It's become commonplace for conservatives to say Democrats want to make America like Greece. Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King, explaining his opposition to gay marriage, refines the metaphor:
“I think that if we can’t defend marriage, that it becomes very hard to defend life,” King said. “Marriage is the crucible by which we pour all of our values and pass them on to our children, and that is how the culture is renewed each time. So, if we lose marriage — for instance, if our children are raised in warehouses, so to speak. There have been civilizations that have tried to do that. The Spartans did that. They took the children away and taught them to be warriors. It’s a good way to defend a country, but not much of a way to run a civilization.
“So, I’m afraid if that happened — if we lose the marriage, we lose the home, we lose the nuclear family then we can’t teach our values. We won’t be able to teach our faith. We won’t be able to teach life. We won’t be able to teach our Constitutional values either. That’s why I’m afraid it’s going to be very, very difficult to defend life.”
You see, gay marriage will lead to the forced collective raising of children. Which will lead to children being raised as bloodthirsty warriors, like Sparta. And will also lead to the end of teaching about the Constitution, because that never happens in schools.
Hey, you know who didn't teach its children about the Constitution? Ancient Sparta.
Anywhere, here's King's vision of the future of liberal America:
Come to think of it, it does look pretty gay.