It is that simple because denying any class of people a basic civil right simply because of who they are is bigotry. It is obstinately and intolerantly refusing to accord the same respect to a class of people for no reason other than your own prejudice, and that is a textbook case of bigotry.

But it seems that there are a number of people posting here who think it's not that simple when it comes to gays and lesbians. It seems that these trolls think it's not bigotry to deny people who wish to marry a person of the same sex as themselves the right to do so on the basis of sexual orientation. They say it's not a simple matter of bigotry for someone to be opposed to the right of same-sex couples to marry and share the same rights and privileges as us heterosexual folks who choose to marry.

They're wrong.

In Loving v. Virginia, the classic, unanimous 1967 Supreme Court decision that banned anti-miscegenation laws, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote the following:

Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival. Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541 (1942). See also Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190 (1888). To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual, and cannot be infringed by the State.

Did you get that? Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man." It's a basic civil right. Denying a basic civil right to a class of people because of who they are is bigotry.

It is that simple.

And given that the same bullshit arguments that were used to support anti-miscegenation laws -- that the Bible says it's wrong (though the First Amendment has something to say about the legality of legislating from the Bible, doesn't it?); that it's "unnatural"; that it somehow "threatens" other folks' marriages that have absolutely no relationship to whether the people in question are able to marry -- are used to support bans on same-sex marriage, there ought to be a lesson here for those who think it's not bigotry.

It is bigotry.

And it is that simple.

And it would be even if the Supreme Court had never ruled that marriage is a basic civil right.