The Political Process:

One point that Glenn Reynolds broaches, in the post I was dicussing earlier, to me is indicative of a political philosophy with much broader ramifications than opposition to same-sex marriage. Reynolds says:

GAY MARRIAGE IN TENNESSEE: Not likely to happen in the near future, but some people are sufficiently upset at the possibility that there's a proposed amendment to the Tennessee Constitution that would define marriage as one-man/one-woman. I think that's a terrible idea: Such amendments are basically an attempt to block any change in political consensus by freezing things now, and that seems wrong to me in this context.

That is an essential part of the Christianist strategy, along with giving non-issues pride of place in the public debate and losing on them. The Republicans, as presently constituted, who somehow can't seem to forget that without their votes, the Civil Rights movement would have been stillborn (they honestly believe that, never mind that it was northern Republicans working with a Democratic President who knew how to twist arms), have adopted this strategy of excluding "pariahs" from the political life of the country. They tried it first with the notorious Amendment 2 in Colorado, and now they're trying essentially the same tactic with gay relationships -- strip all legal recognition of any kind from gay couples and enshrine it in constitutions so that reversing it will be as nearly impossible as they can make it.

I differ with Reynolds on one point: it seems wrong to me in any context. What the Christianists are trying to do is to freeze the public debate in their terms and in line with their theology, and we're already seeing some of the results with the current administration, which is a Christianist's wet dream.