Same-sex marriage row over Margaret Court proves the Left isn’t as tolerant as it likes to make out

JAMES MORROW, The Daily Telegraph

May 26, 2017 1:32pm

A 74-year-old Christian woman declared her Biblical opposition to gay marriage this week saying she’d boycott Qantas in protest of the airline’s stance on the matter and all hell broke loose.

Now this woman was former tennis star Margaret Court, so of course the matter got some publicity.
But for the level of outrage she created, one would think she offered to personally swing the cane at the poor gay couple sentenced to 85 lashes by a sharia court in Indonesia earlier this month rather than spend her travel dollar elsewhere.


American rocker Ryan Adams went after Court on Twitter. Fairfax’s Peter Fitzsimons devoted an entire column to excoriating the player for having the wrong opinions and joined with Martina Navratilova in going the full Orwell, suggesting Margaret Court’s name be scrubbed from the eponymous Melbourne tennis arena. And so on.

For progressive propagandists and those who take their cues from them there is nothing that is safe from the creeping politicisation of everything.

Now anyone who puts their opinions, particularly controversial ones, out in the public sphere shouldn’t be a snowflake about criticism and counterarguments.
And to be clear, I don’t agree with Court one bit when it comes to gay marriage. Indeed I think it’s a shame activists held up a plebiscite which would have seen banquet halls across town heaving this and every weekend with fabulous gay weddings.

Margaret Court’s opposition to same-sex marriage is based on her strong religious beliefs.

But abusive condemnation and hounding from polite society are not the actions of those who want to spread their cause by arguing in good faith. Instead, they are warnings not to step out of line — a dangerous game to play, considering how quickly lines can change.
For progressive propagandists and those who take their cues from them there is nothing that is safe from the creeping politicisation of everything. Recall the images from earlier this year when horrified inner-city bar owners went all Eliot Ness, smashing bottles and pouring kegs down the gutter because two MPs had a respectful discussion about gay marriage over a Coopers.



The end point becomes a world where the beer we drink, the sports stars we admire, the music we listen to, all has to be run through a filter to ensure those associated with it hold the correct opinions, that everyone’s privilege has been thoroughly checked, and that no cultures have been disrespectfully appropriated.


How dull.


One is tempted to think that this sort of hyper-politicisation stems from a revenant Marxism that still kicks around in certain corners of the culture. The Soviet Union may be dead, buried and cremated but it was under Stalin that political correctness became a thing.

But as much as they may be horrified by the comparison — Fitzsimons, for example, is a loud and proud atheist — those protesting the likes of Court actually sound more like theologians thrashing out the path to Heaven.
One of the oldest questions in Christianity, after all, concerns whether one can be saved solely on the basis of the right beliefs — faith alone — or whether good works have anything to do with salvation.
In tossing out previously admired artists and sports stars (and beer and books), progressives trying to build a heaven on Earth throw their lot in with those who say that to be one of their saints it doesn’t matter what you achieve, it’s what you believe.




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Taken from: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/samesex-marriage-row-over-margaret-court-proves-the-left-isnt-as-tolerant-as-it-likes-to-make-out/news-story/cf1286ae0c12ce40233077224ad70697?nk=352b618923d01669efe86ba831788958-1495842343