Does that mean discrimination is ok?

Not all discrimination is bad (another difference between the legal and dictionary versions of the same word). In particular, I think the common difference between okay discrimination and not-okay discrimination is judging people for what they are vs what they do.

The first is unfair and cruel, the second is a necessity of daily life and may or may not be cruel depending on circumstances.

Judging someone because of their race, sex, orientation, religious beliefs? Things they have absolutely no direct control over? Pretty much universally decried as unfair at best.

Judging someone because their actions negatively impact other people? The only way laws are created and society moves.

No matter what Eich does, he will be criticized. There is no way for him to win.

First, this is false. The things Eich could have done are wide and varied, and detailed in particular by me and others elsewhere in this very thread. This isn't about "winning". Critical evaluation of actions is not a game where there are winners and losers.

Why does being gay give you more protection than having a private ideology where nobody is hurt

Having a private ideology is one thing. You can think as negatively as you want to of any race, sex, orientation or gender identity. At the moment you throw money at a cause to legislate that thinking, to directly repress people you don't even know, or speak about those opinions in public, it ceases being private. And per the freedom of speech we all get in this country, everyone has the right to comment on it.

Freedom of speech != Freedom from criticism.

Oh, and as mentioned elsewhere, it's expressly illegal in this country to have civil rights unequally applied. Case law recognizes marriage as one of those rights, so even if we remove all ethics from this discussion, it's still illegal.

It's legal, but it's also not conducive to a tolerant society.

And again we disagree at a basic level. Tolerance does not mean accepting intolerance. Intolerance should be named, shamed, and driven out of our society as an ugly and corrupting influence.

This is a favorite tactic of social regressives, mind - upon making some comment or taking some action that incites mass outrage (Akin's "legitimate rape" comment from the election comes to mind, or Limbaugh's calling a woman a "slut" for campaigning for birth control coverage), trying to paint the opposers as the true evil, and usually invoking these flawed, incorrect comparisons to freedom of speech in an attempt to turn the outrage around.

It seldom works.

First of all, attacking others solely based on our "theories" is a "preemptive strike". It's an unprovoked assault. You don't know the truth.

One does not directly support the backers of a bill unless they want that bill passed. His reasons for doing so are irrelevant, but supporting something that unfairly targets and attempts to remove rights from people can be recognized for the evil that it is. Evil doesn't necessarily imply malice aforethought.

Further, his continued support after being informed that this was seen as unacceptable has only one logical conclusion.

Challenging is fine. However, it should be done with respect of the person.

Why should I respect someone who has absolutely none for me, and wants to make my life miserable having never met me? Respect is a two way street, and Eich has not only not earned mine, he's actively went out of his way to destroy any respect he might have had.

You don't support an attack on rights on people you "respect".

My theory is he & his family were being harassed from this.

Your theory has no more support than mine.

I also think he didn't appreciate the group coercion to change his stance on an issue. Coercion is bad.

I'm sure the people who support apartheid didn't appreciate the group coercion to change their stance either. Yet without that coercion, blacks would still be treated as three fifths of a human for the purpose of law. And women would be unable to vote or have most civil rights. And interracial marriages wouldn't be allowed.

Not all coercion is bad. Sometimes coercion is necessary for progress.

Aren't we all a little intolerant?

Thoughts and actions are different things.

One of my coworkers, who I respect greatly, was raised as a devout Christian and thinks that gay marriage is wrong from a moral perspective. You can't logic someone out of something they didn't logic themselves into in the first place - and believe me we've had some interesting talks bout this very topic :)

Do you know why I respect him? Because despite those beliefs, he doesn't support legislation that codifies his moral restrictions on other people into law. He doesn't vote for politicians that do that. He doesn't give money to boosters of laws that would restrict my equal rights. He did what Eich does not - he recognizes that what people do in their private lives has no effect on him or his morals. He doesn't attempt to legislate his moral restrictions in this matter so that everyone must abide by his narrower version of allowed conduct.

We're getting more into legislative philosophy here, but in this country, generally things are allowed unless there is a good reason for them not to be. Restrictions need to have a good reason, and religious beliefs and personal moral qualms are not a good reason for restricting the conduct of the population. Even less so when that comes to restricting a recognized right.

I think most supports don't approach it from a standpoint of hate.

Maybe, maybe not. But I can only judge what they do - and the fact that they want to treat me as a second class citizen is a case of either ignorance (they don't know that this is a big deal, why this is important, why change what isn't broken), arrogance (they feel they have the right to impose their moral restrictions on the world), disdain (they actually feel that I am strange, broken person that should not have my weirdness recognized by law), or religion (they feel that by denying me this right, they are preventing me from sinning against their deity of choice)

All four of those things reflect pretty badly on the person supporting the law. And you're probably tired of hearing me beat this particular drum, but the same four failings I just mentioned played heavily in the interracial marriage fight many years ago... which is why I find it very puzzling that someone can support interracial marriage (or not speak out against it) and then turn around and oppose gay marriage. Puzzling to the point it calls the supposed pure motives of the person into question.

Also, the tone of justifiers of this demonization seems off.

You keep bringing up this word, "demonize", "disrespect" and so on. Why do you think that morally judging Eich's actions is either of these things? I'd bet that if you were to poll the people who spoke out against him, you'd find very little "hate" for him, and a great deal of exactly what I've mentioned here, the 3 facts why this is unacceptable, based not on his motivations, but on his actions.