I agree that any ideology that believes gay people are inhuman or deserving of death is wrong. And I think most of us know those people exist, and who they are, generally speaking. That's why I don't find it necessary to highlight one particular dumbass regurgitating arguments he got from Westboro Baptist and others. I'm not interested in raising the profile of another church the way Westboro was able to raise theirs. And it's not needed, because the problem isn't that we don't know people think terrible, horrible things and often act on those thoughts, the problem is there is very little we can do about it.
What do you do about someone who believes that gay people should be put to death? How do you change their mind? The very act of arguing against them convinces them that you have been corrupted, because what they're following isn't a reasonable argument that can be repudiated with logic, it's an unfalsifiable statement of faith.
Beyond that, these philosophies of hatred, whether they're parts of Isam, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism, or whatever aren't the only factor involved. We like to believe that things happen for a reason, but it's rare that things happen for a single reason. Things happen because a confluence of reasons and timing occur. Mentally ill people rarely engage in violence. Religious people rarely engage in violence, Violent people, worldwide, rarely have access to guns. Here, we create the conditions for perfect storms all the time, because we mix mental health issues, easy availability of guns, and pathological philosophies. Getting rid of one of the problems isn't going to solve the issue. Elliot Rodgers didn't need religion to go on a murder spree. Nor does one have to be crazy. Any two of the three are generally enough.
We need to address all of them, and quit pretending there are easy answers, like getting rid of a religion or all religions. Not only is that a fantasy reaction, a thing you couldn't do with all the firepower in the world, but it's collective punishment of those who have lived their lives according to the law. It's allowing bad actors to taint life for everyone.
And I'm fine with tackling violent philosophies embedded in religion, and I think that's possible without attempting to jettison the entire religion, a thing which causes reflexive horror and panic from the religion's adherents. But when we get people saying "get rid of religion" or "don't let Muslims in the country" these are people who aren't interested in serious answers. They're people who are angry, but too dumb to actually come up with anything resembling an idea to make things better, so they grasp for a simple answer and shout it twice as loud.
And it's the same thing causing terrorism, this need for easy answers. If your country has been a war zone for twenty years, the easy answer is to hate and to make bombs. It's the first thing we think of doing, because we're angry, violent animals, and it's in our nature to return violence with violence. Blaming a caricature of your enemy is always easier than trying to understand what's really happening. But taking the easy way is killing us. All of us.
