Tuesday, Gov. Phil Bryant signed House Bill 1523, which allows religious groups and some private businesses to refuse service to gay couples based on their religious beliefs.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past week, this is not news.

But it is troubling, because it basically gives people an excuse to discriminate against someone who’s different, whether they’re gay, Jewish, Muslim or Arab, or even divorced.

All you have to do is claim it offends your religion to serve or hire them, whether your faith is really offended or not.

But the real issue here is what is the obsession with gays?

We have health care problems, our aging infrastructure is crumbling, we’re seeing increased violence, international security is threatened, and politicians are worried about people of the same sex getting married?

Mississippi is second only to New Mexico in the number of teenage births. More than 35 percent of our residents are obese.

The Mississippi Economic Council has issued a scathing report on the substandard condition of the state’s roads, highways and bridges, calling for $375 million in additional funding annually to fix the problem.

Our education system is in terrible condition and there appears to be no interest in the Legislature to fix it.

And the major bill involves accommodating people who may be offended by someone who’s gay.

Why? Because it’s easy; it’s safe.

It’s easier for the our legislators to go after gays or pass irrelevant resolutions than man up and take action to take care of the state’s real problems.

Reducing teen pregnancies means developing and approving a comprehensive sex education plan, but no one really wants to do that because it may “offend” someone.

No one wants to adequately fund schools or fix and upgrade infrastructure because they may have to (GASP!) pass taxes to fund those issues.

Cutting taxes helps you get re-elected; raising them may not get you re-elected, even if it’s to make life in the state better and make Mississippi attractive to the big corporations we want to come here. It’s also an intelligent move, HB 1523 is not; it’s stupid.

But as Will Rogers said, “Intelligence is not an issue in politics.”

Instead of passing bills that make us a laughing stock, our legislatures need to show some backbone and address our real problems with meaningful projects and sufficient, consistent funding sources so we can improve the state and give us a positive image.