Rubio shows extremist perspective on gay marriage

by Sara Ritsch
Staff Writer

Marco Rubio, Republican Presidential candidate that some have called the “moderate” candidate, proved himself not-so-moderate on the Christian Broadcasting Network – a channel that a large amount of non-Christians do not think to watch – where he let his extremist views be heard.

“If you do not support same-sex marriage, you are labeled a homophobe and a hater. We are now at a point in our society where if you even associate with someone who doesn’t agree with same-sex marriage you could face boycotts from businesses and others,” he says. “We have people in this country removed from or ostracized from corporate boards because they contributed to a traditional marriage campaign. So what’s the next step after that? …The next step is to argue that the teachings of mainstream Christianity – the catechism of the Catholic Church – is hate speech. And that’s a real and present danger.”

Here, he addresses the mainstream Christian fear that religious liberty is at risk – the threat being same-sex marriage.

Rubio’s perspective is that those who believe it is wrong should be able to discriminate against it. He states that, if elected, he would provide religious exemptions to churches and other religious or religiously affiliated organizations to “ensure people in the private sector and the not-for-profit sector are being protected in living out their faith.”

In the words of The Daily Beast, “Those are nice words, but in practice, they would mean significantly expanded special rights for anyone who believes they should be exempt from the law. We've already seen how this plays out: men accused of abusing their wives have said they shouldn't be prosecuted, because the Bible tells them so; doctors refused to treat the children of same-sex couples; pharmacists have refused to fill prescriptions. Plus, corporations have refused to provide health-care coverage for contraception to women, or any coverage at all to the legally married same-sex spouses of employees.”

So while an idea like this would liberate a large amount of conservative Christians, it would hinder the freedom of a greater amount of women, men and children who live a lifestyle alternative to that of his idyllically backwards nation.

Rubio proceeds by addressing the relation of same-sex marriage and the Constitution.

He drills, “There is no federal Constitutional right to same-sex marriage. There isn’t such a right. You would have to have a really ridiculous and absurd reading of the US Constitution to think that people have the right to marry someone of the same sex. There is no such constitutional right,” to the Christian Broadcasting Network, whose interviewer nods in agreement.

Continuing on with his point, Rubio says that advocates of same-sex marriage want to stigmatize those who disagree with the practice as “haters” and ostracize them from the (greater) community.

Concluding his anti-homosexual statement, however, he emphasizes, “This is not a policy against anyone. I believe, as well as a significant percentage of Americans – that the institution of marriage, an institution that existed before government, before laws, that that institution should remain in our laws recognized as the union of one man and one woman.”

So, as The Daily Beast points out, “The up-and-coming candidate said he would reverse President Obama's executive orders on LGBT nondiscrimination, appoint judges to roll back abortion and same-sex marriage, and expand religious exemptions to a wide range of laws.”

Luckily, those of us within that community won’t be affected at all by a policy that is clearly not against anyone.

The Gayly - 12/11/2015 @ 1:54 p.m. CST