Is California the Deciding Battle in the "Culture Wars?"

That's what American Family Association Don Wildmon says.

From Religion Dispatches:

The “culture wars” will be irrevocably lost, said Wildmon, if Proposition 8 (the “California Marriage Protection Act“ which states that “Only a marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California”) loses on November 4.

“If we lose California, if they defeat the marriage amendment, I’m afraid that the culture war is over and Christians have lost,” said Wildmon, “I’ve never said that publicly until now—but that’s just the reality of the fact.”

Wildmon pointed out that If the “homosexuals” were “able to defeat the marriage amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman, then the culture war is over and we’ve lost—and gradually, secularism will replace Christianity as the foundation of our society.”

“California is a big dam, holding back the flood—and if you take down the dam in California, it’s going to flood 49 other states,” Wildmon maintained. “It will destroy marriage as it has been known for thousands of years [For an opposing view from a historian of the family see Stephanie Coontz's "Traditional" Marriage or a Break with Tradition?—ed.], and with that the cultural decline that normally would follow.”

Of course, he's not the only right-winger using their standard fall-back methodology--fear mongering.

“Homosexual rights are trampling freedom of religion, of speech and of association,” Michael J. McManus, President and Co-Chair of “Marriage Savers,“ recently wrote. “Homosexuals have a right to live any way they wish, but they do not have the right to redefine marriage for the whole culture.”

"What is at stake in the California marriage debate now taking place?” asked Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage, which helped qualify Proposition 8 for the ballot, in a recent piece for the National Review. “The meaning of marriage, the idea of judicial restraint, and the official harassment and repression (by our own government) of traditional religious faiths.” (Gallagher, a long-time marriage advocate, also received money—without disclosing it—from the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the President’s “Healthy Marriages Initiative“.)

Of course, what is at stake is one of the largest states in the nation taking a stand and granting equal rights to ALL people and not hiding behind tradition to perpetuate discrimination.

That apparently just scares the living crap out of some people. What a shame for them.

Click here to read the rest of the article from Religion Dispatches.