a Supreme Court decision read more like it was written by the light of a lava lamp in a dorm room.
Rather than simply overturn sodomy laws on narrow equal-protection grounds -as O'Connor did in her separate opinion- or rule that sodomy laws are dumb and wrong but nevertheless constitutional -as Thomas eloquently stated -the court's majority decided to repeal the very notion that legislatures can use common morality as a guidance for law.
"This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation," Scalia declared. "Today's opinion ... has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda." Worse, according to Scalia, the decision largely paves the way for gay marriage.
But now that I think about it, both Scalia's dissent and Kennedy's ruling demonstrate that folks like Knight and Lively and others who talk about gays as if they are Nazis and pedophiles who want to "recruit" children into homosexuality (and presumably tastefully catered Oscar parties) and "convert" homosexuals, haven't just been having a bad couple weeks. They've been having a bad couple decades.
I don't for a moment contend that all cultural trends on homosexuality -or sexuality in general -have been positive. I don't like it when straight people claim that they can define their "own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life." Why on earth would I celebrate when gays do it?
But certain activists on the far right have dug themselves into a hole on the issue of homosexuality, and their answer seems to be "dig faster." If there were a scintilla of evidence that their furious burrowing were a successful strategy, I might take more of their criticisms to heart, though I just don't have the heart for dehumanizing and demonizing homosexuals.
Indeed, the truth is that the average American is probably more scared of Lively than of the average homosexual. And I would much rather deal with and improve upon the reality that Justices Scalia and Thomas recognize than dig to the never-never land where Nazis and gays are indistinguishable and, presumably, all the collaborators have been shot.