Last week, we responded to Michael Brown‘s article in the Christian Post about how a gay president would apparently spell the moral decline of our society. Brown was saying that a possible President Pete Buttigieg would be disastrous because it would normalize the idea of a same-sex marriage.

This week, Brown responded to my post in Charisma magazine, and his rebuttal is exactly what you would expect.

He defends his earlier comments, insisting that the threat to religious liberty posed by a gay president is not an exaggeration:

According to Stoneburner, “No one is trying to silence Brown. He regularly publishes his bile on larger platforms, for goodness’ sake. He’s doing just fine. Somehow, right-wing believers survived eight years of President Obama but they can’t handle the possibility of a gay president.” … It would have been better, of course, if Stoneburner had responded with accuracy rather than rhetoric. For example, I never said a word about believers not surviving an out and proud gay presidency. I simply stated that such a presidency would contribute to the further moral decline of our society.

My response was purely “rhetoric,” but Brown’s was not? Saying that an out, proud, married gay man as president “would contribute to the further degeneration and moral confusion of our society” is very much a piece of conservative rhetoric that is thrown about without much specification as to how, exactly, this would happen. Maybe Brown’s audience is already aware of this, and thus no explanation is necessary, but if he writes to convince skeptics (which he often does), it falls flat.

He needs to explain how government protections ensuring that no one can be fired, denied housing, or medical care due to their gender and/or sexual identity threatens society. He needs to explain how any of that is a threat to him personally as well as others who share his beliefs.

Conservatives have been making that claim for decades, with no satisfactory evidence. It’s a red herring mixed with fear-mongering, nothing more.

But again, why deal with specifics and facts when it’s so much easier to demonize your Bible-believing opponents? Unfortunately, this only adds to the polarization rather than opening the door for a meaningful, candid discussion of our differences.

I find Brown’s beliefs reprehensible, but I believe he deserves the same amount of legal rights and protections as anybody else. I don’t think that offering those protections to Brown, and others like him, threatens society in any way, shape, or form. But Brown seems to believe that “the gay agenda” — which is only about equality — will do just that. So who is being divisive and polarizing here? You can’t have “meaningful, candid discussion” when one side believes that the other will cause the downfall of society simply by existing. That’s ludicrous.

LGBTQ people shouldn’t have to hide who they are just because Brown is unable to deal with them.

Also ludicrous is the claim that anyone who disagrees with Brown is not “Bible-believing.” I am Anglican, Mr. Brown. I and many other Christians reject your Bible-based hate.

Contrary to her claim that no is trying to silence me, already in 2012, the gay activist group GLAAD put me on its “Commentator Accountability Project,” urging major media networks not to allow people like me on their shows. That sure sounds like an attempt to silence our voices. Also in 2012, the SPLC put me on its list of 30 New Activists Heading Up the Radical Right, seeking to defame me by linking me with neo-Nazis and other violent extremists. Then, in 2014, the HRC added me to its list of “America’s worst globetrotting homophobic offenders.”

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. Just because someone recommended that media networks not feature Brown doesn’t mean they have to listen. Obviously, outlets like Christian Post and Charisma are happy to do so.

For a man who claims to have been repeatedly silenced, he sure keeps talking.

Not surprisingly, on a regular basis, Christian groups on university campuses have faced strong opposition when trying to bring me in for a talk or a debate. And not infrequently, those opposing my presence point to the SPLC’s misinformed attacks against me.

The irony of this argument is that people like Brown have said to gay couples denied wedding cakes at bakeries to simply “find another one.” So if one Christian campus denies you, guess what? You can do the same. I’m sure Liberty University would love to have you.

Groups trying to prevent Brown from speaking are not a threat to society, only to Brown’s chosen career. The sense of entitlement and pettiness over rejection is staggering.

As for whether a President Buttigieg would try to marginalize Bible-believers like me, what we do know is that he has already done that very thing. He has already used his campaign platform both to celebrate his homosexuality and to denigrate the Christianity of those who differ with him, including Vice President Pence.

Criticizing another’s beliefs, which Brown does for a living, is hardly comparable to the destruction of society. Disagreement and hurt feelings are not persecution.

Ironically (and quite unintentionally), she has hit the nail on the head. LGBTQ+ activism has already had a deleterious effect on society in many ways, some of them outright oppressive. We could expect more of the same — really, much more — with an out and proud gay president.

Citation needed. If Brown feels oppressed, I’m sure plenty of LGBTQ people would gladly exchange the amount of privilege they have with people like him.

It’s clear that Brown really doesn’t like gay people. He claims to not want them to be harmed, yet the policies he supports will do exactly that. All the LGBTQ community wants is to have the same rights and protections as everybody else, and in a secular society, Brown’s religious beliefs shouldn’t be able to prevent that from happening.

