Opposing gay marriage is no longer an acceptable position

I wrote my first blog post on gay marriage over ten years ago, and I'm proud of having written back then:

There are no tenable grounds for denying equal rights to homosexuals, just as there are no (and never were any) tenable grounds for denying equal rights to blacks. This one is a complete no-brainer. Why does it have to take so long for society to figure these things out?

Today, in the shadow of the debate of Brendan Eich's ouster from Mozilla, it is time to go one step further: opposing equal rights on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity should no longer be an acceptable position in civilized society, just as opposing equal rights for people according to the color of their skin is no longer an acceptable position.  Anyone who opposes gay marriage, or who opposed it in the past and does not repent, doesn't deserve to sit at the grown-up table any more.  Gay marriage is no longer an issue where reasonable people can agree to disagree.

Why now?  Because this year is the tenth anniversary of the legalization of gay marriage in Massachusetts.  Over the staunch objections of conservatives, we did the experiment, and the results are clear: none of the horrible things that conservatives predicted would happen if gay marriage were legalized have actually happened.  Children have not been "converted" into being gay.  They are not confused over gender roles.  Reproductive rates have not plummeted (alas).  There has not been a dramatic increase in child abuse.  In fact, the most egregious source of systemic child abuse in the last ten years has been the Catholic church, one of the staunchest opponents of gay marriage!

So, enough already.  This is no longer a theoretical debate.  Unless someone can come up with some actual evidence of harm caused by allowing gays to marry (and making bigots feel queasy doesn't count) this debate should be over.