Demeaning, degrading, disparaging, or vilifying of someone in order to exert authority over them, whether by punitive taxation, burning books, or by overt restriction of their activies has a clinical name. It is called sadism, and is an exceedingly popular perversion here in the Bigot Belt.

Our Kansas legislature just passed several "emergency funding" taxes, every one of which singles out an "unpopular/inferior" group for "punitive" taxation - because "they're not nice like the rest of us." And no one seems to think that's sick?

Moralistic legislation, even if it enforces a moral choice I might make, takes from me the freedom to make my own choice, and is an assault on my moral dignity. The most important freedom I can defend is the freedom of my fellows to choose things differently than I would choose, because when they no longer have that choice, I have no freedom of choice for myself.

John