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Religious Freedom a Casualty of Legal Gay Marriage?

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WASHINGTON -- The case again Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis is just the latest example of how religious freedom is quickly becoming a casualty of same-sex marriage proponents.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court's June ruling legalizing gay marriage nationwide, some activists are trying to make opposition to same-sex marriage itself illegal.

For years, those who campaigned for same-sex marriage claimed it would not harm their opponents or believers in traditional marriage.

A new book, Truth Overruled: the Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom by Ryan Anderson, argues that harm is already being seen.

"The main rhetoric that we've heard for the past decade from those in favor of redefining marriage was that if you're against same-sex marriage, you're just like the racist bigots who were against interracial marriage," Anderson told CBN News. "And we're already hearing voices say the government should now treat people who believe marriage is the union of a man and a woman as if they're racists."

Anderson cites business owners who are already being punished for not actively supporting gay marriage or at least for not serving gay couples.

"The fourth chapter of the book, Bake Me a Cake, Bigot, tells the story of all these professionals who simply asked to be left alone by the government to run their business in accordance with their belief," Anderson continued. "And they've been fined sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars."

Erick Erickson, editor-in-chief of the popular RedState blog, says the fact that Anderson's young is both striking and meaningful.

Because he's younger, his perspective is "kind of counter-intuitive because people perceive it as being a generational issue."

"So here's this young guy who has a mastery of these issues and the implications for the future of the country," Erickson explained.

Anderson, meanwhile, says the fight by proponents of gay marriage to punish people is a serious threat to freedom. He said he actually doesn't know how he'd advise a person trying to decide to bake or not bake a gay wedding cake.

"The government's role shouldn't be telling them what to do either," Anderson continued. "So my position on this is whether you would bake the cake or not isn't a reason for you telling someone else that they should have to bake the cake."

"Freedom is actually what should be reigning supreme here and the people who are in favor of baking the cake can bake the cake," he said. "Those who aren't cannot bake the bake, and the market can sort these things out. It's one of the beauties of freedom."

Even before the book was published, gay rights activists organized a campaign against it on Amazon.com.

Erickson pointed out that such folks are intolerant of any opposition to gay marriage. Click here for Erickson's blog on the campaign. "They cannot have that," he said. "They also cannot have books and data that dispute their claims."

"The fact that they've attacked his book on Amazon to discourage people from buying it -- before it even came out, they were trying to drive down its ranking on Amazon so people wouldn't buy it -- just tells you everything you need to know about the contents of the book," he said.

Click here to see comments by the book's opponents on Amazon.com

Although it's difficult to say which criticisms are legitimate disagreements and which are orchestrated, clearly many people took strong shots at the book.

Following are comments on Amazon by some of the book's critics.

"This is a sad and desperate book written by a sad and desperate man clutching at any straw that will enable him to justify what, in the end, is simply homophobia."

"It really is time for you religious zealots to move on."

One writer even defended the way opponents are so obviously showing intolerance.

"Tolerance in and of itself is not a virtue. I am intolerant of a lot of things like racism, sexism, and homophobia."

"It was people who didn't even want a dissenting voice to be heard and so they were trying to sink the book," Anderson said. "Many of them were nasty reviews. One review went up with pictures of Holocaust victims, saying this book was the equivalent of Nazi propaganda."

But the young author isn't a bit surprised at the tactics used against him.

"The Left didn't win this debate by the goodness of redefining marriage," he said. "They won this debate by silencing people and then getting the courts to overrule the people."

Despite the campaign against the book, supporters far outnumber its attackers.

Advocates for traditional marriage believe that just because the court has ruled against their position doesn't mean truth has actually changed. And no amount of shouting it down is going to change that. 

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About The Author

Paul
Strand

As senior correspondent in CBN's Washington bureau, Paul Strand has covered a variety of political and social issues, with an emphasis on defense, justice, and Congress. Strand began his tenure at CBN News in 1985 as an evening assignment editor in Washington, D.C. After a year, he worked with CBN Radio News for three years, returning to the television newsroom to accept a position as editor in 1990. After five years in Virginia Beach, Strand moved back to the nation's capital, where he has been a correspondent since 1995. Before joining CBN News, Strand served as the newspaper editor for