Razib Khan

April 30, 2009

John Derbyshire is making the secular case against gay marriage over at Secular Right. Since Andrew Sullivan linked, John’s follow up expresses some dismay at the nature of the comment threads. By the numbers opposition to gay marriage is concentrated among the more religious and older age cohorts.  This “sorting” naturally leads to more polarization, and if you find yourself “behind enemy lines” because you happen to be an atheist who opposes gay marriage, or for that matter a conservative evangelical who supports it, it seems the current mood means that you likely be verbally savaged.  The days of disinterested discourse are over. I do want to note however that East Asian nations combine secularity with social conservatism, so perhaps John should look forward to his retirement on the South China coast.