"Christian Cop arrests Gay Protestor for anti-Church comments"

I'm paraphrasing this headline: "Gay Cop arrests Preacher for Antigay (sic) Comments". The story was carried in a few places, e.g. Telegraph, and many pro-Christian and pro-Gay sites. My version of the headline looks a little odd and out of place, and would either make people do a double-take or get quite annoyed.

The balance of feeling now is that gay is fine, it's been incorporated into 'normal', and persecution based on sexuality is fading fast. All good. It's also been shown that religious fundamentalism is seen as just that, an extreme, containing views that the majority of the faithful would not really hold.

So we would, rightly, be quite upset and angry if someone used their faith/belief as bias to persecute someone. Strangely though, it's fine when we do exectly the same but just under a different banner, that of gay-rights. From the reports on this story it seems that the preacher concerned stated opinion, quoted scripture, and was engaged in a debate. He wasn't hurling abused or threatening or "inciting hatred". In my opinion his views are wrong and I agree that, to me they are "offensive" in the sense that I'm gay/lesbian so he's, in a very minor way, insulting me for my sexuality. But it's his right to hold that view, in doing so he's not harming anyone (except maybe himself).

My (vague) understanding of the bible is that same-sex relationships are pretty much painted as a bad thing, you could argue this is devine proclamation or simply practical advice from the time, nevertheless that's what it states. Why persecute someone for stating something that is historical fact?

Seriously, there are lots of opinions that people hold that I could take offense at, and vice versa. You can use the law to force people to comply with what you believe - we really don't want to go down the 1984 route of having the thought police. This arrest was a bad thing, it shows that we've replaced anti-gay bullies with pro-gay ones, is this progress?