Dude, if they are believe they are being moral, then on some level, they're being moral. Now, say their morality differs from yours, that's fair. You say you don't believe in moral absolutism. If that's true, than why isn't someone who's trying (in their eyes) to save someone else's soul immoral? Nobody is actively being physically hurt.
Nobody gets physically hurt? Tell that to a homosexual who is about to be executed in Iran.
Preaching that "you need to be saved!" might not be immoral, ridiculous but not immoral. However, promoting policies that directly call for harm against someone for being gay are clearly immoral.
Clearly how?
Let's assume I've got my head and a KJV shoved directly up my own ass. I believe that gays are in fact a cancer on the face of the world and if left unchecked will destroy society. I have facts left and right, suicide statistics, STD rates, sexual partner counts in the billions. Why would I possibly believe my actions in opposing them invading my institution of marriage, or attempting to brainwash my kids. Hell, I've even got a passage in a book which declares their actions to be an abomination. That's clear past immoral, that's immoral AND bad.
I can rattle off like this for a while. But you're running as if people agree with you, and using your own assumptions as objective truths. I don't particularly dissagree with most of what you consider moral/immoral, but I will say claiming it to be objective truth isn't going to win any body over any more than the Phelps win new fans by protesting military funerals.
1. I can see how someone might suspect that homosexuality rather than societal judgment is leading to more suicide, however a person who commits suicide after getting depressed by some aspect of their behavior that is non-beneficial(assuming here for the sake of argument that the homophobes are right and homosexuality is detrimental to the homosexual) is making a choice. Same with getting STDs unless you are raped(then it suffices to just ban rape).
2. If homosexuals are really confused and hurting themselves without knowing it the appropriate response would be compassion, not hate. The nonviolent antigays who may not agree with gay marriage or adoption may just be naive (their opposition to those rights is still immoral, however their intentions are moral, I don't condemn these people just their actions, when possible reeducation is better than punishment though punishment is sometimes the only reasonable course of action for society such as against someone who commits a homophobic murder. Things like homophobic speech on the other hand while immoral it's still immoral to ban it as it pushes homophobia underground and helps them to justify their mentality with a persecution complex and the reasoning "We must have the truth and they are just afraid of it, otherwise why would they have to ban the expression of it". Even when something is immoral it doesn't always make it moral for us to police it and even when it is it's typically only moral to police it in certain ways(no death penalty, the risk to innocent people of being killed is too much and it doesn't reverse the crime, and really you're letting the criminal off easy by cutting his years in prison when you could give him life even if he doesn't understand that).
Wow, big digression...anyways I was saying The appropriate response would be compassion and not hate, since even if it's harmful to the person himself it's victimless. Others who hurt themselves who had a choice involved does not create real victims. Rising health care costs creates "victims" but in a sense that is best rectified with taxation or fines as that holds the chance of recouping losses.
3. People are not responsible for the choices of other people without a position of power involved such as teacher-student, parent-child, superior officer-private, and in some cases this responsibility is wide and in others narrow. Adult-child is narrow, if an adult actively addresses a child and gets them to do something inappropriate it's clearly the adults fault, but more subtle influences are things everyone deals with so policing just based on that opens up a can of worms.) If homosexuality in the media influences someone even a child to become a homosexual, too bad. The individual still wasn't forced to do it, although this parents have the primary influence and a power relationship they are responsible so there's some room for taking kids away if the parents are teaching them certain things such as raising their kid to be a thief. There are all kinds of influences in society, so attacking something just because it is a bad influence when that influence is something which influences through being received as positive naturally by oneself and not an influence imposed to some degree by power, opens up a genuine slippery slope. In some cases an influence is positive naturally, it appeals to who the person already is and it influences through that person's conscious choice to accept it. In some cases, in a lot of cases the individual thinks a little about whether or not to accept the influence. Being influenced does NOT= being enslaved, or even overpowered. We make decisions about which influences to accept and reject everyday. Being influenced or not is for an adult their individual responsibility and for a child their individual responsibility but with more(progressively less as they mature) responsibility on parents or caregivers and in some settings teachers, and babysitters.
Could I be wrong about these things? Absolutely and I believe it is objectively moral to keep an open mind about things, and willing to change one's mind. That doesn't mean there is no objective morality, only that it is impossible to know for sure whether one is right or wrong about objective morality. But this is true of everything. For all we know physical reality could all be a simulation or an illusion. Does this make it subjective? Some people reason that it does(ex: The Secret), sometimes this boosts the persons confidence and they are able to avoid too much negative effects and other times the person goes insane or winds up disappointed because they try to solve all their problems with "beliefs".
We still need to use our best judgement and not just think of "morality" as "what ever I want", that's selfish and ignores the needs of other people. We also must not think that it automatically is the case that if something is "immoral" it requires the law to respond, it requires some sort of social sanction obviously unless there are temporary problems that make it impractical to impose social sanction for the time being. In some cases the law is the right solution and in other cases it is not. Just because I can't perfectly list it all out doesn't mean there isn't an objective answer, just that it must be discovered with reason and that I must even after drawing conclusions be open to the possibility that I wind find that they are wrong.
Indeed I don't get why moral relativism is looked on as more open-minded. If I were a moral relativist I would think "I believe this is right, morality is relative, so I win and it's right." This mentality can easily lead to the following of "might is right" 'morality' in society. Because I believe morality is objective I know that like all things which are objective facts it is possible for me to be wrong about it and impossible to ever have absolute certainty, only general certainty(hence moral generalism versus moral relativism). I've changed my mind many times, and indeed I recognize I have been immoral in the past and there are probably things I have yet too discover were immoral and in time I may discover that some of those immoral things in the past were OK. It's not critical for me to get it right except where it really matters enough to direct my conscious energy, too much focus on trying to be moral is itself immoral(in action but not in intent) as it wastes one's energy and thwarts one's endeavors and makes one useless to both the self and others.
4. If I bought that homosexuality was harmful I would limit them to domestic partnerships (still good to promote stable relationships), no adoption, and a tax on any gay-themed places and anything gay-themed in the media (with a ban on advertising). I would permit employers to use their own judgment in hiring and firing decisions related to sexual orientation. I might even support a ban on openly gay teachers and openly gay soldiers. I would support allowing parents to send their gay kids to ex-gay camp or even declare it "neglect" not to for kids, but I'd let adults make their own decisions. I would not support putting them in jail or executing them. All that does is revenge and does not benefit society compared to less harmful(to the gay people) options. It can also increase people's resistance as clearly happened over the years with the gay community culminating in Stonewall and growing even more.
PS this is IF I bought the argument that homosexuality was harmful(and hence immoral). I do NOT.
