America has lately been experiencing a wave of hate by the left toward holders of Christian and traditional beliefs, with legions of stories of intimidation campaigns, campus shout-downs, calls to imprison those who question the concept of man-made global warming, and the like. At the Library of Law and Liberty, Dalrymple takes aim at one aspect of this movement: the pro-gay marriage puritans…

…a spirit of puritanism of opinion is abroad. This puritanism is not puritanical in the old sense. On the contrary, it is inclined to attach itself to libertinism. But it wants to send to Coventry all those who think that the removal of restraints on conduct is not necessarily a good thing. It brands them as ipso facto bigots (as, of course, some but not all of them will be), and is prepared to punish them, so far as is possible, for holding the wrong opinions.

Thus are created what one might call microclimates of totalitarianism in which people live in fear: fear of losing their jobs, fear of social ostracism for having said or even thought the wrong thing.

This is a problem that is neither of the government’s making nor susceptible to solution by government. (Indeed, government action can only exacerbate it.) The problem lies in the human heart—in its lust for power and thirst for domination, in its pride in its own goodness.