3fingas, i think your words are words to live by. LIVE AND LET LIVE. and also, your principle of ‘not forcing your lifestyles on everyone else’ is a good way of rephrasing this.
here’s the thing: dan cathy donates MILLIONS of dollars to organizations that do just that: they work actively to FORCE THEIR LIFESTYLES on gays and lesbians. it’s fundamentally unamerican. not just forcing their lifestyles: they work in some cases to support, literally, EXTERMINATING gays and lesbians. see, for example,
http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/chick-fil-a-profits-are-supporting-ugandas-kill-the-gays-bill/politics/2012/08/01/45430
that’s not just unamerican: it’s inhuman.
think about how this great nation was founded: the pilgrims were facing similar oppression in england, and had to sail across an ocean to get away from that kind of persecution. that was 1620; by 2012 we should surely have internalized the lessons of LIBERTY to where we can let other people have the same rights we do. including marrying the people they love. including — not getting exterminated.
it’s just the right thing to do. as you said: LIVE AND LET LIVE. your principles have, actually, helped me understand why so many gays and lesbians are upset over dan cathy’s very public pronouncement about his beliefs, and — more urgently — about his political activism against their physical and emotional welfare.