Of pageants and piety

Sometimes it doesn't pay to be "biblically correct."
Booed and cheered simultaneously, Miss California Carrie Prejean has soared into the national spotlight for sharing her views on marriage during the Miss USA pageant, where she ultimately finished second.
“We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite," Prejean began, obviously ignorant of her home state's passage of Proposition 8, rescinding the right of same-sex couples to marry. "And you know what, I think in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that’s how I was raised.”
Was that so incendiary?
I don't agree with Ms. Prejean, but I cannot muster the furor others have at her response.
Perez Hilton, the gay blogger who asked her the question during the pageant, went on to call her a "dumb b--ch" on his website when it was over. His criticisms have been joined by a chorus of others.
But why so much fuss over a young woman whose scholarly pursuits extend as far as San Diego Christian College, whose biggest achievement beyond the pageants was being a finalist in a model search for "Deal or No Deal"?
I doubt they were offended that a potential Miss USA actually gave an honest answer during a Q&A, or even a semi-coherent response (a far cry from Caitlin Upton's nonsensical Miss Teen USA 2007 speech on maps). If that were the cause, every pageant contestant with a lick of common sense would eschew anything that could be construed to be the least bit un-PC. Perhaps they could just sing "The Greatest Love Of All" while waving an American flag in one hand and cuddling a puppy in the other in response to any prompt and leave it at that.
The real reason? Our country is no less unified than it was prior to the election and subsequent inauguration of Barack Obama as president.
If anything, we are more partisan and markedly fiercer in that partisanship. Look no further than the Tax Day tea parties for evidence of this on the right end of the political spectrum.
There was no malice in Prejean's response, but there certainly was spite in those who derided her. What happened to accepting our differences and realizing that there are few issues on which the world is in universal agreement?
But don't fret for Miss Prejean. She's survived the cutthroat world of beauty pageants; I imagine she can handle the scorn of the blogosphere. Besides, she may have unwittingly made herself the new darling of the Republican Party — look out, Meghan McCain, you've got competition!