Happy New Year everybody! Or, as many on the right wing call it, Merry Christmas! I’m planning on celebrating with the family today with oodles of champagne, hugs, and board games. But I did want to pop in to talk about a football game we’ll be watching today and why.

The Rose Bowl is preceded by the Parade of Roses where one of the floats this year will feature a gay wedding. You can be certain this has set off people who think Phil Robertson’s hateful comments were a display of good Christian love but that two men holding hands and devoting themselves to the other will result in societal collapse.

Some took to the organization’s Facebook page to voice their anger, calling the wedding “unbiblical” and “highly offensive.” “I can’t think of many things LESS appropriate for families and especially children,” one wrote. “It’s completely the wrong venue for a stunt like this.”

Yeah, turn on Duck Dynasty. That homage to Southern-bred pig ignorance will serve as a much more Christian-friendly role-model to children than two men invested completely in the others happiness.

And yes, two women/men in love, supporting one another, bringing immense happiness into each others life is absolutely unbiblical. That says as much about the bible as it says about those who immediately conclude love, not the bible, must be jettisoned when faced with that fact.

A separate Facebook page has also been started called “Boycott the 2014 Rose Parade,” with more than 1,600 “likes” as of Sunday. A post reads: “Gay ‘marriage’ is still illegal in over 30 states. Why would the Tournament of Roses promote something illegal like that?”

Because love is beautiful.

And don’t pretend like legality is the issue. When marriage equality is realized in every state (as it will be within a few years), will you true blue believers say “well, I guess gay marriage is ok now”? Of course you won’t. You’ll only begrudgingly accept gay marriage as morally good when the rest of society has reached that obvious conclusion to such a degree that bigots are realized for what they are in every part of the country, save for the darkest corners of the most fundamentalist churches. At that point, bigots will be as secretive as racists while Christians try to convince the rest of us that it was Christianity that secured equality for gays all along (and they will ironically use the current pope, who opposes gay marriage, to do it).

Here’s a link to the facebook page calling people to boycott the parade. If willfully placing yourself among some of the most hateful people you’ll ever encounter isn’t your thing, don’t visit the page. However, if you’re a fan of drinking in the impotent wailing of people who are determined to unmake the happiness of others (all while god, as usual, does nothing), then click that link as fast as your fingers allow. According to the page recently (and to the people throwing good Christian tantrums in the comments) we secular/liberal/commies/queers are forcing this on them even though floats are won by random lottery win and nobody’s holding a gun to their hamster’s head making them watch. What’s more, is there anything more ironic than Christians, who want to maintain a state of inequality for LGBT people on account of their religious beliefs, pissing and moaning about others forcing their beliefs on them?

Despite the constant reassurances I receive that Christianity makes people better, more than anything it seems to create an embarrassing lack of self-awareness or consistency. Christianity, on pages like this, has made people vile. It’s not just that these people were already vile and chose to dangle a cross around their neck – they became vile (or more vile) through the influence of their faith. Are all Christians vile? Of course not. But this brand most certainly is, and it is their faith in Jesus that keeps them that way. I hate their religion for what it has done to them.

And there are lots and lots of this brand of Christian. You know, the ones who say “Look at how humble I am” but really mean “I’m so much better than you” with every promise of “I’ll pray for you.” These are the Christians whose defining characteristics in their interactions with the world are their hate, their contempt for intellect and education, their obliviousness to how much privilege and luxury they enjoy combined with a determination to simultaneously feel persecuted, and their pride over all of it; thick enough to keep them from ever achieving the minimal amount of perspective that would awaken them to how pitifully aloof they really are – so proud they think nobody could be more loving than they, even as they try to keep to people who love each other apart.

I would pity them if they weren’t so deplorable. But as much as I despise them, I cannot fathom why the Christians who are functionally atheist in their dealings with the world don’t despise them more. The people protesting the Parade of Roses (the ones saying people should go to church while the parade is on TV) are the people who demonstrate, very clearly, that faith in Jesus can motivate people to hate and to spend a large portion of their time, effort, and moral energy in fealty to that hate. They make the world a worse place, and Jesus is their motivation for doing it. When the moderate Christians wonder aloud why atheists like myself oppose religion so fiercely, we need only point these Christians who worship the very same god. The fact that some Christians have managed to listen to the conscience rather than to the bible does not rescue faith or the masses corrupted by it, and I will never pretend that it does – especially on days like this where there is every cause for celebration, two people who love each other are getting married, and gaggles of believers seek to ruin it all because religion has so thoroughly fucked up their idea of what it means to love.

They attempt to show love by forbidding the love of others. In a world where actions almost always speak truer than words, that’s not love, and no amount of Jesus will change that fact. The only love I see are the two guys on the float getting married.