"You have the right to remain an imbecile ..."

Back here, we were having some light-hearted, harmless fun with Conservative Elitist Andrew Smith, who appears to have a real talent for following up something stupid with something even stupider. To wit:

I think adultery should be a criminal offense.

Let's follow the logic and see where this takes us, shall we?

First, given that the Religious Right is frothingly opposed to the "redefinition" of marriage to include same-sex marriage, it's safe to conclude that those same RRs feel that it is the Church, and no one else, that should have the right to define what "marriage" represents. In short, the Church clearly wants to "own" the concept of marriage, as it were. With me so far?

But if that's the case, what does it mean to commit "adultery?" If the institution of marriage is defined exclusively by the Church, then the act of adultery represents nothing more than a violation of Church doctrine, and what this has to do with the Criminal Code of Canada is, I confess, a bit of a mystery.

Is Andrew seriously suggesting that the Canadian legal system be used to punish religious transgressors? What a novel idea. And once the courts deal with the adulterers, perhaps it can take care of those who, say, take the Lord's name in vain. Or, better yet, those who worship some other God. Oooooh, that would be delightful -- criminalizing non-Christianity. (Although, technically, we atheists should be safe as we don't actually worship a different deity, as it were, per se.)

In short, if the Church wants to claim the entire institution of marriage, then they hardly have the right to ask the State to help them police it. You don't like adulterers? Tough shit. The last time I looked, that's what the general concept of ex-communication was for.

In a nutshell, look after your own house and leave the rest of us the hell out of it.