GOP Seeks to Protect Us from Gays and Women

As we all know, SCOTUS' June 26th ruling on Obergefell signaled the coming end of the world. Now, living in America is the equivalent of a one-way ticket to hell unless you are able to somehow convince God that you are totally against the notion that queers and women are people. Don't worry, good cafeteria Levitickers (could be a word), the GOP has your back. A piece of legislation called the First Amendment Defense Act has been introduced in the Senate and the House. It already has 130 Republican sponsors in the House, so you know it's going to be chock-full of freedom. The text reads:

 

"Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Federal Government shall not take any discriminatory action against a person, wholly or partially on the basis that such person believes or acts in accordance with a religious belief or moral conviction that marriage is or should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman or that sexual relations are properly reserved to such a marriage."

 

Thank goodness! If this passes, landlords will be able to say, "oh, you want to add your wife to the lease? I'm afraid I will face eternal damnation if I let you do that, so you are now officially homeless. It is what my god wants." Restaurants will be able to ask two girls on their first date to stop eating their breadsticks until they can come back with proper male companions. When a single woman tells her boss she's pregnant, she can be fired for flaunting her sinning ways in order to protect the employer from doing anything un-Christian-like such as provide a source of income to a mother. Isn't this bill just fantastic?

 

What's great is that so many people already have practice exercising their religious rights this way. As Dana Liebelson wrote for the Huffington Post, "There are a number of recent cases where religious schools have fired unwed teachers for becoming pregnant. A Montana Catholic school teacher who was fired for having a baby out of wedlock, for example, filed a discrimination charge last year with the EEOC." 

 

And in case you're worried that this isn't the intention of the bill, be comforted. The Senator who introduced the companion bill, Mike Lee (R-Utah) told NPR "There are colleges and universities that have a religious belief that sexual relations are to be reserved for [heterosexual] marriage" and they "ought to be protected in their religious freedom." Phew! What a relief.

 

If your Representative has cosponsored this bill, please thank him or her for trying to protect us from needing to risk a hellish afterlife by treating people respectfully.