I love that the legendary comedian George Carlin is still being vindicated years after his death. When he died, Carlin was still booked for more performances of his last ever stand-up show, It’s Bad For Ya. He opened the show with a prescient dig at Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods, at a time when both were regarded as American heroes and before either was engulfed in scandal.

Two of my favourite Carlin routines (in a pretty strong field) are Religion Is Bullshit and You Have No Rights.

“Just when these American citizens needed their rights the most, the government took them away. And rights aren’t rights if someone can just take them away.”

This is what I think about whenever some Catholic shlub or American governor talks about how we should put rights for LGBT people to a popular vote. Remember Proposition 8? Four other states this year will have marriage equality on the ballot, including in three states where gay marriage laws have already been passed into law by the legislature. For obvious reasons it would be great if all four passed (and there’s a good chance at least a couple of states, if not all four, will pass them) but it’s still an uncomfortable thought, holding a public vote on a minority’s civil rights in the first place.