1. Let's put marriage aside for the moment and talk about a much much more basic right to employment. This case is being cited by organizations in favor of the broad ENDA religious exemption.
http://supreme.justia.com/u s/483/327/case.html
So if a gay person wants to be even the assistant to the janitor at your school BYU guess what! If the school finds out they are gay they can be LEGALLY fired. So even if ENDA passes on a federal level it will likely still include a broad religious exemption which sends a message that according to church doctrine it is ok to fire someone because they are gay. In a town like Salt Lake City that is a strong message.
2. Be careful how critical you are of California. Utah's hyper-conservative state supreme court doesn't exactly make it a poster-child for human rights.
And their new mayor, Ralph Becker, is a Democrat, like their previous one, Rocky Anderson.
Also, I'm with you in assuming it's still better for a GLBT person to live in California than in Utah, or Texas outside of Austin or the "villages" of Houston and Dallas for that matter.
At BYU someone can be fired or expelled for drinking, smoking, or engaging in extramarital sex period. It's not as if their discriminating against people solely on a basis of sexual orientation, they simply have a code of conduct that students/faculty/staff must agree to live by in order to work or attend school there. If BYU received any sort of state or government funding I would say you have a point, but since they do not their right to employ or admit students based on religious living standards (whether you agree with them or not) is protected by the 1st amendment. Furthermore, it is not as if BYU is the only university in Utah either.
I'm perfectly happy to be critical of utah's politics, as I have frequently been on my blog, I just thought Californians were a little more open minded than most people in utah. Unfortunately, it turns out there doesn't seem to be quite as big a difference as i thought. I don't think I defended Utah anywhere in my post whatsoever. That said Salt Lake City tends to be a little more progressive than the rest of the state.
The LDS church should lose its 501(c)(3) status because of the door to door volunteer action and the $20 million it contributed to support and influence prop 8.
http://newsroom.lds.org/lds newsroom/eng/commentary/cal ifornia-and-same-sex-marria ge
Here is my message to the LDS church and anyone who donates or contributes time to it. I want you out of my neighborhood and my state. As far as I am concerned you have the same "right to exist" as you afford to the LGBT community which is nothing. If you are an LDS donor and I have a chance to legally rip you off in a business transaction I will. It was a huge mistake for Salt Lake City to have been given the Olympics. After prop 8 I have a 0 travel policy to Salt Lake City. At work if I find out someone I supervise is an active Mormom I will find some work related issue to fire them over because I don't find their code of conduct acceptable.
Just to clarify, BYU won't expel or probate someone for being attracted to members of the same sex, they will expel someone for engaging in extra-marital sexual activity. So conceivably a gay or lesbian person could work for or attend BYU without consequence so long as they lived by BYU's "honor code". I'm not necessarily saying that I agree with that position, but it is what it is.
As for your boycotting of Utah, I'll let the Salt Lake City Weekly's Ryan Bradford speak for me in that regard:
http://cityweekly.blogspot. com/2008/11/dear-dan-savage .html
