Can't take credit for this diary's title-- that's the actual Detroit News headline:
http://www.detroitnews.com/...
From the report:
Detroit — Homosexuals who don’t repent for their lifestyle are going to hell, said the state’s final witness in the federal trial challenging the constitutionality of Michigan’s bans on same-sex adoption and marriage.
The witness, Douglas Allen, is the author of a 2011 report, “More Heat Than Light: A Critical Assessment of the Gay Parenting Literature, 1995-2010.” He also criticized a major 2010 study on gay parenting and households by Stanford sociologist Michael Rosenfeld who testified for the plaintiffs last week that children raised by gay parents had the same outcomes as children raised by straight parents.
Asked by plaintff’s attorney Kenneth Mogill if he thought homesexuals were eternally damned, he responded:
“Not repentant? Yes.”
I am flabbergasted that the State of Michigan would use someone like that as their star closing witness. Especially after the judge already had struck down their first witness:
http://www.mlive.com/...
Federal Judge Bernard Friedman in an unexpected turn Monday -- for the state of Michigan at least -- declined to allow testimony from Sherif Gergis, a scholar who has argued in favor of traditional man-and-woman marriage.
Sherif Gergis is a 27-year-old college doctoral student who co-wrote "Man and Woman: A Defense" last year. (Here's his "Catholic Answers" page:
http://www.catholic.com/... ) The state was shocked -- and conservatives everywhere were offended -- when the judge concluded that he wasn't ready to be considered an "expert witness" because, well, he's a 27-year-old college doctoral student.
As we learned in Hollingsworth, Windsor, and others, there simply aren't any non-religious reasons to bar marriage equality. And the opinion of a religious bigot should not carry any legal weight, because constitution. The State of Michigan's "expert witnesses" are merely making the plantiff's argument for them.